(The buttons, however, are atrocious - mushy, hard to press, and literally falling apart. I'll probably do the 3D-printed button mod but to advertise this watch as IPX8 water resistant is ludicrous. The first button press out of the box put a crack in the silicone.)
But kudos to Eric and Claudio, they're shipping me a replacement (in white, which, as I understand it and as they said in their email, should be less susceptible to the issue, something about the white rubber versus black makes it less problematic). My only frustration was how quickly it failed, since I know it's a new-old-stock case.
Highly looking forward to the Time 2. I only stopped using my Pebble Time Steel when the battery life degraded to ~3 days (after about 6 years), used a Fossil Hybrid for a few years, now a Pixel watch. Measuring battery life in weeks will be a breath of fresh air :)