(Pebble founder) Happy to answer any questions you have!
what safety measures does this have to avoid some incident (held down button, software bug, etc) draining the entire battery within a few hours, thus bricking the device?
Pebble Index 01 – External memory for your brain
401–410 of 615 posts
Re: Pebble Index 01 – External memory for your brain
#402This is 80% of the reason I have an apple watch. I whisper to it for reminders, timers, calendar stuff all day.
Re: Pebble Index 01 – External memory for your brain
#403Earlier quoted context omitted.
I wouldn't think about the total recording time so much as the actual usage you'll get out of it. If based on typical usage, you could get even eighteen months out of it, then you're looking at around $5/month for a device to serve this purpose for you. Is that worth it to you? Perhaps not. But plenty of us pay similar amounts of money for software subscriptions related to productivity, so it's not especially outland…
I sometimes speak into my voice recorder when I’m out for a walk and have a thought. Those voice notes can be many minutes long, and full of repetition and silence. When no one’s looking obviously. Not sure how that would work with the ring. Either lots of small similar notes. Or a dead battery.
I don't think that's the use case they're aiming for. If you want to have a meandering voice recording that lasts minutes, the friction to pull out your phone is less of an issue while you're out walking your dog.
But when you're having a conversation with someone and they ask you to pick up milk from the store later, or you're running to the bus and want to just jot down an idea you had briefly, and other moments where the friction is higher...then this seems like the solution.
Re: Pebble Index 01 – External memory for your brain
#404Earlier quoted context omitted.
> "Years of average use" is great until you realize that it actually means "Roughly 12 to 15 hours of recording". Is that based on anything, or is that just a guess? Anyway, 12 hours' worth of 30 second recordings is a total of 1440 recordings. I guess three a day for a year does seem a little low? > Just hate Apple and love e-waste rings? Enlighten me. What e-waste? You send it in for recycling; they might just repl…
That's not what recycling is. If you get it back it's recruitment.
Sorry I meant refurbishment. Not recruitment. DYAC
Re: Pebble Index 01 – External memory for your brain
#405> How long does the battery last? > Roughly 12 to 15 hours of recording. On average, I use it 10-20 times per day to record 3-6 second thoughts. That’s up to 2 years of usage. I feel like I’m usually good about being able to imagine a market for different devices even when I’m not the target audience, but I’m having a hard time with this one. Having 20 different 3-second thoughts transcribed to notes that I have to p…
The idea is immediately interesting to me because I often am in the car and want to remind myself to look something up and forget when off the road. I do not have a car with CarPlay. This would suffice beautifully.
...But that battery life absolutely kills it for me. I'd feel like each time I recorded something I was burning lifetime off my device. (Technically also true of rechargeable battery lifetimes, but it's abstract enough and minimal enough I don't think about it.)
Re: Pebble Index 01 – External memory for your brain
#406Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't understand why people who are probably OK with ordering Doordash once in a while are up in arms about a disposable device that weighs a couple of grams, lasts for years, and is recycled. You can easily spend more on a single Doordash meal for two people and I guarantee a few Doordash meals have more impact on the environment than this minuscule device ever could.
I doubt it's about the environmental impact. I agree that the environmental impact probably isn't that bad. My biggest concern is that it's $75 USD (plus shipping, presumably), and if the company ever goes under it's now worthless because I can't get a new one. That said, if I assume that the company will last long enough, I think $75 USD is worth it even if I only get to use it for 4 years. Although if I end up buil…
On a monthly basis the cost is quite reasonable IMO. It will continue to work if the company goes out of business. Their software is open source. So you can count on using it as long as the battery lasts.
Re: Pebble Index 01 – External memory for your brain
#407No way this made it out of internal vetting without a recharchable battery.
Man, if I even suggested this over lunch with my old Sparkfun colleagues, I would have been shot down before I finished chewing my bite of open-faced turkey sandwich.
Re: Pebble Index 01 – External memory for your brain
#408Instead of a stand-alone piece of e-waste, how about this: a device with the same format (a ring and an button) but the only thing it does is trigger the pebble watch to start recording a message. This way the microphone isn't needed, just the radio (and much weaker radio at that), and the battery will last exponentially longer. Then just expose the charging terminals so that we can at least hack the device with cust…
It's open source and the button is customizable. So it's very likely that could be achieved with the product as-is.
Re: Pebble Index 01 – External memory for your brain
#409Earlier quoted context omitted.
How will a single press provide that much energy?
Piezo
It's a single press, which has to power the microphone for several seconds, and wireless connection to communicate with the sync device, even later if it isn't immediately available. In what way would piezo generate that much energy?
Re: Pebble Index 01 – External memory for your brain
#410Earlier quoted context omitted.
Might as well bundle the ring with the watch at that point, and increase the price accordingly, as it's then become an accessory particular to the pebble watch. And including a charging circuit means more complexity and bulk, also leading to an increase in price. And cost is a factor they're optimizing for.
That's my point exactly. This should have been a pebble accessory, not a standalone device that sends voice notes to your phone. If this device actually has a 2 year battery, if you'd remove the microphone and turn it into a "smart button" to trigger a watch action, the battery should easily last 4+ years.
Yet a design goal is for it to also work standalone, so users who don't have/want a pebble watch can use it with their phone, something that essentially everyone has.