Moto 360 | Hacker News Reader

Moto 360

moto360.motorola.com

669 pointsuptown414 comments

I'm very impressed. When I saw the Google video, I thought the round watch was a photoshopped concept we may see in the future, but it's actually shipping in a few months.

Also, is this the first mass-market device with a round screen? I'd be interested to see how the layouts work from a developer perspective. Whether relative or fixed, desktop, mobile or web, we're all so used to rectangular, grid based layouts.

It's still "simulated" which means Photoshopped / After Effects. I"m actually pretty nervous because there's no "simulated" disclaimer, yet these mock-ups are terribly rough:

- fake / inconsistent lighting accents & bevel

- screens in the photos are pixelated (looks like a screen-res quality source was rotated), yet the 3D model's screen is totally smooth suggesting 400 dpi or better

- clip rotation angles are off

- the cropping is poor, has antialiasing problems

In other words, you can tell by some of the pixels?

An easy way to tell: look at the edges of the text area's white background. See how they're kinda jaggy, almost like steps? That's due to low resolution. Either the device is low res (which most smart phones are) or the source image was.

Now look at the edges of the 3D watch's hands: they're all smooth at every angle. That means either a 3D mock-up or an incredibly high res screen. Yet look at the black watch face in the prior shot: all the hands are jagged.

Well, i imagine radley has seen quite a few shops in his time.

A+, didn't think I'd see this reference on HN :)

and by ...

Did you watch the video? Looks like they have real prototypes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xQ3y902DEQ&noredirect=1#t=6...

"Screen Images Simulated" fine print @ 0:25 (under the scrubber)

I've never seen Android that smooth and I'm an Android UI expert. That's all After Effects.

The LG watch looks more like an iPhone strapped to your wrist than a watch.

http://i.imgur.com/yP1Qpa9.png

I was kind of excited after viewing the Motorola page, but after the videos, I'm disappointed. I don't want to speak to my watch, and I don't care about having yet another app for weather, calendar, etc. The videos just reminded me that I don't care about any of this information, or having it available on my wrist. I'll stick to a traditional watch, I think they're more stylish, and the time is really the only piece of information I need immediate access to on a constant basis. Everything else can be in pocket.

It's no doubt a real watch he's wearing, but I'm pretty sure the screen is fake. No screen that emits photons would appear like that when recorded by a camcorder. The brightness and crispness is visibly wrong. I'm pretty sure it's CG.

He means that it may be a real device prototype, but the video is added in post.

We'll see what the real one ends up like. iPhone screens (and the recent Galaxy S screens) look great in 'simulated' images, and look pretty amazing in real life.

On the other hand, I've seen a Galaxy Gear in person and the screen was not impressive. But I bet the 'simulated images' look pretty good.

I thought this disclaimer was needed only for TV ads.

IMO if you're a responsible marketer, this is needed everywhere.

it's not photoshop at all, device emulator exists and it works good.

> Also, is this the first mass-market device with a round screen?

Motorola has made a phone with a round screen before http://www.gsmarena.com/motorola_aura-2562.php

I mostly remember the v70 http://www.mobilegazette.com/motorola-v70.htm (2002) and was waiting for Motorola to pitch in the watch game.

I used to have a v70. It was one of my favourite phones I've owned.

I was 100% sure that Apple's iWatch would be round. This looks almost exactly like I imagined the iWatch would look, and weirdly it feels like they copied it. (Well, it looks like a normal watch, and that's what I expected from Apple, not from Google/Moto).

Wait what? You're accusing Motorola of copying your imagination of what an unreleased Apple product might look like?

Its serious third order ip theft!

Yes, that's obviously what I said.

Plenty of mass-market devices with round screen. Heres a 3+ year old Garmin watch with touch and pixel-based round screen:

http://www.dcrainmaker.com/images/2011/04/IMG_0486A-720x479....

Based on the size of the bezel couldn't that still be a rectangular lcd?

I tried finding pictures of the internals of that watch, but my google-fu is not strong enough.

Here is a picture of a teardown of a similar watch: http://gadgetnerdly.com/the-garmin-fenix-gets-the-fcc-teardo... , confirms square screen.

I have one (well, two at one point). The LCD is rectangular in a round bezel.

yeah it looks like a rectangular screen

A round screen both worries and excites me. I can't think of a nice way to present a website on a circular screen but it would also bother me to waste all that space putting everything into a box.

Do you really think browsing the web will be an important use-case for a watch?

No, but I also didn't think people were going to be crazy about browsing the web on a small touch screen. It's fun to think about at the very least.

This is exactly what's wrong with the idea of smartwatches today. People want to do things like put websites on them.

Why, why on earth do I need the web on my watch?

Why not if it can be done well? Also, I thought the same thing about my smart phone years ago.

CSS will need a @media (device-shape: circle, radius: 300px) { … } ☺

I would assume app development/etc would be done in 'block' like GUI and the watch will convert it into a round version on the fly.

Personally I think it would be awesome to have a radial based layout system. But recognize that probably won't happen. Probably do a square layout with a circular clipping mask. Still rect(3, -45, 3, -45, 3, 130, 3, 130) assuming a [radius,angle] co-ordinate system would be fun to play with.

Radial menus are the best. I wish everyone used them (for all platforms). My biggest advantage is they (when implemented properly) allow and promote muscle memory, less mousemovement required. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pie_menu

You could certainly implement that on top of the cartesian system.

> Also, is this the first mass-market device with a round screen?

Haha, that takes "responsive" to a whole new level.

Round LCD display can already be bought online (for example: http://www.alibaba.com/showroom/round-lcd-display.html) Some suppliers can provide 5000 items per day.

I think they are used in cars as dials and gauges.

The round screen in the Google video is obviously a mock-up, but it's only a slight tweak away from existing screens. Notice that the screen isn't a full circle but is flattened at the bottom - unlike with a fully round screen this means they could use a standard FFC to connect the screen.

Of course it's photoshopped, they essentially have to in order to do the scrolling effect.

Nest has a round screen, and it came out over 2 years ago.

The Nest display has a square body, but they only have actual pixels in a circular area[1]. Definitely innovative, but the Moto360 will need to be circular in both body and pixel area.

[1] http://d3nevzfk7ii3be.cloudfront.net/igi/xMQM5UAtkAbVdFZL.me...

(http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Nest+Learning+Thermostat+2nd+..., step 12)

Nest has a round screen. Not on your wrist, but none the less.

Am I the only one who doesn't wear a watch (even if I wanted to) because I don't like the way it scratches against my MacBook Pro?

I find it hilarious that you name the exact model of laptop.

I appreciate that, I actually went back and forth on mentioning the specific model. It seemed relevant because of the case material (and dimensions of the trackpad/palm area), and I don't remember having the same issue with previous plastic case laptops.

I had the exact same issue on my 15" mbp, on the 13" rmpb I don't have the issue. It's is most noticeable with watches with metallic bands, but rubber bands also tend to get in the way.

This is anecdotal evidence but I've noticed people using idevices mention the models rather than generic device names.

I wonder why that is.

Maybe because they have simple and straightforward names that it's reasonable to expect most people will understand. Whereas if you said "my Dell Latitude 3300" most people would have no specific mental image for that.

Like it or not, the simplicity of Apple's product line and naming scheme makes their product names more meaningful.

Apple is more a fashion company than a tech company. Those who buy and use its products are primarily concerned with advertising the fact that they use Apple products - conspicuous consumption. It's no different from how Gucci or Prada owners make sure to prominently display the brand of their handbag when they are in public. It's a simple form of signaling your identity, that you belong to a particular group.

This is also why Apple's profit margins are sky high. Consumer electronics is an industry with razor thin margins, but with fashion, the sky is the limit (given that you can effectively manipulate the minds of consumers, which Apple is excellent at). An iDevice cannot be commoditized, no matter how hard Apple's competitors try.

One possible reason is fragmentation: Apple have a small number of ranges with persistent names, whereas their competitors have a lot of models and constantly invent new names for them. Even if everyone name-dropped their kit with equal frequency, a given Apple model would be mentioned far more frequently than any single model from another manufacturer.

It says "MacBook Pro" right under the screen so that's what I think of it as. I also know that the terms are common enough that people will know what I'm talking about (as opposed to my old Inspiron 8000).

Same reason that people are more likely to namedrop the make of their car (when it's not particularly relevant) if it's a premium brand.

I have a Macbook Air that gets referred to as "the skinny computer" around the house. (as in, "I hate this f'ng skinny computer. Why won't it let me copy a f'ng photo???).

It would never occur to me to refer to it by its model name.

My wife has an iPhone 5s. As in, "Hey, toss me your phone. It has a better camera". Guess we're safe there too.

The post was an advertisement itself.

can't have people assuming you use an acer. what might they think of you

A Macbook Pro is made from aluminium. Most other laptops are plastic. Metal-on-metal scratching would be quite different to metal-on-plastic, so I'd say it's relevant.

Why is it quite different? Is it that aluminium is a poor material for a surface likely to suffer repeated abrasions?

That wasn't the exact laptop model, just a general laptop description. The Model name is usually something like, "MacBookPro11,1", and an exact model would be, "ME864xx/A","ME865xx/A", or "ME866xx/A".

I think it's reasonably to say, "Macbook Pro" as a generic reference. Nothing is really gained/lost by saying, "Mac Laptop". And, you do need to distinguish it's your unibody mac laptop, not a dell laptop, which likely doesn't mind being scratched by a watch that much. This is a Point for Dell! - My Latitude 2120 has been all over the planet in all sorts of rough conditions, doesn't have a visible scratch, unlike my macbook air - which is pretty ugly (but still working) shape after the same two years.

On the surface, I agree - but in my case, it's a behavior specific to that particular device.

I wear/wore a watch while typing on my chromebook, my Dell laptop, my Lenovo laptop, my old white macbook, and various external keyboards, but when I type on my macbook pro, the watch comes off almost immediately.

The watch clasp grating on the wide aluminum bezel quickly drives me to remove the watch.

Hacker News: where you can find a 40+ comment thread debating the use of generic vs specific device names.

It's relevant information for the comment. They'd otherwise have to describe the case material of the laptop. "Scratches the 'patterned aluminum finish' of my laptop," is a bit more verbose in conveying the same information.

I find it hilarious that someone actually took the time to point out this incredibly inane detail.

idk, I make a clear distinction between laptops and macbooks myself; the last laptops I remember using are quite different from macbooks (OS, (perceived) speed/performance, form factor).

Relevant due to the fact it has a metal case.

I don't like how my Rolex Oyster Perpetual taps against the table.

Try a NATO watchstrap. The buckle bit ends up sort of on the side of your wrist rather than right on the bottom. That how it works out on my tiny wrists anyway.

I have a Nato watchstrap but it scratches anyway. The buckle is more to the side than a normal strap, but it's still on the bottom of my wrist and still makes contact with the laptop. Maybe my wrists are even tinier than yours.

I'm sure the iWatch will have a MacBook friendly strap.

Starting at $299. iWatch not included.

I actually take my Fitbit Flex off when I'm writing (typing) for extending periods of time on my Macbook Air. The edge of the Macbook presses into the rubber at just the right angle and annoys me enough I have to remove it. I don't know how this isn't more of a problem for all wrist-wearables, honestly.

When the band on my last Casio broke due to my taking it off and putting it back on so often, in order to type comfortably while either using a wrist rest or putting up with the increasingly large palm area on laptops... (Phfew! Time for a new sentence.) When that happened, I stopped wearing a watch.

Until the battery died, that Casio, sans wristband, served as a sort of pocket watch. Now, I just look at my phone -- when I don't already have a clock on-screen somewhere.

Aside: I'd prefer a URL that didn't necessitate dynamic content in order to get a basic idea of what the product is. Call me old-fashioned... or paranoid (exploits); take your pick.

How on earth does your watch scratch your laptop?

Your wrist lies to the left / right of the track pad area. When you wear a watch or a fitness band, you are constantly rubbing those areas as you type.

Your wrists shouldn't be touching your laptop if you care about ergonomics.

I'm left handed when I write, so I should put a watch on my right hand. But I mouse with my right hand so I should put it on my left hand.

After years of getting irritated with watches and leaving them off half the day, I just stopped wearing them and I've very rarely ever regretted it.

Nope. I haven't been able to wear a watch ever since I got the latest Macbook Pro. Even I wear one to work by mistake, the first thing I do is remove it. Maybe the keyboard is a bit deeper in the newer models?

Why do you rest your wrists on your MacBook Pro while you type?

Who doesn't rest their wrists on the palm rest of the laptop when they type?

You're not supposed to - but most of us do it. In theory, you're only suppose to rest your wrists downwards when not typing, because doing so takes them out a neutral position. I'm not saying you should change, just trying to discourage the notion that's a healthy habit. (http://www.webmd.com/back-pain/proper-sitting-posture-for-ty...)

The specific model is relevant here as Apple laptops have a much deeper palm rest area than tiger machines.

I rest the bottom of my palms & the edge of my wrist. Maybe you're wearing your watch too loose and its sliding down your arm? My watch generally doesn't touch the top of the MBP 15" surface as i type.

I rest my wrists on my laptop whenever I'm not typing. But I type using 4 of my fingers though, lol.

I rest my wrists on my MBP as well.

I've been typing this way since like '94 and I've yet to have any carpal tunnel issues.

Attempting to type this line with elevated wrists feels very strange and something that I couldn't do for long periods of time.

I rest my wrists on the MPB when I type also, and I've been typing the same way since the late 80's.

I looked at the pix, I looked at the junk on my desk and compared my deskware and wrist vs the pix, and assuming I have a male model physique, that watch is a bit bigger than a sigg water bottle but a cm or so smaller than my large coffee (tea) cup. Its huge.

So... yeah, strap a couple pound weight to your arm, and until you bulk up, there's going to be some sagging by the end of the day.

I wore a watch in high school. Playing volleyball the summer after I graduated I went up for a block and came down minus the watch. When I showed up at college, there was a clock tower that chimed the quarter hour, and it turned out that was more than enough, so I never replaced the watch.

Now I've got a computer in front of me a majority of my waking hours, and a smartphone in my pocket for the times when I don't; _really_ no need for a watch.

The last time I wore a watch was when I realized I always took it off while using my computer and sort of the point where I had a cell phone with me at all times; of course, simultaneously I started developing RSI symptoms, :p.

Unless you wore your watch with the face inwards, a leather strap ought to fix this.

Leather straps have buckles.

I usually take it out and put on the table.

One thing that I learned after years of scratching the glass on several watches is that you should take it off often.

Sleep with watch, and bath with watch are just two of the no-go. :)

No, you are one of the two.

Yes, you are the only one.

Really cool stuff! From what it looks like this is a big departure from the previous Android smart watches that look like they jammed Android 1.0 on there.

Two big concerns for me: 1) Battery life 2) Display visibility

They go hand-in-hand for me. Get that nice high-res display but will it last me a day? For battery life it would be nice to have induction charging if it were to last about 8 hours (my personal guess).

Right... in theory, a smartwatch type device sounds great.

Battery life, screen brightness/visibility (can I read the screen on a clear summer day at noon?), size, and ease of use are all really important. Price matters for business purposes, but I wonder what could be done if that were not considered as a factor.

But since they'll have to compromise on those parameters (or just physically can't push them too far) it makes you wonder if this thing will actually be worth it. It's definitely cool, but is it really that much better than just having a smart phone? Is it $600-$1,000 better? I have a hard time imagining it would be... hopefully I'm wrong!

I'm sad that no one is going e-ink here. That solves the battery and screen visibility problems so nicely, plus the screen is always on. If Pebble is going to be it going forward, I hope they continue to innovate.

The problem is that eInk is relatively slow (I know the newer versions are much faster than the old 500ms ones) and can't do color (well).

It's a teeny tiny clock on your wrist.

The use of color is limited imho, you won't look at high res pictures (or really anything that isn't very limited in size and scope).

Monochrome or 'a couple' colors would be more than enough for me.

Don't care. I would be ok with a watch without a second hand and the slight sub-second delay of eInk for displaying notifications. And a lack of color too. Especially if it meant that I got 10x the battery life (which it would).

You only have to refresh the an HH:MM clock every minute

I feel like not having color is a price I'm willing to pay to not have to charge my watch every day

Why not both? E-ink display over OLED, or vice versa. Updates every minute.

If they price this to compete with typical mid-high watches, then you're looking at about $4000 [1] which is more than enough to get some very impressive display technology in there.

If they skimp and try to put in cheap hardware and go for a $500 price target then this is going to fall flat. Hopefully they understand the watch market and know to charge more and put in the best materiel, but knowing the tech industry I doubt it a lot.

[1] http://www.thewatchquote.com/List-Price-and-tariff-for-Montb...

$4000 is insane for a piece of consumer electronics OR a watch. A watch that expensive is purely status-indicating jewelry.

If all you want to do is tell the time quickly, a $10 quartz watch does the job just fine.

I am sure Vertu or some other ridiculous company will sell you your insane diamond-encrusted titanium penis size signifier with a touch screen and Android Wear integration, but it won't be any more functional than the regular version.

This was, by far the best cost/benefit watch that I found latelly: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004VR9HP2/ref=oh_details_o...

Also, Swatch have some very nice ones, with a VERY good price.

"A watch that expensive is purely status-indicating jewelry."

For those of a certain extreme old age, say, over 30, one problem is not wearing a watch has been a display of wealth for some decades now. The signal is, "I don't wear a watch anymore, I pay an expensive cellphone contract instead". Last time I wore a watch was during the Clinton presidency.

For elders like me, wearing a watch would indicate I'm too poor to have a phone.

If they price this to compete with typical mid-high watches, then you're looking at about $4000

...which will render the product DOA.

I can't imagine anyone releasing any sort of smart watch that breaks the $1000 barrier. I think that sub $500 is probably necessary to get any kind of traction at all.

You are missing a big factor in the 5k USD watch. It is expected to last you a lifetime, if not more. It's more like an heirloom. This watch, at the pace technology is moving would be lucky to last a year.

Hopefully they'll just sell it for a regular price and people will put I Am Rich[0] on there to distinguish themselves.

[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Am_Rich

I'm curious - what does spending $4000 on a watch get you?

You'd have better success taking that $4000 watch and adding android bits to it. Advertise it as the same expensive fancy watch with more smarts in it. That ball is in the fancy-watch company's court, not google's.

Pretty much the same thing that spending a few hundred will get you. Upwards of ~$500, watches are jewelry. You might as well be buying diamonds. The value is 100% in the eye of the beholder (e.g. mechanical movements that are beautiful, but no more accurate than quartz, rarer materials, name brand, etc...)

This is not targeted at watch enthusiasts. This is for the consumer electronics market.

See that's one of the problems with current tech and these watch devices. First of all, it will take a whole lot of convincing to make me buy another watch as I currently own an $800 Seiko that's nearly 15 years old and I've never had to change the battery (because it's kinetic). Second, if I DID buy a new watch it would take even more convincing to get me to take it off more than once every few years just to charge it. A normal watch lasts at least a year on a battery, and a kinetic watch such as mine literally never "winds down" unless I stop moving for months at a time. And finally, a watch as a display device is fine, but I'm simply not going to use it as an input device. Thus, I can see context-sensitive info on my watch (which is cool, I readily admit) but I still have to whip out the smart phone or laptop or tablet in order to really do much with that data. Now I'm not saying that someone won't make a good interface, but I just think the physical size limitations of making a watch that doesn't look and feel ridiculous will make any such interface very (very) difficult to pull off.

I work from home so most of the time unless I'm in a google hangout I'm largely alone. I've found that using voice activated input for my moto x is something that I use more and more often. There will likely be a social stigma around voice oriented device control initially but for me it's just the simplest thing that gets the job done.

All that said I agree with you about the battery. It'll have to be nice enough to make it worth it. Lots of people need one less reason to get sucked into checking notifications on their phone.

+1 If I am knee deep in code and need to calculate something quick, I just yell out, "ok google now, what's 34 time 324".

Also Adding new calendar events and setting the alarm, are both so much easier via voice. Sports too "ok Google Now, did the Bulls Win?"

Once you get in the habit of using it, its very convenient.

Glad to see this is being integrated within the watch.

I do think voice is an under utilized method of input, but in a crowded and loud urban environment it won't work well because of all of the background noise (I would think, honestly I've never tried it). I do think a lot of people assume that you would get angry looks from people, but I know that in NYC and in London people will largely ignore you unless you're doing something very annoying or disgusting (a travel companion was chewing her finger nails on the Tube once and was reprimanded by an older gentleman, rightly so). And so I don't think that voice input would be an issue socially, except in obvious cases like restaurants and offices. I just wonder how it would work logistically "in the field."

My opinion is that you forgot the biggest concern; "Google sued for data-mining students' email" is another post on HN today.

The features presented (est. time to work based on my route, etc) is not data I want to be present in googles dataset.

On the other hand these wearables are pretty great in this sense, for the first time you are the customer (usually the businesses buying ads are).

Maybe it's a color e-ink display...?

No, that would be an incredible, revolutionary, first-of-its kind feature. You'd see it trumpeted all over every single piece of concept art and advertising. There's absolutely zero chance that the first color e-ink display would be a stealth feature only shown off at launch.

Maybe not at the level this watch is sporting but E Ink's Triton is a color e-paper display. If the Moto 360 had one, it certainly would not be the first device. But you are right about them trumpeting the feature if it was there.

> 2) Display visibility

I can't decide whether this is genius or ludicrous, but on your phone, you can ask Google Now "What time is it" and get a spoken-word response. So presumably, you could wear a watch that you have to just ask for the time when you're outside. :)

That sounds dangerously close to the first digital watches. They used so much battery to drive the display you had to press a button to see the time.

I'm excited about this, and disappointed in Pebble. They were first to market but totally squandered their opportunity. I got my Pebble last year, and stopped wearing it after a week because all the promised apps were still a work-in-progress. One year later, not much has changed :/

I'm using mine with RunKeeper and it works great. I'm pretty happy with my Pebble's notifications as well. Having said that, I didn't have great expectations to start with. I wasn't going to play games on a watch. I wasn't going to type responses to my SMSs or e-mails. I'm happy because I don't miss calls anymore. I see my notifications instantly. And when I'm outside running, I can easily see my distance, pace etc. And I only recharge once a week or longer.

Same here. My biggest use case was a nextbus app.

To be fair though: the Moto 360 is still a work in progress and neither the promised apps nor the device itself exist at all.

What apps do you miss?

Bus arrivals, gps, and a route tracker.

Agreed. I will happily get rid of my Pebble once one of these devices becomes available.

Sony would like a word with you.

An aside: When does the deal of selling Motorola Mobility to Lenovo close? I'm assuming not for a while and this is why they're still branded as a Google company?

The sale hasn't gone through yet, so they're still a Google company for the time being.

Can I ask a dumb question? Is this a stand-alone device (requiring a SIM card) or does it require pairing with a phone for data access?

Because if it's the latter it's no better on the key feature of portability than the existing Samsung/Pebble devices (AIUI).

I would be amazed and/or shocked if it had a 3G radio in. It surely has to be paired with a phone for data access. The power requirements alone would result in a watch that had a 2 hour battery! I suppose it could use WiFi, but that seems unlikely. I am guessing bluetooth pairing...

Well, it doesn't have to be 3G, good old GSM, so I could leave my phone in the locker and go to gym and have all the data available to me right there. It has small screen, which most of the time should be turned off, without bluetooth (which is battery hungry also) and without wifi, I think it should work for 1 day. That kind of smartwatch I would definitely buy.

I'd really hope the screen never goes to sleep. That would kinda defeat the whole point of the idea IMO.

Make it bluetooth only. Try to give it a decent battery. Maybe a peltier could help stretch it further (seen on some watches, though I suspect the space would be better used for a larger battery since this watch would be much more power hungry)?

Still. Pretty pumped about this.

Makes sense.

It requires pairing with a phone via Bluetooth(Low Energy). I don't think at this time it is economically feasible to have a phone with data service, touch screen and a juicy battery all in such a small foam factor.

Just really curious:

Why does a watch need a touchscreen? What are you touching on your watch?

Digital watches already have a wonderful UI: they're called "buttons", and they're located on the sides of the screen, so you can still see what you're doing while using the thing.

Simple gestures and taps seem like a win IMO.

It reminds me of DeusEx2. Before release all the PC gamers lamented the dumbed down circular menu interface developed to accommodate console gamers. Turns out it was just a flat out better/simpler interface in general though.

So while I could see buttons working OK (well, not really, watch buttons have always been real imprecise and difficult for me, but still), simple swipes, taps, and maybe radial or quadrant based options seems like a solid interface to me.

Say someone texts me while I'm using the walking directions. Swipe that stuff away with a flick of the finger similar to WebOS. Much better UI than hitting a button IMO.

I constantly want to touch my Pebble's screen. It's plenty big enough (and could easily be bigger). The buttons are workable but not ideal. With, say, 3-4 menu items on the screen, there's plenty of area for touching them, and it would be a lot faster than hitting the up/down buttons a couple times followed by the select button.

I don't get this "can't see what you're doing" thing at all. Do you not use touchscreen phones? What's your finger doing in front of the thing you're going to touch before you go to touch it?

I recognize I'm in a minority here, but I'd love to see Graffiti [0], the old Palm OS glyph-based input method, come back on smart watches. I could write short text messages in-place on a watchface in Graffiti, or write two-letter shortcuts for different watch displays I want to switch to.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graffiti_%28Palm_OS%29

The classic interface for watches is a rotating crown or bezel. The closest modern equivalent would be the circular touch pad on an old style ipod. Why not have a touch sensitive bezel around the outside? Even better would be to make the skin of your arm a touch sensitive surface so that you do not have to cover the screen with your finger.

couldn't this argument be transposed to all touchscreen applications?

Am I the only person hoping this comes through with some type of iOS compatibility? It seems to be the only smart watch out there that looks like a watch and not a futuristic-80's-era-digital-caluclator-watch

Definitely second your point about the styling. This is the first smart watch I've seen that I could see myself wearing (although it still looks a bit thick for something I'd be wearing on my wrist -- but that's a hard problem to get around with current-generation technology).

Current smart watches remind me of those Windows convertible tablets from 2006-2007. It was a good idea, and for certain use-cases it was the best thing out there, but the technology just wasn't quite advanced enough to make them practical for most people. I see smart watches catching on when they are sleek enough to function as a no-compromises watch while also integrating all the contextual information they promise to make available.

I don't see why they won't treat this like Glass, where it's the same sort of experience on iOS and Android.

I have a full blow Android watch (Simvalley AW420) , but I wouldn't recommend a Smartwatch to others.

Why?!

- Gorilla arms; When your in bed or on the couch, keeping the watch turned towards your face takes a toll on your wrists. It's tiring. See how the people in the video look down towards their watch, try doing that 20+ times a day for prolonged times.

- Call quality; Calling with it sound like your wearing a skimask. A bluetooth dongle is the only option for good voice quality, but its another extra device on you.

- Battery quality ; Battery lasts one day if your taking it easy.

- Restricted Controls; The only thing you can do is swipe or touch. I can manage the onscreen keyboard, but its tiny! The only things you can truly use it for is a notification system.

Call quality is a matter of using decent hardware, and http://minuum.com/ solves the keyboard problem. I expect to see amazing developments in the next couple years!

No matter how good your mic is, you still have too much ambient sound. A mic near your mouth is the best solution so far.

Good points, but as for restricted controls, Google is trying to emphasise voice control and context-aware notifications.

Have you ever tried using google voice search on an accelerating city bus? (Like when your in the back near the engine?). Its not cool that you sometimes have to "wait" for it to be quiet enough around you. And what happens if everybody around you is voice controlling as well?

Can I ask why you own that? It sounds incredibly inconvenient. Are notifications on your wrist really worth all those downsides?

Because I wanted to be ahead of the game. I saw an official Google smartwatch coming. And yes, I think the notifications are worth it. If your building an app or software that is context or location aware, than it's an awesome addition to your product.

I'm extremely curious to learn about how they build the display. I have been to lots of component trade shows but have never Seen anyone able to produce non rectangular screens or flexible screens that could be bent like they would need to here, does anyone know more?

Meta: Why after so many comments am I the first to ask this?!?

Cutting an AMOLED screen in a circle isn't exactly rocket engineering. Driving it will be a bit of a challenge, but not something that a team of electrical engineers can't overcome. The biggest problem is that it's going to be expensive, which is convenient because a smartwatch is a luxury item and people will be willing to pay if it's even halfway decent.

The biggest problem is that they haven't demonstrated it will be even halfway decent yet, and none of the existing comparables give any confidence to that.

Doesn't seem to be Amoled, the only screen so far that would atleast from the the tech fit the bill: http://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/unique-small-circular-...

How can it seem to be anything, it's not even real yet. It's a marketing mockup.

AMOLED fits the bill easily because the technology allows you to place dots however you need to place dots and doesn't restrict you to arrays or rectangular shaped emitters or even planar geometry. The only challenge is running wires to each LED to drive it.

And that's not the screen. Your linked screen is 240^2 pixels, while Moto circular display is is 320^2 pixels. Additionally, that screen has too big a bezel (especially on the bottom) to fit inside the moto's case.

According to the android emulator profile.

Flexible screens? The screen looks perfectly straight to me. But even so, flexible OLEDs are doable, first cell phones with curved screens are out there, I have no doubt the next generation of smart watches will have curved screens etc.

Someone should teach Motorola that "I would like to receive product information from Motorola and confirm that I'm 16 years of age or older." is NOT what "opt in" means...

The whole point of entering your email address on that page is to "receive product information from Motorola". That's what signing up for updates on the Moto 360 is: asking to receive info on a Moto product.

To be fair, I had a similar reaction (still went ahead and subscribed, though) - I first had the impression I was signing up to receive information specifically related to this one product, and now don't know if that's the case or if I'm going to get a tonne of mails about stuff I don't care about while waiting for an update on this.

My first impression is that the face looks slightly too big for the wrists it is being modelled on. If the pictures are representative of the final product then I can't see it being worn by many women, or men with slimmer wrists.

>Synchronizing your pulse with Google...

>Say "share now" to share your cardiovascular activity on Google+

>...

>Synchronization completed!

>5 minutes later

>ping! One new message. Say "read" or "later"

>"read"

>Enjoying the run? Try these Adidas XYZ shoes for only 99$, perfect for athletic running!

Call me a tinfoil hatter, but I am not touching this tracking device with a five foot pole.

And yet no one seems to complain about the Nike fitness bands, devices that collect the same information and have the same access to your phone's always-on network connection -- a device that's made by a company that actually sells you shoes.

This device just connects to your phone.

And that will prevent Google from implementing libraries and functionality specifically designed to enable what the GP proposes? I think more along the lines of more and more integration to compel users to "get the full experience" out of their phones and watches.

I am still failing to get the idea of enabling phone related services on a tiny device like this, it’s unlikely it can run sms/phone calls at its own, rather you would have to keep a smartphone with it. That said, I guess the focus should be on doing something that phone can’t. Than indirectly using your phone by this device, which barely makes any sense to me.

The device depicted in the images does not appeal me, it’s seems massive and old fashioned. I don’t think a smartwatch should have this look. We do not need a touch screen enabled watch, we are talking here about a ‘smart’ watch.

It's impossible it can run anything on its own, its an accessory, that's the point.

The best use is typically just getting notifications. So you can see SMSes, IMs, whatnot. The fact is that 90% of the time it's more important to have read a message than to reply to it. It also saves you the trouble of having to remember to read something when you notice you've gotten a message but you can't check it just now 'cause you are busy with something else. That alone is a huge use case. Sure, it doesn't apply to everyone, but it applies to enough people that it justifies the product.

And ultimately it is just a product not a way of life being imposed on humanity. If it doesn't work for you then don't use it. If you don't like sailing you don't have to buy a sail boat, but you also don't have to decry their existence either.

Seriously... It looks like a toy comparing to a good old swiss watch :

http://www.omegawatches.com/planet-omega/bond

And Omega is to Swiss watches what Lindsey Lohan is to acting =)

* I'm Swiss and this comment was made in good humour

Since when was Lindsay Lohan a bad actress? Sure, her movies weren't everyone's demographic, but that didn't mean she was a bad actress

(Sorry for the off topic. You are right that Omega watches are by no means what I would consider a "good old swiss watch")

Let's be honest - a Tag Heuer is the Macaulay Culkin of watches and not everyone can afford a Patek. Omega is ok. ;)

How about Tissot? (I'm by no means really understand about swiss watches, just curious)

Or something really classy:

http://www.eterna.ch/de/1948/1948-date

I wonder how can you call someone? You can speak to the phone but how do you hear what is being said to you? Does it comes with some kind of wireless earphones or something?

Or how you text someone, for that matter.

I'd guess that it's like Google Glass - quick to read things like texts, and you can respond with short transcribed messages.

Watch the Android Wear video, it uses Google's voice input to transcribe messages.

how it is different from Moto Watch[1]? I guess they just changed the dial.

[1] - https://motoactv.com/home/page/features.html

Well, for starters, it's round, which is a big thing (round LCDs are hard to pull off). Secondly, it runs Android Wear, not whatever custom baked thing was running on the MotoActv watch. Thirdly, it does completely different things. The MotoActv watch was a fitness watch. It's meant to track your runs, etc. This is a smartwatch. It's meant to connect to your phone and give you relevant information. Completely different use cases.

MotoActv is also a smart watch. Please refer to feature list below. Sales of Moto 360 will see whether there more fans round dial or square screen.

The trend I see here is - if your shit does not sell in first attempt then repackage it under a new name.

MotoActv Features - 1. gps 2. heart rate 3. monitor 4. music 5. challenges 6. texts 7. ant+ 8. wi-fi 9. clock 10. weather 11. display

Except not even slightly accurate. The MotoActv is not primarily a smartwatch, it's a fitness device first. It's meant for active audiences who want a watch while they excercise, hence the Actv part of the name.

The Moto360, which looks absolutely nothing like the MotoActv (seriously, where the hell are you getting that they're repackaging an existing watch under a new name? They're completely different) is meant for an entirely different market, has completely different features, and probably features none of the same internals as the MotoActv.

They are two watches, with completely different functions, with completely different UIs, meant for completely different people. The only similarity is that they're both made by Motorola but even that's a stretch because the Motorola of today (I'm referring to Motorola, a Google company) is nothing like Motorola of 2 years ago, when the MotoActv was released.

This has to be the smoothest scrolling image transition on that scale I've seen.

Anybody care to enlighten an amateur how they did it?

Looks like it's mostly jquery. You can check out the scrolling stuff here: http://moto360.motorola.com/js/functions.js

That has the weirdest mobile detection code I have seen. Is is bad code, or is this the best that can be done:

  window.mobilecheck = function() {
		var check = false;
		(function(a){if(/(android|bb\d+|meego).+mobile|avantgo|bada\/|blackberry|blazer|compal|elaine|fennec|hiptop|iemobile|ip(hone|od)|iris|kindle|lge |maemo|midp|mmp|mobile.+firefox|netfront|opera m(ob|in)i|palm( os)?|phone|p(ixi|re)\/|plucker|pocket|psp|series(4|6)0|symbian|treo|up\.(browser|link)|vodafone|wap|windows (ce|phone)|xda|xiino/i.test(a)||/1207|6310|6590|3gso|4thp|50[1-6]i|770s|802s|a wa|abac|ac(er|oo|s\-)|ai(ko|rn)|al(av|ca|co)|amoi|an(ex|ny|yw)|aptu|ar(ch|go)|as(te|us)|attw|au(di|\-m|r |s )|avan|be(ck|ll|nq)|bi(lb|rd)|bl(ac|az)|br(e|v)w|bumb|bw\-(n|u)|c55\/|capi|ccwa|cdm\-|cell|chtm|cldc|cmd\-|co(mp|nd)|craw|da(it|ll|ng)|dbte|dc\-s|devi|dica|dmob|do(c|p)o|ds(12|\-d)|el(49|ai)|em(l2|ul)|er(ic|k0)|esl8|ez([4-7]0|os|wa|ze)|fetc|fly(\-|_)|g1 u|g560|gene|gf\-5|g\-mo|go(\.w|od)|gr(ad|un)|haie|hcit|hd\-(m|p|t)|hei\-|hi(pt|ta)|hp( i|ip)|hs\-c|ht(c(\-| |_|a|g|p|s|t)|tp)|hu(aw|tc)|i\-(20|go|ma)|i230|iac( |\-|\/)|ibro|idea|ig01|ikom|im1k|inno|ipaq|iris|ja(t|v)a|jbro|jemu|jigs|kddi|keji|kgt( |\/)|klon|kpt |kwc\-|kyo(c|k)|le(no|xi)|lg( g|\/(k|l|u)|50|54|\-[a-w])|libw|lynx|m1\-w|m3ga|m50\/|ma(te|ui|xo)|mc(01|21|ca)|m\-cr|me(rc|ri)|mi(o8|oa|ts)|mmef|mo(01|02|bi|de|do|t(\-| |o|v)|zz)|mt(50|p1|v )|mwbp|mywa|n10[0-2]|n20[2-3]|n30(0|2)|n50(0|2|5)|n7(0(0|1)|10)|ne((c|m)\-|on|tf|wf|wg|wt)|nok(6|i)|nzph|o2im|op(ti|wv)|oran|owg1|p800|pan(a|d|t)|pdxg|pg(13|\-([1-8]|c))|phil|pire|pl(ay|uc)|pn\-2|po(ck|rt|se)|prox|psio|pt\-g|qa\-a|qc(07|12|21|32|60|\-[2-7]|i\-)|qtek|r380|r600|raks|rim9|ro(ve|zo)|s55\/|sa(ge|ma|mm|ms|ny|va)|sc(01|h\-|oo|p\-)|sdk\/|se(c(\-|0|1)|47|mc|nd|ri)|sgh\-|shar|sie(\-|m)|sk\-0|sl(45|id)|sm(al|ar|b3|it|t5)|so(ft|ny)|sp(01|h\-|v\-|v )|sy(01|mb)|t2(18|50)|t6(00|10|18)|ta(gt|lk)|tcl\-|tdg\-|tel(i|m)|tim\-|t\-mo|to(pl|sh)|ts(70|m\-|m3|m5)|tx\-9|up(\.b|g1|si)|utst|v400|v750|veri|vi(rg|te)|vk(40|5[0-3]|\-v)|vm40|voda|vulc|vx(52|53|60|61|70|80|81|83|85|98)|w3c(\-| )|webc|whit|wi(g |nc|nw)|wmlb|wonu|x700|yas\-|your|zeto|zte\-/i.test(a.substr(0,4)))check = true})(navigator.userAgent||navigator.vendor||window.opera);
		return check; }		
	var isMobile = mobilecheck();

Scroll right to see the code...

Not saying whether it's a good method or not, but it's the standard detection script from http://detectmobilebrowsers.com/

thanks

It looks simulated to me.

If you're looking for a video like I was, there's one on their blog post: http://motorola-blog.blogspot.com/2014/03/moto-360-its-time....

It's light on product shots, however.

They clearly don't have a working model, yet. All of the physical devices they showed in that clip were engineering prototypes (CNC or 3D printed plastics) with no electronics.

My first thought: who would want to wear that? I think that watch is way too unwieldy to have mass appeal.

But let's assume that I have no taste: assuming that the model shown is an average western white male, the size of that watch cuts out 50% or more of the population because it is too wide for their wrists.

And yes, they do mention "a selection of styles", but I doubt that will include size differences. If you scale it down to the size of a ladies' watch, chances are you will run into problems w.r.t. Battery volume.

Power usage may be the Achilles heel, anyways, but they may have tweaked that through software (I think it might be possible to use motion and light sensors to infer when the user might be looking at the watch and switch off the display when he isn't)

It would be nice if the watch was the phone and the black 5 inch square was a cheap secondary screen.

It would be nice if I could fly too, but I'm fat and able to generate shockingly small amounts of lift.

Any idea how this works? I don't think we have reached technology level to cram CPU+memory+battery+GPS to do all that in standalone watch. So my guess is that the watch has bluetooth that connects to your phone and uses its horsepower. It probably pings phone in your pocket every 1-5 seconds. This then bags question if it is compatible with only Android phones and how far can it be from phone.

It also appears that the watch has color LCD that would display analog faceplate. It would be pretty expensive to run color LCD full time though. Another alternative could be color E-Ink but unless there have been any recent advancement that was still experimental.

If you want a watch, you should buy a good Swiss watch, you don't need this cheap crap on your hand, unless you are 15 years old (which btw is a market on its own).

I don't know why people invest in these things. I don't know where this vision is coming from, but this is not a tech breakthrough. These things will not be used in the long run, period.

Do you think that Eric Migicovsky wears a freaking pebble watch? I hope not. I hope he can afford a cheap Rolex or a little more expansive IWC.

There should be a disclaimer, product for 5-16, 16-18 if your mom still changes your diapers, or for true tech lovers.

If you are looking for a different perspective on digital watches, come visit us at slyde.ch

Thanks, I will definitely check it out.

This is a pretty shallow, close minded perspective.

"I don't know why people invest in these things. I don't know where this vision is coming from, but this is not a tech breakthrough." < I don't like the comment that I made here, it was a little harsh but written in the moment. Thanks

A watch on a man's hand is like a sexy pair of shoes or a purse on a woman, and it is not my place or time to teach you that. Once you grow older you will understand it.

And like i said, some people will definitely go for it.

This looks great. I'm a little bit confused though by motorola calling itself "a google company" .. wasn't motorola essentially sold to Lenovo?

Or did Google, in addition to the patents, keep the motorola brand?

I assume, until the sale is cleared by regulatory bodies, contracts signed,and money exchanges hands, they are still 'A Google Company'

Sure, but a major product release tied to the Google brand like this seems to be coming at an odd time.

This watch, for better or worse, is now going to be seen as the Google watch.

You might want to double check this but I seem to recall that Google didn't sell all of Motorola to Lenovo, only the mobile division. This might explain that.

Yeah, the still retain the watch division, as well as the shoe division and shirt division.

I guess I'm the only one here who sees no use in that. I have my smartphone with me and my company phone. I don't need another display with less features. Especially not on my arm where I have a real watch.

I somehow feel it as a step between a phone and an hand-free device like google glass (or even implants). But because we have already google glass I don't even see why we need to go a step back.

Edit: downvotes with no comments? I did not expect that here.

I'm right here with you. This is not a compelling piece of jewelry for me. It's too thick, the battery is undoubtedly insufficient, my phone works better (and isn't always listening), and I don't want another device that impairs my attention.

Maybe it's only me, but I'm tired of big watches. I recently got a Jawbone UP and it replaced my wrist watch. The only downside is that the UP doesn't have a clock on it. I don't like having a lot of things on my wrist and I don't like having anything on the arm that I use my mouse with.

What I want is the smallest possible watch out there, and so far I really haven't found anything.

Traditionally, female watches are small, and male ones are larger. I don't see this changing any time soon.

Try a Nike Fuelband however, it's very thin. It's not always on, but it sure is fancy when you click the button in public.

This might be a good occasion to shake that trend. Smartwatches are not only targetted to the traditional watch buying people, but also to those who don't wear one today and are uncomfortable strapping a giant device to their wrist.

OP may be referring to the trend toward larger watches for men. I blame Panerai.

Smartwatches are somehow male?

Yes, but that doesn't matter at this time. We are pretty much getting what we expected out of a first gen smartwatch.

What you are asking for is premature optimization.

I'm more commenting on how watches have remained the same size for a long time. I'm not even talking about smart watches. I want something that tells me the time that is one step above the lower limit on possible watch sizes. It doesn't have to be an analog or digital display, it doesn't even have to have hands! Just a series of LEDs would be fine.

Very cool - hopefully '360' is not a reference to how many minutes of battery life it will have. I hope for one that it uses an OLED screen, so the black-background watches will use very little battery. Also, I found it interesting that each of the pictures were of vascular men-forearms. I guess they don't expect this to be well adopted by the female population.

If you look at the difference in surface area between traditional men's/women's models of the same watch [1] there's a pretty massive difference in what you'd be able to do with the space. However, you do see more women wearing men's watches now, so I could see it catching on.

I think they will need to hit a pretty big number for battery life. A "40-hour power reserve" (what most mechanical automatics have) would be a big step towards being taken seriously as a watch instead of a gadget.

[1] http://www.omegawatches.com/collection/seamaster/aqua-terra-...

The Moto X uses the OLED screen to effectively support the active notifications feature without burning battery. I've been very pleased with this feature and taking that technology to a watch just seems to make sense in my opinion.

OLED makes sense in terms of battery life, but since it's going to be showing a watch face for 95% of the time, burn-in might be too much of a problem.

Looking forward to seeing how they solved this.

I think this is the first real smart watch that i might buy depending on the final price, battery lifetime and design/functionality.

Signed up to be a developer and told them I'd make a beer pong trainer app. Here's to hoping they give me one for free!

Am I the only one who thinks it's ugly??

probaably

The double-twist to open the camera on the Moto X is probably my favorite physical interaction with a device. It works perfectly 100% of the time and I never accidentally open my camera in my pocket. I take more instantaneous photos than ever before. If that precision is brought to the interactions on this watch, sign me up.

I also use a Moto X and really like this functionality. However, it doesn't work for me 100% of the time, more like 90%. And I have managed to take several photos of my pocket, though usually while skiing or during other active pursuits. Just another data-point.

Although about Android wear in general, this video shows off some of the UI and gives a glance at the builtin features (mostly notifications and something that reminds me a lot of Google now): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xQ3y902DEQ

So now I have to charge 2 devices instead of 1 every day? This is my biggest issue with smart watches.

Pretty much this. any smart watch with current battery tech is going to be on the charger a lot. My gps/hrm watch needs to be charged at least once a week, and that is annoying, I can only imagine what a "smart watch" is going to need in terms of charge cycles.

That stem is interesting. The Pebble has 4 buttons, which are generally mapped to up, down, select, and back. That strikes me as the minimum for useful app interface.

With the Moto 360's stem I can see getting up down and select, but now how they'd do back. Maybe a long-press?

It has voice and touch screen. Here's a video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xQ3y902DEQ#t=60

Remember that this is likely to have touch and voice input too, unlike the Pebble.

That one knob could be a really short joy-stick type device. Giving you 5 different inputs: up, down, left, right and push. Or even 7 if you can also turn it each direction. (we have a 7-input knob for the navi in our car.) So depending on how you mapped those movements, you can achieve all the actions you want.

Not really input related, but is it remotely plausible that winding could charge the battery?

Absolutely not.

  1. The dynamo would take up too much room
  2. Pinching a tiny metal shaft is ergonomically awful
  3. have you seen the tiny wind-up flashlights?  they're huge, and they require quite a lot of winding, and that's just to power an LED for a few minutes.
  4. groundbreaking features like a wind-up piece of personal electronics, are *flagship* features.  If this thing had a 1 week battery, or was windup, or whatever, that would be a *very high visibility* part of the ad campaign.

Swipe from left to right?

I wonder if they will let you flip the screen orientation so left handers can wear it properly..

Is that a problem in any other watch? Left or right wrist, the 12 stays on top. Only the button is on the other side.

Besides that: don't count on it. If you pay close attention, you see that the bottom part of the round screen stays black. Most likely to accommodate the controller for the screen. Upside down will not work for that reason.

In a square watch, it might.

Yeah, normally, you have two options, just wear the watch with the stem pointing inward which means you have to reach over the watch face to use it, or buy a special watch with a left handed stem. You can't just rotate the watch 180 and wear it with the stem facing outward because the numbers would be upside down.

With a completely digital display though, theoretically, it would be possible to rotate the watch and have the display rotate as well. The clasp would still potentially be upside down, but depending on the type of clasp, that doesn't matter much.

As you said, if the controller face of the screen is dedicated and not able to be rotated as well, that wouldn't work.

Impressive! this watch may mark the comeback of Motorola in the mobile arena. Well done Google.

This form factor had already been invented by Microsoft more than five years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WazA77xcf0A

Its a little strange that all of the promo pictures on the site are of male arms. I wonder if it was on oversight or if they really are only going after a male demographic.

I assumed that they used only large arms to make the device appear smaller. On a typically sized woman's arm, I suspect this thing would look quite hefty.

The fact that it seems to be relatively large may unavoidably limit its appeal to smaller individuals of either gender.

Do you think that a smaller version might make the interface unusable? I wonder if they are keeping it that large because they cant get the insides smaller or because it would not be easy to use.

Now here's something that could actually work. Not sure why anyone thought people would want a device that looked like one of those casio calculator watches.

I hate it. It is selfish, but I hate it.

Problem is, I love real watches. More specificaly, I love mechanical watches. You know, those little miracles with cogs and spring in it. And jewel bearings. And balance wheel. See-through back, where you can watch movement running.

And I love technology at the same time. I think that this is the future of technology, everybody will now jump onto bandwagon of smartwatches. But I don't want to replace my beatiful mechanical watches with something like this. I hate that I love watches, because otherwise I would be thrilled to put something like this on my wrist. But I'm not.

As a stylish watch, this is right up my alley. Add that it will probably work awesomely w/ my Moto X and I'm sold.

I'm really glad that it's a style significantly different from pebble. Should be fun to develop on!

Love it! Price?

It's marketingware, which is worse than vaporware because it means they spent money making mockups instead of, you know, the actual device.

The dial is just too big and too thick!

did anyone else notice how there are no ports on this watch...hoping for inductive charging!

That guy's clothes look so comfortable yet still professional! I wish I had some.

A tweed jacket and polka dot chambray? Uniqlo and H&M got you.

I wonder if pebble will react to this. BTW, is there any mention of sensors on it?

I'd definitely use one, but two things need to happen:

- make it smaller, it's bloody huge

- better battery

You realize that those are in opposition of one another, right?

That doesn't make it an unreasonable request. There's always the option of not purchasing one until the technology improves enough to make it smaller while having an acceptable battery life.

Given the full color display and the current abysmal battery life for any smart watch not using e-ink, I'm pessimistic about the battery life of this product. I would be very happy to be surprised though.

This is very, very interesting. I wonder how much it'll cost.

Holy fuck is the "responsive" HTML broken on this page.

Yes, but where can i get that guy's shirt?

Google is taking Motorola to the next level!

They sure are: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-25956284

2014 and the best we can do is a Dick Tracy watch.

http://i.imgur.com/hpSgOcA.png

That underside is dope.

A kid could have done those mockups better.

Is it possible to automatically rotate the UI 45 degrees if the watch detects the arm perpendicular to the body?

Makes me wonder.

I guess an NFC tag in your belt would do.

Does anyone have any details? That page is amazingly non-informative.

-__- IT'S. A. FUCKING. WATCH. -__-

Cool, a male only product.

I know more women that wear watches than men, but let's go with something that is gigantic and only men would wear. Seems to be a sound strategy.

Your reaction makes for an interesting contrast with:

http://www.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/20q8qf#cg5q70u > bicyclemom: As a woman who really wants a smartwatch but who absolutely hates the big, manly square look of all prior efforts, I want to kiss Moto on the lips for doing this.

The watch, like all smart watches, is big because of constraints of electronics and batteries, not some sexist conspiracy.

>Cool, a male only product.

Well you got to test the waters somehow. Its better to test it in one segment and if it doesn't flop, expand it further. Else, complaints can also include why they din't target children or the elderly.

Also gender specific products are established by society. You don't have necessarily follow them. If a female wears a men's watch, it won't automagically stop working.

> If a female wears a men's watch, it won't automagically stop working.

Its huge. I think the concern is more female upper body strength than aesthetics. Or fear she will grow massive biceps if she wears it.

The watch the woman in the first shot is wearing looks like a joke:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrqZl2QIz0c

That's the official Android Wear teaser video.

Maybe the device is larger so that you can have a bigger screen, and anyone who wants one can wear it regardless of gender. Ignoring free will, fashion also seems to be accepting of larger watches for women recently.

Near the end of the page it says it'll come in a variety of styles. As a guy that finds the large watch face style to be absurd, I'd hope for something a bit smaller if it's going to grab my interest.

It is kind of comically large, but I presume it's a tradeoff to fit the tech in there, and a screen size that's actually usable for anything.

The only company I know of that's specifically targeted a smartwatch to women is Sony Ericsson back in 2009 (5 years ago), but it didn't quite catch on... https://www.google.com/search?q=MBW-200&rls=en&source=lnms&t...

Fairly sure it's always the same model arm to make the image transitions be more fluid. I'm sure after all of this they'll show just a female model's arm. I imagine too they picked a male model because in general men have bigger forearms, and so it will make the watch look less bulky.

I'm a man and it still seems gigantic and something I wouldn't wear.

So I'm only seeing white male hands

It's all the same model. Do they need to hire a model from every race to prove something?

Also, now that I look, he might be Hispanic... not that it should matter to anyone.

It's the same model. Unless you want him to go black arm, that's what you got.

You are everything that's wrong in tech right now.

I believe all of them are the same person (note birthmark near right side of wrist). Still seeing race?

It's one person. Would you prefer he changes skin-tone between photos?

Also how about trying to make a watch that women will want to buy? I just don't see that happening for most women who won't really care about this kind of gadget (maybe I'm wrong).

A pretty glaring oversight these days. Who's in charge of marketing there that they would make such a ridiculous error?

It's easier to photoshop it onto one arm than many.

Very perceptive.

paging @shit_hn_says

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