The Apple Watch launch event was a spectacle. Thousands of journalists and industry luminaries lined up for entry into the auditorium, giving it almost a red carpet feel (though without the silly "who are you wearing?" questions). Once inside, the crowd hung on every word, with even journalists applauding each new announcement (something I don't believe they teach at J-school).
The crowd oohed and aahed at each new device - ooh a gold MacBook, a pretty aluminum Apple Watch and, ultimately, the gold Edition Watch.
But for me, one thing was missing. Compelling User Stories. How were these Apple Watches going to solve real problems or drive new behaviors.
"That's unfair" was the retort of the fan boys and girls. "When the iPhone launched, no one knew what it would be used for" was a common refrain.
But that's not quite true. The iPhone promised a computer in your pocket, with full Internet access wherever you went. And it offered features we had become accustomed to in other devices - an iPod, a phone, a GPS (the camera came later).
"What about the iPad?" was another common refrain. Well, the iPad added some core functionality - a larger screen for surfing or reading, but not a lot more. In fact, one of the weaknesses of the iPad model is that it relies heavily on 3rd party app developers to drive innovative functionality. And, to be frank, as an early adopter, I haven't seen a lot of innovation from those developers.
One of the first innovative products for the iPad was the News Corp tablet-based newspaper, The Daily. The Daily, leveraging all the capabilities of the iPad, held the promise for immersive, innovative advertising. But most of the ads were simply boring. It turns out that ad agencies were ill-equipped to create immersive experiences what they were good at were creating static display ads and video ads for television. So, that's mostly what we got in The Daily.
Fast-forward nearly five years and we see that the big challenge for the iPad is that upgrade cycles are long. Since app developers are not pushing the limits of the hardware, the version you bought 3 years ago is still just fine for the primarily tasks of reading and browsing. My iPad 3 does everything I need. And my wife only recently upgraded from her first gen iPad, only because Apple wouldn't allow that version to upgrade to the latest version of iOS. The app ecosystem around the iPad remains largely focused on reading apps, along with more expansive views of phone apps (calendar, mail, social media). App developers have failed the test of driving new use cases that Apple had not imagined.
Which brings me back to the Apple Watch. In the demos, the greatest benefit that Apple shared was "YOU DON'T HAVE TO TAKE IT OUT OF YOUR POCKET!!!"
OK. There's some value in that. If you get frequent notifications, you might find value in glancing at your wrist, rather than reaching into a pocket or purse. Then again, I shut off most notifications as I don't want constant interruptions for low priorities. For high priority alerts I am fine reaching into my pocket.
I've always felt that the wrist was not the most obvious place for a mobile device. The reason why Dick Tracy had a wristwatch phone was that, at the time, a watch was the only "device" most people carried (Maxwell Smart's shoe phone came later). No one at the time envisioned us all carrying a powerful computer in our pocket.
Wearables have the potential to impact the way that we work. I'm not sure that a wrist-based disruption device is the answer. Small screens have limited use cases, other than for quick alerts. I think there's more potential for an in-ear device ("smart earbuds") that can provide more useful information. And, perhaps I'll be pleasantly surprised by innovative apps that emerge, but I'm a skeptic for now.
