With WWDC around the corner and a number of unrefreshed products, speculation on Apple’s next move is intensifying. Here’s MacRumors’ take on the latest on Apple Watch:
Few details are known about the Apple Watch 2 beyond a June 2015 report that said it will feature a FaceTime video camera and expanded Wi-Fi capabilities, while new bands and finishes are always a possibility. Kuo believes the Apple Watch 2 will feature mostly internal improvements, and possibly minor form factor changes, with a more complete redesign of the device not arriving until 2017.
I do kind of want a FaceTime camera on my wrist because it would be so futuristic, but I do question the utility. Namely, how long can I hold my wrist up to have a face-to-face discussion with someone? What will the latency between my wrist and my phone be? How much battery would I have if it connected directly to WiFi? These aren’t insurmountable, but I take them to be very hard problems for the Apple Watch to overcome.
This comes at a tough time for Apple Watch, because many articles recently have questioned it’s potential and utility. Here’s an example from Re/code:
More than half of those surveyed by the advertising technology company Fluent said they considered the Apple Watch a flop.
That sentiment — expressed by the majority of the 2,578 adults in the U.S. who responded last week to an online survey — reflects how the device is perceived by the tech press and industry insiders, many of whom have been pessimistic about the Apple Watch from the start. Asked whether they considered the Watch a successful product for Apple, 53 percent responded “no.”
While I think the Watch isn’t a breakout new category in the way the iPhone was, I disagree that its future is as dim as those 53 percent believe. In particular, notification are great on the watch, timing functions (including the calendar) are indispensable, and weather is on the watch his highly convenient. I think what we’ll see at WWDC for the Apple Watch will be a focusing of the product, as at least one of the ways of interacting with the Watch is essentially useless: the apps. The watch face is where all the utility is, in my opinion, and the glances are great for those secondary functions, to drill down and scroll around for an app is difficult on the tiny screen.