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Apple has a decade-long lead in wearables

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Re: Apple has a decade-long lead in wearables

#131

Post by anoncake »

908B64B197 wrote: post #94
jiggawatts wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of the Apple Watch health features are blocked in Australia because they were literally too lazy to submit the paperwork to the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA)! All a competitor has to do is submit their paperwork and they won't get any competition from Apple. Easy!

> Most of the Apple Watch health features are blocked in Australia because they were literally too lazy to submit the paperwork to the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA)! Why duplicate all the work done by the FDA? Just use their certificate. Save the taxpayer some money.

Because the FDA only certifies that a device meets American laws?

Re: Apple has a decade-long lead in wearables

#132

Post by dijit »

stephc_int13 wrote: post #129

I strongly disagree. Apple is selling a ton of watches because the brand is currently so strong that it's a no brainer for most people. Also, the product is actually not bad. But, I don't find it attractive, I think the rectangular design was an early mistake that will hinder their design for a long time. The software look good mostly because Google did a really poor job when porting Android to this form factor. This…

I disagree with your disagreement.

Though I also disagree with the article itself, but for one particular reason: I don't think it'll be nearly 10 years to catch up.

I was skittish on the idea of a watch I have to charge (nearly) every day, but it really has improved my life, in fact it's _nearly_ to the point where I don't need a phone.. since I can pay, take calls, respond to messages, play music (though, not browse the web or take photos) without having my phone anywhere near me.. I've trialled entire days with no phone and it's worked pretty well honestly.

There's nothing coming close to this anywhere else.

But, I think people catch up easier than they lead.

A decade lead is absolutely unthinkable- if google/samsung wants to do wearables seriously I think it'll be 2 years at most -- especially as they're almost certainly working on it already, and they can use the product that's already on the market as a meter to measure against for anything they're building.

Re: Apple has a decade-long lead in wearables

#133

Post by defaultname »

krrrh wrote: post #38

I think people underestimate how big of a factor weight is going to be when it comes to face wearables. Apple’s lead in terms of performance/watt is so massive at this point, they’re going to have a few years where no other AR solution can even compete.

I work in the AR space and it is incredible how much Apple is preparing their entire platform for a massive push into AR. For years they have been laying a very robust groundwork with their APIs (ARKit, RealityKit, SceneKit), the inclusion of LIDAR on their iPhone 12 Pro / iPad Pro, and likely the entire iPhone 13 line. These are all things that are effectively gimmicky and seem like failures with little uptake, but all of it is just prepping for the inevitable headset in the very near future.

They are going to absolutely dominate the market so completely.

Re: Apple has a decade-long lead in wearables

#134

Post by snowwrestler »

gnu8 wrote: post #124

The article seems to be saying that Apple has a decade-long lead in wearables over a list of companies that don't even make wearables. That is a clever trick for giving the article a bold title, but the result is a fairly uninteresting and uninformative Apple jerk-off piece. It is akin to saying "Quaker Oats has a 150-year lead in edibles" where Apple doesn't even make food.

So who are the most capable competitors to Apple in wearables?

Among my friends and colleagues, those who don’t buy Apple Watch often buy Garmin watches instead. In the area of fitness tracking watches, Garmin seems to be serious competition. It’s missing the full app ecosystem of Apple Watch but I think you can send messages and email to some Garmin watches over 4G, for example.

Re: Apple has a decade-long lead in wearables

#135

Post by hinkley »

dijit wrote: post #132
stephc_int13 wrote: post #129

I strongly disagree. Apple is selling a ton of watches because the brand is currently so strong that it's a no brainer for most people. Also, the product is actually not bad. But, I don't find it attractive, I think the rectangular design was an early mistake that will hinder their design for a long time. The software look good mostly because Google did a really poor job when porting Android to this form factor. This…

I disagree with your disagreement. Though I also disagree with the article itself, but for one particular reason: I don't think it'll be nearly 10 years to catch up. I was skittish on the idea of a watch I have to charge (nearly) every day, but it really has improved my life, in fact it's _nearly_ to the point where I don't need a phone.. since I can pay, take calls, respond to messages, play music (though, not brows…

Most days I can put it on the charger when I get in the shower, and put it back on when I grab my keys and wallet. It’s not like you have to charge it over night. Half hour will last you quite a while.

Re: Apple has a decade-long lead in wearables

#136

Post by snowwrestler »

amelius wrote: post #121
sQL_inject wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm have to sort of disagree, not a decade but easily half a decade lead. Source: I worked in this space years ago with what was, at the time, the leader in the space, and remember how many of my coworkers laughed at the Apple Watch unveil. Now Apple is the one laughing with a girthy, multibillion dollar schadenfreude. Apple has leads in silicon and cross-platform integration which is inarguably led to a better user…

> Apple's weakness is now their precarious position in bed with China, which will take decades to undo. But this holds for the entire world economy.

Kind of, but among the largest tech companies, Apple uniquely runs most of its revenue through the hardware category, and gets a lot of revenue from China.

Google (Alphabet), Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook all use hardware from China, but most of their revenue comes through software interactions. Google does not officially even operate in China. Amazon has a limited corporate footprint in China.

I think it’s reasonable to say that Apple has higher risk related to China than many of its competitors.

Re: Apple has a decade-long lead in wearables

#137

Post by dhosek »

alpaca128 wrote: post #122
sQL_inject wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm have to sort of disagree, not a decade but easily half a decade lead. Source: I worked in this space years ago with what was, at the time, the leader in the space, and remember how many of my coworkers laughed at the Apple Watch unveil. Now Apple is the one laughing with a girthy, multibillion dollar schadenfreude. Apple has leads in silicon and cross-platform integration which is inarguably led to a better user…

> Apple has (last I checked) the highest revenue/sq. foot retail space in the world Does this also correctly count the area of all Apple partner stores? In some countries they sell Apple devices but don't operate a single store themselves.

The revenue/sq foot ratio is based on the sales from those square feet, not the total revenue. They measure sales at each individual location for location revenues/sq foot and all locations for overall. Revenue from partner sales, internet orders, etc. are not counted in that (although they might include deliver to store website orders, I don't know). It doesn't hurt that they're selling products with a high price-volume ratio.

Re: Apple has a decade-long lead in wearables

#138

Post by dhosek »

solarkraft wrote: post #114
least wrote: post #17

I'm pretty skeptical that Apple has a decade-long lead on any of the other big players in the market. Any innovations that one company can make can be more quickly adopted than new innovations occur and there's nothing as far as software goes that Apple is uniquely positioned to create. The other factors mentioned such as silicon tech being years ahead of the competition is one that is hardly a factor for the smart w…

> On a tangential note, I'd like to take a moment to recognize the amount of work that Apple has put into its accessibility features. Assistive Touch on the apple watch will probably serve a remarkably small portion of the user base On a similar note I’d like to point out that accessibility affects everyone. You don’t need to be disabled to enjoy accessibility. My eyes are fine, (I think), but I find the iPhone X’s l…

When I showed the designers at a company I worked at a few years ago how to enable screen zoom, they found it an imminently useful tool. Once enabled, ctrl-scroll zooms in/out on the display which is very useful for being able to check pixel-level details on, say, an HTML render.

Re: Apple has a decade-long lead in wearables

#139

Post by stingrae »

mmmmmbop wrote: post #115
orev wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m glad you highlighted the materials/manufacturing component, which I think is frequently overlooked by tech people (who mostly focus on the chips and software). Apple’s ability to build millions of devices with such precision and tight tolerances is really a huge accomplishment.

Just to clarify, Apple doesn't actually build any devices. They are built by Foxconn, mainly. It's still very impressing, of course.

To be clear. Apple provides the designs, the build procedures, fixtures, and test stations. Foxconn provides the facilities and workers.

Re: Apple has a decade-long lead in wearables

#140

Post by hellbannedguy »

unparagoned wrote: post #50
least wrote: post #17

I'm pretty skeptical that Apple has a decade-long lead on any of the other big players in the market. Any innovations that one company can make can be more quickly adopted than new innovations occur and there's nothing as far as software goes that Apple is uniquely positioned to create. The other factors mentioned such as silicon tech being years ahead of the competition is one that is hardly a factor for the smart w…

I've got a Samsung watch and the the heart rate monitor has serious reliability issues. Apples is not only suppose the be better but you got blood pressure and o2 monitoring. I'm definitely going to switch over in the future

It gets weird as you age.

When I was younger, I wanted my vitals. I bought numerous BP machines. I even bought glucose meters. I wanted to know what my body was doing.

I wanted to know because I was young, and those numbers were always fine.

Now--I just don't want to know. You can call it denial, or life is too short to measure health stats all the time, especially on my wrist.

I'm also a Certified Hypochondriac. I've been one for ever. I don't anything on my wrist reminding me of my eventual death of cancer, or a heart attack.

Now--I get a physical every three to four years.

I don't want to know what my aging body is doing daily.

If I had diabetes though, the upcoming glucose monitor would be a no brainer. This will be huge.

I'm a Watchmaker, so my tastes might not be Apple's demographics? My perfect watch is something I can repair, and just tells time, and looks good on my wrist.

I will admit Apple square watches have grown on me. I didn't like them when introduced, but now they look fine.

Would I trade my '62 IWC with the 362 movement for any Apple watch; hell no.

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