There is now work underway to make smart watches both at
Apple and other manufacturers using Android. In fact, many of them are already
on the market. Chances are you don’t own one. They have not sold particularly
well even though they are the size of a regular watch and can do additional
tasks. People have not found them useful enough, but now a new generation of
more advanced ones is coming along, and the makers are optimistic that this one
will be a hit. Some securities analysts agree, and have estimated Apple Watch
sales to be as much as 30 million units in the first year.
Why are the new ones different? Put simply, it is the
software you can buy (the apps) that make the difference. They will be giving
much more timely and relevant messages to you than those that earlier smart
watches had, and will significantly increase the ways such watches can be used.
Earlier smart phones were mostly for people concerned with fitness and health
who need a convenient way of recording data about themselves (they will click
the phone as soon as they wake up…). The new ones can also be used for
shopping, social network sites, orientation and sight finding in an unfamiliar place,
and even making payments.
A key feature of this application development, and the
reason Apple is seen as the leader even before the launch, is that alliances of
firms working closely together is needed for this launch to go well. A normal
launch of a smartphone will involve sharing knowledge of the programming
language and hardware so that the apps can run correctly, and is a familiar
task that does not require alliances. The Apple Phone and similar devices have
a range of new functions related to tactile feel (it can give information
through vibration functions) that need to be understood in order to fully use
them, and this requires close collaboration.
It also has functions related to location monitoring that go
far beyond the GPS functions of existing smartphones. You may have thought your
phone was accurate in locating you within a 2-5 meters – in fact, you may have
thought it could locate you within one meter, but that apparent accuracy is
just a guess based on the map information it has. This is nothing compared to
what a smart watch can do when helped by locator systems that are or will be
installed in buildings – the accuracy will be within a meter. And, it can
follow your motion so that a locator system will know exactly how you walked
around in a store. If you pay with the phone also, it can connect the pay
information with the walking information to find out what you looked at but did
not buy.
Impressive? Yes. Somewhat worrying? Well, I would certainly
start thinking about when I let the phone give away my location information. Or
maybe not buy one at all. I am impressed on behalf of what firm alliances can do, but I admit my feelings are mixed. This information collection is set up to be useful
for the user of the smartphone and the owner of the locator system (usually a
store, but not necessarily). Remarkably, it can do surveillance on people more accurately
than anything a government has been able to build.
Mims, Christopher. 2015. Slick, Useful Apps Put the Wow in Apple Watch. Wall Street Journal, January 11 2015.
