Are wearables just a fling?
By Caroline Smith, Senior User Experience Designer at Blonde
I love gadgets!
I’m always first to get my hands on new toys. I was the first of my friends to get a Nike+iPod sensor for my trainers, I backed the Pebble watch on Kickstarter, I bought a Nike FuelBand within the first days of it being released and now I’ve got the Apple Watch dangled in front of me as the next potential purchase.
But is it really worth it? Or will it be another tech fling to add to my history?
Early adoption: my first steps into wearable technology
Growing up, my birthday and Christmas presents consisted of the newest technology, from Gameboys, flip phones and mp3 players to cameras, digital watches and voice recorders.
I remember how smug I felt when I showed off my new Sony D-EJ625 Walkman’s “jog proof” feature in a full demonstration to my friends. It was the summer of 2001, I was 14 and this portable CD player would be my first venture into true “wearable” technology.
In 2002, Minority Report blew my mind when Tom Cruise controlled a wall sized computer screen with fingertip glowing gloves while making controlled gestures with his hands. The ability to control and interact with digital data through physical wearable tech was the future, and captured my attention for years to come.
Fast forward to my Masters Degree where I got to delve into this interest:I focused on developing and researching projects that played with the concepts of physical and digital, exploring offline and online, trying to merge these two realms.
I discovered Rambler shoes created by Ricardo Nascimento, an artist and multimedia producer from Brazil, which broadcast every step you took over Twitter, giving your physical self a measurable digital presence.
“Depending on the pressure exerted on the soles of the shoes, each footfall is translated as a “tap” or “.” This information is then transmitted via the magic of Bluetooth to a cellphone, which, in turn, updates the Rambler’s Twitter page. Following these postings, one can know if the wearer is walking or not and also predict his speed,” says Nascimento.
While this is undoubtedly cool, Rambler shoes didn’t really “do” anything. Since then, wearables have evolved, and so has my relationship with them.
Can wearables change your lifestyle & habits?
The Nike+ iPod tracking sensor
When I first got the Nike+ iPod tracking sensor in 2007, I found that it actually altered my lifestyle and behaviours. The sensor measures and records the distance and pace of a walk or run. It embeds into your Nike+ shoe and a receiver plugs into the bottom of an iPod.
By visualising run stats and gamifying workouts with awards, I became obsessed with reaching the next level and filling my digital trophy case. Within a few short weeks, I had gone from someone who couldn’t run a mile to someone who was consistently running 6–8 miles a day.
Unfortunately the excitement of a new gadget subsided with time and the gamification model felt repetitive and lost its initial impact.
The Pebble smartwatch
The Pebble smartwatch raised $10.3 million through a Kickstarter campaign in 2012, the most money raised for any product on the site at that time.
I had a similar experience with the Pebble smartwatch as I did the Nike+iPod sensor. I spent hours finding the perfect clock face, setting up notifications and exploring its integrations.
I wore it proudly every day for a few months, drawing attention to it whenever I could but soon the novelty wore off. The software was buggy, the settings functionality basic, customisation limited and so I stopped wearing it.
FuelBand by Nike
When Nike launched their FuelBand as a method to track NikeFuel points, the lovely marketing graphics and the retro design of the device instantly captured my attention and I immediately set out to purchase it. The beautifully designed app created glorious digital visualisations of my physical effort, as well as celebrating my achievements with wonderful trophies and awards. I could measure and earn Nike+Fuel all day, every day, for the rest of my life. Marvellous!
However, three months later, it was in a box in the back of my cupboard with the Pebble and Nike+ Sensor.
The wearables dilemma and an Apple Watch waiting to be purchased
The reason I’m facing a dilemma right now, and thus haven’t rushed out to purchase the Apple Watch yet, is the reality that all those gadgets “I had to have” ended up in this dust covered box.
I’m left asking myself, “Are wearables just a flash of excitement with no real staying power? Or is it just me? Can I not maintain a relationship with anything apart from my phone? Am I destined to just have passionate flings with wearables, never really committing?”
“The definition of a “fling” is; “a short period of enjoyment or wild behaviour”, and when looking at my history of wearables, it seems I have enjoyed many a passionate tech “flings”.”
But what about everyone else?
With the release of the Apple Watch in April, 2015 could certainly become a pivotal year in the history of wearables.
Early numbers are showing a surge in popularity for other products in the wearable market, not just smartwatches. Fitness trackers and activity devices will continue to dominate, with Fitbit and Jawbone building on their success and growth in 2014.
However for me, the Apple Watch will undoubtedly be the start of the next phase of wearables, and there are two reasons for that:
- the Apple brand is a household name, known for producing high quality products which are consumed/loved by a vast amount of people so there will undoubtedly be a surge in users simply because it’s iOS, boosting the wearable industry and market;
- the device itself is innovating in both hardware and software, the Digital Crown, Taptic Engine and Force Touch features push the boundaries of physical interaction, with the combined functionality of all our favourite apps.
If Apple Watch is the product of a fresh new industry coming into maturity, then perhaps the problem wasn’t me after all. Perhaps the products weren’t quite ready for full lifestyle immersion.
The Apple Watch is basically an integration of all the devices I had over the years, plus a whole host of new exciting developments such as Apple Pay. I think I will find the fitness and health features the most useful initially, as going to the gym and working out is already a big part of my life. Being able to control Spotify from my wrist rather than awkwardly from an arm band will also make an immediate positive impact on a daily basis.
Next step: the Apple Watch test drive
I can imagine how useful — or unuseful — the Apple Watch features will be to my life but I won’t know for sure unless I spend some quality time with it.
So with one eye on the past and these thoughts in mind, I’ve shotgunned the Apple Watch when it arrives in the Blonde office and I’ve planned to spend some time with my new technical buddy, to understand if this will be the product that truly defines what it means to be a “wearable”.
Keep an eye out for my next article — probably titled something like “72 hours with an Apple Watch”, “Apple Watch: better than cats?” or “I’ve dumped my boyfriend for an Apple Watch” — in which I will share all the juicy details from my latest wearable romp, hopefully giving you some insight into whether or not I think it is worth more than a torrid fling.
Follow Caroline on Twitter
Originally published at www.blonde.net on August 27, 2015.
