Wow, @MagneticNorth, we've come a long way since then, huh?! Do you still have the Motorola phone, pictured, or is that photo courtesy of Google Images or a similar search? Pretty cool; thanks for taking the time to dig up a picture! I agree with your GUI concerns. I'm no engineer, sadly, but I'm having a tough time figuring out how designers will create a screen or images that are easily visible while simultaneously designing hardware that's small (and attractive) enough to be worn as a wristwatch. Early models aren't as ambitious in their capabilities. I'm not a Debbie Downer! I think it can be done. I'm just having a really tough time visualizing it. With so many brilliant minds attacking this issue, though, I'm sure we'll see a smart wristwatch that meets all these criteria, and more, before too long.
@Alison - The first mobile phone my family owned was a Motorola MicroTAC. The display only had 2 lines of text.
When I later owned a Nokia 3210, which had 4 lines of display, I realized that many of the menu items that the 3210 had were also in the MicroTAC. But I never saw them in the MicroTAC. That's because the sensation of viewing menus couldn't be done so well in 2 lines, really. I think Nokia became so successful with its 5110 and 3210 simply because they didn't scrimp on the display size.
That's my primary fear for the smartwatch. GUI can easily suffer with such a small display, and GUI tends to be X factor these days.
Yes, so far most of the criticism I've read has focused on the input. But like you, @magneticnorth, I think it should pinpoint the display and the size of the font you can expect from a screen that's only 2-3 inches. You're not going to want to display it on a wall, for example, so how are people expected to read this small type? If you increase the size, you're only going to see a few words at a time. If it's all done through voice, then that means folk are further connected via headphones to a device. Whereas I was an immediate fan of tablets, I also am less intrigued by smart watches -- at least for myself. I can see vertical applications but can't envision more widespread, mainstream adoption, at least right now, once you get beyond the people who buy tech because they love tech for its own sake.
Indeed, that was one of the main points of Michael's blog: That the network will be overwhelmed, and so will security, if many employees are accessing the network via smartphones and smart watches. Not sure what pundits predict the network-traffic uptick will be, but it has to be sizable in time.
Indeed, it seems that IT devices will -come strapped to our wrists. Because of that, now it is more important than ever to understand mobile software vulnerabilities, to focus on remediating vulnerable software on mobile platforms and to give teams the tools to assess and mitigate application risk, and ultimately fix bad mobile code. These are all possible with mobile solutions provided by Security Innovation. For more details, I recommend reading further here: https://www.securityinnovation.com/products/mobile-solutions/
I've seen Android-powered wristwatches around and haven't found them practical. There were some that were quite cheap, but even for a low price, they seemed like a waste of money. I think the form factor limits the display far too much for the device to be user-friendly. I'd be fine if it were the CPU or remote to a display similar to that of Project Glass, but alone, I doubt if it'll be successful.
Until and unless smartwatches can do everything smartphones can do, I don't particularly see smartwatches becoming the standard. Assuming they standardly have voice call functions, they may catch on among tablet users (who are carrying around basically a large smartphone that can't make phone calls anyway), but the smartphone right now seems to be the most functionally "aggregated" portable device.
These do look cool but I wonder how far they will go. I myself had stopped wearing a watch simply because time was all around me and I didn't need to look at my wrist anymore. I know these devices are not clocks and I'm sure they have a market, but is it a huge market?
The ThinkerNet does not reflect the views of TechWeb. The ThinkerNet is an informal means of communication to members and visitors of the Internet Evolution site. Individual authors are chosen by Internet Evolution to blog. Neither Internet Evolution nor TechWeb assume responsibility for comments, claims, or opinions made by authors and ThinkerNet bloggers. They are no substitute for your own research and should not be relied upon for trading or any other purpose.
Midsize businesses rarely achieve the same standards of security in their own datacenters as professional providers that specialize in delivering these services to organizations.
It was about 10 years ago when a new generation of software-as-a-service (SaaS) alternatives started to gain acceptance and adoption among organizations of all sizes. And it has only been about five years since Amazon Web Services captured the marketplace's attention with Amazon EC2 and Amazon S3, which opened the door to a vast array of infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) offerings. Now, the third piece of the cloud computing puzzle is beginning to win over organizations seeking to build their own apps: platform-as-a-service (PaaS).
Energy consumption is a primary contributor to global warming. At the end of 2012, 40 percent of energy consumption in the US came from commercial and residential buildings.
Big-data and analytics tools enable marketers to understand customers as individuals, identifying unmet needs and addressing each customer as a "segment of one," says John Kennedy, VP corporate marketing, IBM.
New York's Metropolitan Transit Authority is conducting a pilot test of digital kiosks to guide subway users to where they want to go more efficiently and at lower cost.
The whole Amazon.reader debate is a double-stupid. It's stupid to think that there's any e-book buyer who doesn't know Amazon's URL, and it was stupider to let ICANN launch the whole free-form TLD initiative to start with.
While NFC's original goal was to enhance mobile commerce applications, it is finding its way into a number of other uses, which is creating both opportunity as well as challenges for IT departments.
Enterprises would like to move to cloud computing but are hesitant because they are concerned about providers’ ability to secure company data. Here are some tips that help to ensure that if breaches occur, the business is not left holding the bag.
Edmunds separates customers into segments based on the info it collects on its site and from partners, and uses that to push out custom content, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
The IBM Smarter Commerce Global Summit in Monaco kicked into high gear today, and we've already begun to see news emerging from that lovely city-state by the sea.
Expert Integrated Systems: Changing the Experience & Economics of IT In this e-book, we take an in-depth look at these expert integrated systems -- what they are, how they work, and how they have the potential to help CIOs achieve dramatic savings while restoring IT's role as business innovator. READ THIS eBOOK
your weekly update of news, analysis, and
opinion from Internet Evolution - FREE! REGISTER HERE
Wanted! Site Moderators Internet Evolution is looking for a handful of readers to help moderate the message boards on our site – as well as engaging in high-IQ conversation with the industry mavens on our thinkerNet blogosphere. The job comes with various perks, bags of kudos, and GIANT bragging rights. Interested?
To save this item to your list of favorite Internet Evolution content so you can find it later in your Profile page, click the "Save It" button next to the item.
