I forget how, but I eventually found a way to add her on MSN messenger, where we spent many evenings and weekends chatting. This allowed me to get over my initial shyness; we eventually dated for about a year. She was my first girlfriend, and I gained a lot in self confidence and social skills through this experience.

I don't lock myself in the bathroom when I mess up at my job these days.

I think your message is either a silly straw man, or that you really don't get teenagers.

On the other hand, there have always been non-verbal ways to communicate. Note-passing was common when I was in school. Presumably the boy with the crush on the girl who is sending the texts on his watch is trying to create an "IRL" relationship with her.

Teenagers already do everything they can to moderate this. And plenty of people actually fail to learn to deal with rejection. Providing another mechanism that makes the learning curve smoother is more likely to help than to exacerbate the problem.

  It feels like humans keep building more and more barriers to ACTUAL communication.

"Technology is anything that wasn’t around when you were born." - Alan Kay

I'm not sure what you mean here. Email, text messages, watch taps, Facebook likes, Twitter favourites, etc. are all forms of communication. Sure, they aren't face-to-face verbal communication. But that doesn't meant that when I'm having a Skype chat with my deaf grandfather in New Zealand 20 000 km away I'm not communicating. You seem to be making the mistake of privileging your preferred method of commuication over all others, and deciding that none of the other ways of iteracting are ACTUAL communication. This just isn't true.

However, I'm sure in the future we'll have people complaining that direct mind-communication via neural stimulation implant isn't ACTUAL communication, not like Apple Watch taps or instant messaging ;)

Yes the quality of communication is far lower, however if he wouldn't have otherwise approached her in person, then isn't this better than not having it?

> Also, though it sounds trivial, I enjoy the perfect 60 FPS smoothness of Apple Watch’s second hand — a smoothness no mechanical watch could ever match.

Based on a culmination of reviews and early preview articles I have read, videos and basically everything I have read about the Apple Watch this statement seems kind of ironic. The second hand might be smooth, but the very real performance issues people have encountered with the watch mean the rest of the Apple Watch experience is anything but smooth. What's the point of a smooth second hand if the rest of the experience is somewhat crippled and unusable?

I like the look of the Apple Watch and the very idea of it, but to an extent. It feels as though articles like Gruber's here are talking with reckless abandon, from the perspective that existing solutions aren't out there. From a user interface perspective the Pebble watch and Moto 360 especially are beautiful, well-crafted and smooth interfaces. Apple are not entering new territory nor are they introducing any ideas or improvements into the space (besides the physical appearance).

Lets not pretend that there aren't as equally good, if not, better smart watches out there. They might not have had the same amount of design and research put into them, but I think there is such a thing as over-engineering something. I am pretty happy with my Pebble watch, the battery life is great and so too, is the battery life.

I am by no means an expert, but I like nice watches and to me the Apple Watch will never match the build quality, feel and longevity of a nice traditional mechanical watch even if it is only from a battery life perspective.

The internet, a crappy eMachines desktop, and AIM made this possible. Technically, I didn't "need" my own computer at the time, but it made interactions like this possible. Maybe the Apple Watch will create new interactions that could spark something great between people.

Shrug

I couldn't help but laugh at this part:

> Also, though it sounds trivial, I enjoy the perfect 60 FPS smoothness of Apple Watch’s second hand — a smoothness no mechanical watch could ever match.

Isn't a mechanical watch hand ∞ FPS by definition? Real life has got to be at least better than 144hz :)

Edit: for the record I love both of them after being initially dubious about the usefulness of such a device.

The digital crown looks like one such mistake. Swipe-to-scroll is so natural, particularly at this point, that moving back to an indirect method of scrolling seems just wrong. And doing so on a device that's already touch, and already using swipe-to-scroll, feels twice and wrong and unnecessarily confusing.

I understand the intent and the goal, but the inconsistent use of the crown -- if it's so great, why can I still swipe to scroll at all? -- is a tell. It would have been better to simply detect swipe-to-scroll along the right edge of the bezel (if not along the right side of the frame itself) to effect "scrolling without obscuring".

Four-ways-to-click (crown-click vs tap vs force tap vs tap-and-hold) is an eyebrow-raise-er all its own.

Also: displays should be wider. At fifty- to one-hundred-percent wider the display would be far better for notifications and would make the selection of A/B buttons more clear and precise.

The next time you get a notification on your phone, rest your phone on your wrist, so the notification is displayed roughly where a smartwatch would sit. Ask yourself whether that notification would still "work", if it were crammed into an Apple Watch-sized screen. Some certainly do. More can be made to work alright, if font size were reduced. IME, most simply don't work.

There just isn't enough room to get enough meaningful information onto a screen that size, in a comfortable font size, for me to make good decisions about what can be ignored and what should be addressed.

You can mitigate this problem if you can ignore all messages of a given type (e.g. don't even bother getting email alerts on your wrist). But even if you could do this, it would be better if you didn't have to. A screen that enables better decisions would make for a more useful object.

That's really the one of the biggest problems I can imagine. Pity that the "show the time at least somehow" wasn't engineered as a special feature, something like "e-ink for somehow time" and the OLED (if that's what they're using) for the full color. I know that nobody made something exactly like that, but I've read that a hybrid e-ink/LCD exists (1). Maybe it wouldn't look so pretty at the moment, but that's why the "magic" is needed, I don't think anybody designed any such hybrid specially for a smart watch. That e-ink or any other magic wouldn't have to be able to display everything, just the time. Even the big unchangeable segments like on old passive LCD watches would be (maybe?) enough.

1) And Apple even has some patents, discovered as early as 2011! http://www.wired.com/2011/04/apple-patent-hybrid-display/ Hmm.

I rather scroll using the edge of the screen, I hate reading on my phone and interrupting with my finger to scroll, that's why I swipe at the very edge of the screen, almost scrolling with the metal.

When watches get thinner, and they will, the crown will give place to the scrolling edge, longer area, more ergonomic.

And I hope nobody patents it.

I wonder if that small postage stamp portal to your wife's wrist will be the notable precursor to larger contact features and eventually touch-featured clothing or (ooooer) playsuits?

He has a fairly flowery and gushing writing style with Apple topics, but it's obvious he thinks everything through and looks for a deeper angle.

I wonder if many people will buy a pair of these watches as something to experience with their partner? Touch or smooth/personal gestures are certainly a bit more personal and emotive than blue and green text bubbles.

I always imagined the primary interface for shortcuts would be gestures such as waving away your arm to dismiss a message or flicking the wrist multiple times (if you try it right now, you can easily flick your wrist 3-4 times per second). It would make interaction that much easier and wrist flicking could even become a thing. One flick for health, two for time, etc. depending on the context.

Another thing that could be mildly annoying for a lot of people is that it can only ever be operated by engaging both hands. Phone by contrast can easily be operated with one hand using the thumb.

EDIT: If the watch has enough sensors, I am sure it could detect users not only flicking the wrist via rotation but also bending your hand down/up (which tends to pull/push the tendons on your wrist) though the watch would need to be worn snugly.

...if you return your watch to a charging station daily.

He goes on:

That said, compared to a traditional watch, daily charging is terrible.

Before entering into the smartphone market, I charged my cellphone less than 100 times per year. Now, I have to charge my smartphone at least once a day. It's a tax on my lifestyle that I don't mind paying.

I hated the daily charging of my smartphone at first. Now, I plan my day and commutes with respect to a battery to ensure I have enough charge for me to interweave the technology in my pocket with my experiencing of the analog world.

I suspect I and others will make the same allowance for a smart watch and the Apple Watch will be a very profitable device for Apple.

Honestly, I think it's impossible for anyone above ~25 to imagine what it's like to be 16 in school today.

Context and social dynamics have changed too much for anyone that old (and probably anyone at all) to be insightful about the behaviour of groups of teenagers using a yet unreleased product.

Who the hell think that a watch that can't even function a day is an acceptable product? This just blows my mind. And yet, I'm pretty sure they are going to sell millions of them. I wouldn't want one if it was free.

This is why I value Gruber's reviews. He's unabashedly pro-Apple, but he's also critical and observant.

> You simply hold the connector near the back of the watch, where magnets cause it to snap into place automatically.

I would instantly buy a phone without a traditional connector port for headphone and USB - just metal pads flush with the surface (maybe laid in rubber to be watertight) and kept aligned by magnets.

Seriously, the amount of devices failed due to either bent (e.g. during gaming) or rusted/dust-damaged Micro USB connectors (and don't forget the headphone connectors, where even the tiniest damage can be heard) is ridiculous.

The only real option is to buy one of CATs smartphones or (iirc) one of the Galaxy series with protectors over the connectors - but again, the protectors start to annoy after a while. Too bad Apple holds a patent over MagSafe - and then doesn't even employ it in their phones!

A recurring event in the advance of technology. I saw it hit hard when Smith Corona's computer-y typewriters couldn't keep up with gadget-y word processing software, and the typewriter died. Likewise when computer-y photography (lots of image processing introduced into developing photos) lost favor with consumers vs gadget-y digital cameras.

"the established market — watches — is not despised. They not only don’t suck, they are beloved. And the best and most-beloved watches aren’t even electronic. They’re purely mechanical — all gadget, no computer."

Yet...all they do is tell time. Elegantly, yes, or cheaply, if you like...but time and little else. Attempts to add computer-y function failed for a decade, succumbing to horrible interfaces and anemic UIs; the author completely overlooks the computer-y phases which watches have gone thru (and failed miserably). That a $5 POS watch tells time more accurately, and with less maintenance, than my elegant $500 Movado or the improbable $500,000 watches seen on http://uncrate.com et al, was setting off warnings that the market was ripe for...something.

I think he's the only one I've ever heard of who gets paid so much to write blog articles.

In this day and age, with a phone on you, and everyone else, you can always get the time. A watch is a relic of the past. It's Tradition. It's ornamental. It's redundant.

With tens of thousands of brilliant people working day and night to build amazing third party apps, the smart watches can actually do things. A regular watch can't do shit. It's not a tool, it's not a workhorse. People that are satisfied with their traditional watches are kidding themselves, as much if not more than the people who will happily buy an Apple watch and tout it's features.

I am glad CDs are still around to stop this MP3 slime from washing away all the uncompressed audio!

I stopped wearing watches but have thought about a Fitbit watch and why not have that be an Apple watch maybe.

However, I keep my phone in my pocket. Wearing a watch that millions of other people may have feels a bit weird to me. It's like taking that membership of the iPhone "club" and turning it into an external badge signifying membership.

Watches become part of your visual identity, and I'm not sure that I want something that ubiquitous as part of mine.

I say this as someone who generally admires John Gruber's ability to sell me on 1000-2000 word blog posts on Apple minutia purely on the strength and clarity of his writing. This post was painful.

Which is to say, I think Gruber's on to something, but I think he's actually understating it with the way he presented it.

[1]It could also be eye-roll-worthy bourgeois douchebaggery depending on your socio-economic perspective.

And you, and your crush, each have both an iPhone, and an Apple Watch, both charged, both connected to the internet.

> You’re in school. You’re sitting in class.

Do, or will, many high schools actually allow students to use smartwatches while in class?

> You have a crush on another student — you’ve fallen hard. ... You’re afraid to just come right out and ask, verbally — afraid of the crushing weight of rejection.

But I assume you already have this crush's phone number or information in your contacts to send them a heartbeat or drawing?

Nothing can be infinity FPS because it would be limited by the frequency of the light that we use to see the watch hand. In the case of the visual spectrum, it caps out around 668 THz with blue light (red light is lowest at 400 THz). This would make it "only" ~4.7E12 times better than 144 Hz ;-).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZsBTXgksr4s

I found this more informative because he used it a bit more like I expected someone to.

You guys are so silly sometimes.

That's not the point of the digital crown. It's to free your "swipe to scroll" gesture which blocks a screen of that size, to a physical input. Apple has been very clear on it's existence, and it's taking a classic component of a watch and propelling it into the modern era.

Might want to rethink that first.

Regardless, I'm glad there is a way to scroll without covering the screen and adding more skin oil to it.

I would like to see these devices progress to more of a band form factor with a wider and curved display to fit the contour of our wrist.

I can only imagine they are marketing first to the people who want something new, but don't want it to look like new technology.

It's probably also important as a point of differentiation that they keep it looking very different to a phone screen.

I'm still skeptical, the smartphone provided a tremendous advantage, namely that you had the internet with you, always. That made it easy to get over the tradeoffs. I'm still unconvinced that the tradeoffs a smart watch has will be compensated.

One exception to this is people who just never take their watch off. I did this for a couple of years. Having to charge it every night would have been a problem then. I don't know that people do this in large enough numbers to be significant though.

You'll have your answer in a few days. You'll even be able to tell who these people are by looking at their wrists.

He said, the Apple Watch is as much a "watch" as the iPhone is a "phone".

I think the idea is that we are thinking about it all wrong. The "phone" functionality of an iPhone is just an app and is in fact one of the least used apps on the device.

The same line of thinking will probably start to explain the Apple Watch. It's actually a wearable computer with an app that tells the time.

We heard the same arguments about cell phones. Who would want a smartphone that would discharge in less than a day, when you could get a dumb phone that would hang on for days? or a wired phone that didn't have power problems (even when the power went out)? Then people discovered how darned useful that power-sucking capability was, and have adapted to charging daily.

I do wonder when smart watches will include self-charging "eco drive", tapping wrist motion for energy.

Just my personal anecdote. Those who aren't rushed out the door in the morning would probably have a different experience!

Also, one reason I am happy with the Pebble's 4 - 5 day battery life is because I actually like wearing it to bed because of it's vibrating alarm feature which allows me to be woken up without disturbing my partner.

No idea how the Apple one works, but the Moto guys figured it out pretty quickly. Just use the Qi standard, ship a cradle, or let people use their own Qi pads. I imagine Apple's "not invented here" mentality is going to make this a worse experience. It doesn't seem to be using Qi. Its proprietary. That's a mistake.

Tellingly I barely use my phone as a phone. I suspect we will see a similar pattern develop with smartwatches, where telling the time will be only a single bullet point far down a much longer list of features.

I think he's an excellent writer but let's be honest, he doesn't really "review" Apple products any more than their marketing department. Apple could re-introduce the Newton and Gruber would be writing about it's "elegant simplicity" and "thoughtful processing".

I'm sure the Apple Watch is neat tech, but from what I've gathered, it's suffering from "version one syndrome" a little more than most of their product launches. That said, it will probably be a wild success anyway if only because it's an even more conspicuous consumption signal than the iPhone...