Quick bit of History The last smartwatch (and generally considered the first ) I had was a Timex Datalink from the 80’s. It was fun, I could store phone numbers in it and set alarms with tiny memos notes. For the time it was pretty kickass, I loved this watch and bought it a few times over as it was not very rugged. It had some upgrades but pretty much disappeared from the stores after a few years. Once I bought my first mobile phone it became totally obsolete, my phone did everything the watch could do and more (I played the snakes game far too much) so it went info the tech junk box. Tech love is often a fleeting thing, I do remember it well so when I noticed a post about a new smartwatch from a group of makers I had to give it a look.
Pebble, Kickstarter and me..
The Pebble was the very first kickstarter I joined. It was a leap of faith for me, after all it was just an idea and many miles to go before it actually became a production ready item. I gave it some quick thought, they had NOTHING more than an idea and I could lose my money in this. Still I never cared for the amount to tech junk that had been dumped into the market from companies that DRM the hell out of it. Limited and junky tech really ticks me off. You can see where they left out an improvement for the next version. Notice I wrote “left out” it seems that making an item is less about making the very best item that can be made and more about getting you hooked so you buy the next item. So I why not support a group of makers that are trying to build something new.
So I put up the cash and got the early bird tier for 99 bucks.
I’ll toss up a link for the updates. It’s better to read it on the site. I am pretty much just waiting and reading the updates and hoping my trust has not been misplaced.
LONG AFTER……..I finally get this in the mail
The Pebble Unboxing
Some thoughts
I like the pebble and the best function is a tie between the messaging service (which you really need to be selective about) and the remote control of my phones audible library. None of the other apps have broken out of the pack as of yet. Still it but it does have some stuff to overcome.
That plastic band is awful UPDATE: turns out I am far from the only one hated it. So I joined the WIDE BODY kickstarter for silicone and leather band options. I picked leather.
The pebble apps really need a store. Going from seldom spoken of web pages for new apps is not the way to do this. UPDATE: I see more on the Android pages now for Pebble apps.
That special charging cable… I misplaced it somewhere and didn’t order another one till today. I would for preferred a micro usb cable but they wanted to waterproof as best as they could so they went with the magnetic contact option.
The pebble watch reached 10 million and put kickstarter on the map. It really did change things for Makers and companies are now seeing that the Smartwatch may have a market. More importantly it’s opened up things for other kickstarter projects for people to get ideas funded. I am glad to be apart of that with my little leap of faith.
Sean O’Connell @TechSean
Leave a Reply