“In October, Apple updated its Apple Watch software to let apps run on the watch itself instead of working as iPhone extensions, mitigating the absolute interdependence of the initial scenario. The second version of the Watch OS also features new watch faces, improved third-party apps and better overall performance,” Justin Jaffe writes for CNET. “But those improvements were ultimately incremental. And in the meantime, the Watch has seen some fairly meaty price cuts at mainstream retailers like Best Buy.”
MacDailyNews Take: It’s called a loss leader. And it means the Apple Watch is a success, a coveted product “that’ll get them in the doors,” not anything negative as Jaffe intimates. Anyone who implies that a loss leader is anything other than what it is, either has no idea about the basics of retailing or they’re lying about the product in question.
“Though no official invitations have been made yet, Apple’s next big event is rumored to be scheduled for this coming March. Given that the original Apple Watch would be coming up on its first birthday in April 2016, it’s likely that such an event would be focused on its successor,” Jaffe writes. “One widely reported rumor out of South Korea, first sourced by gforgames.com, predicts that the Apple Watch 2’s form factor won’t diverge much, if at all, from the original’s rectangular, iPod Nano-ish essence. And perhaps that’s for the best. According to CNET’s Scott Stein, ‘in terms of craftsmanship, there isn’t a more elegantly made piece of wearable tech’ than the Apple Watch.”
MacDailyNews Take: That is certainly the truth. The Digital Crowns on all of our Apple Watches, by the way, are working as they did the day we got them back on April 24th, so the build quality also reigns supreme.
“Other possibilities being discussed include the ability to track sleep and smart straps that would include extra sensors for tracking fitness,” Jaffe writes. “In fact, Apple CEO Tim Cook hinted in an interview last month that the company could build ‘something adjacent to the watch’ that would be more medically focused and would require US Food and Drug Administration approval. That could be an app, he said, or ‘something else.'”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: One more thing: We’ve already gone through this loss leader crap from Anti-Apple types with the iPhone. How did that turn out?
Shoot the lying messanger.
It’s spelled “messenger”.
Oops, shoot him too.
Happy Holidays 😉
I LIKE THE “ANGER” IN MESSANGER
Have a little temper tantrum you least significant bit.
You must lead a sad,lonely life, being the most insignificant, pointless, retarded unnecessary cretin that was ever born.
That place is already taken by the zune. Talk to you Ina couple of years, ok (though I doubt you’ll be around…)
Hah, I just found my Zune moving. Gears of War edition and everything. It’s actually a really kickass media player, but completely obsolete.
I still use it in the car, the radio doesn’t have an aux input, or Bluetooth, or a cassette deck, but I do have the Zune FM adapter, and 120GB is a lot of storage.
It actually saved my entire library once – I had an accidental format, but since you can move music in both directions, I hooked the Zune up and copied everything off of it. Couldn’t do that with an iPod.
Of course, everyone *knows* that the Zune sucked, but if you’ve ever used one, you know the truth… yet another good product killed by bad marketing, poor exposure, and Steve Ballmer in a dark alley with a baseball bat.
Actually, you *can* do that with an iPod using Senuti.
Why is there no option to give zero stars to such a bigoted comment?
Seriously. What a prick.
You people are ALL alike , had a guy in work look at my watch , gazing in awe , then he says
” so you got the Apple Watch ?” I said yes , then , here it comes ” do ya like it ?” , I said
Sure do !!! He waves his hand at me in disgust and hisses ..😂😂😂⌚️⌚️⌚️
You people cant stand that
Apple just dominates practically every industry it enters !!!! And it goes rite up ur A–.. Merry Christmas 🎅🏻
I agree! I can’t handle minor disappointments in life in a rational manner either! I too think I might be deep enough in the closet to have found all of my Christmas presents! I also have forgotten how many mistakes Steve Jobs made, like the god-awful puck mouse for example, and can only look at what happened in the last 5 minutes to make judgements! I’m confident everyone agrees with me, and that those who don’t are blind sheep for some reason! WE NEED TO TELL THE WORLD ABOUT THESE THINGS TO SAVE THEM ALL OR SOMETHING!
I know several Apple Watch owners, History, and none of them come close to fitting your description in any respect. Therefore, I can only conclude that you were describing yourself and attempting to project it onto others. In the words of Buzz Lightyear, you are a sad, sad, little man.
Melvin, shut the fück up.
Thanks,
The World
I bought one of the on sale Apple Watches as a gift. Pretty sure they sold out shortly after that. I donno. Of course they click bait you with AW2 headline just to tell you the AW1 sales aren’t doing well. The honest truth is you will never know, and Apple designed its reporting category this way on purpose.
If I pick the black 42mm with black stainless steel band, it’s still $1200 for the thing so not that many price cuts,that I see.
Well yeah, but it’s only one tenth the price of the gold model (with a rubber strap, ho ho). These things are disposable items, just like a smart phone. If someone really needs one to make their life complete, they should get the cheapest version and in a few years throw it out and get a new one.
Until they can totally replace a smart phone it doesn’t make sense to spend an exorbitant amount of money on one. Bet’cha this really gets the down votes.
C’mon dweebs, is that all you’ve got?
It’s almost guaranteed as soon as Apple announces AppleWatch 2, the pundits will say how it’s not worth the upgrade because there won’t be that much of an improvement over version one. It may have slightly better battery life along with a faster processor but what more can it really have. What can be added to such a small gadget? Whatever it is I’m sure there will be plenty of detractors as always. What Apple should do is accept trade-ins for users with version one AppleWatches. I see it unlikely for a lot of AppleWatch owners to upgrade so soon for a small improvement without some major incentive. I know I like to keep my watches for a long, long time. I’d never want to have to buy a new watch every couple of years.
It’s not a watch, it’s a computer that happens to also have a watch app. People don’t keep computers “for a long long time”.
I want two things with the new watch, and one wish that I doubt can happen yet:
1: FASTER (really if it’s just faster that’s enough for me to buy a new one).
2: Longer batter life. Tough with point #1, but things keep getting more efficient.
3 (very hard to do now, I know): on-board GPS on the watch so you don’t have to take your phone out for running/biking, etc.
Given Jony Ives’ obsession with circles (rivaling only Little Dot comics) I’m surprised that the Apple Watch isn’t circular.
Apple is not interested in circles. If Apple thought that you needed a round-faced device it would have made one – Apple didn’t; therefore, a round-faced device is nixed. Don’t bother with providing an argument to the square-faced device.
Fred, I think you misread me a bit. You are right. I was just musing. Everything seems to be turning into a circle, the most extreme example of which is the UI for apps on the Apple Watch—it’s all circles, no exceptions. When an Apple Store employee was helping me with my watch, when I said “bubble bath” they knew instantly what I was referring to.
Jony Ive does appear to be obsessed with circles, so it very well may be that the only reason the Apple Watch is not physically a circle is that Jony hasn’t finished figuring out how to do it in hardware.
“Don’t bother with providing an argument to the square-faced device.”
Spoken like a true liberal. So tell me, if the square watch form is so hot, why doesn’t Apple have any watch faces that are square? On a conventional rectangular watch the numerals and indices match the form, but on the Apple Watch they are circular.
So what is your brilliant hypothesis for that?
When observing rectangle vs circle, You can easily note that one is more effective than the other… Otherwise, papers, letters and even books would be circular…
FASTER is what I want.
It’s all about failure cases. Right now if I tell the watch to do something, I have to hang around, keeping the display on, sometimes for like 15 seconds to find out “dictation failed” or “I can help you search for ‘add onions to the grocery list’ on your iPhone.”
If it’s not gonna work, I want it to return a failure message FAST. If it’s gonna be slow, it needs to work closer to 100% of the time.
Dictation has failed on my Apple Watch, but when I dictated a shorter version immediately afterwards, it succeeded. It’s not a problem for me any more, I am just more succinct. There must be an undocumented length limit.
I believe some versions of Apple Watch 1 will remain on sale much like iPhone. This will allow for an even cheaper entry point for people wanting to try it out. Functional sensor bands will also extend the capability of Gen 1 watches. The new watch will likely be faster, but GPS function may be located in one of the new bands.
IMO many would agree the Apple Watch is very much a version 1.0 product, and I would think Apple might well bring a v 2.0 this year addressing a few functions and degrees of functionality that are slightly lacking…
…and then, if the benchmarks that would have wowed year ago are achieved, move toward more like a 2 year upgrade cycle…
….keeping previous models around at whatever prices for who knows how long…
Sorry but calling the price reduction a loss leader doesn’t cut it. B&H also had the watch at $100 off until the 20th and they still have it at $50 off. This price reduction at 2 high volume retailers was to spur sales. These retailers would not be selling at these reduced prices if Apple wasn’t involved in it. I’d bet this was a way for Apple to test the price reduction in order to see how much sales would increase. The watch isn’t selling as good as the fanboys want to believe it is.
I finally bought the Apple Watch because of the reduced price. At $299 it’s getting closer to a more reasonable price but $399 for the low end 42mm was/is too high. I actually paid less than $299 for a new 42mm.
I will say that from my very short time with it the watch does seem to be a very useful companion to the iPhone.
“Sports” watch that you cannot get wet!
For me it’s basic.
Can’t swim, surf, kayak…
… can’t even take it out in heavy rain!
Love the look, some great apps but unusable outdoors.
Mine has been dunked several times with no effect. I wasn’t careful at all as Tim Cook said it was fine in the shower.
Of all the Apple products I have (which is, essentially, all of them), I remain the most “meh” about the Watch. Yeah, craftsmanship is top-notch, but the rest of the watch seems like it’s waiting for a huge software update that is never coming. Siri only hears me correctly about 50% of the time. And given that 90% of the time the Watch is used as a Watch, it’s ridiculous that Apple won’t open up watchfaces to developers.
The design of the watch was and is bad. There were much better proposed designs by many people outside of apple. Most of the excitement came from those that designed what looked to be a bracelet like device. All wondered how in the world apple would pull that off. Well, they didn’t.
Sometimes, even after spending great sums of money in research and development, the CEO has look at a product and say no. The watch, in its current form, should never have been made.
We should not see another watch until the design changes radically from what it is now.
If Apple just sell the watch at a REASONABLE price…