Switzerland is trusted for design of watches. Apple is trusted for design of computerized devices. And the 18 carat gold edition will certainly be more expensive than $350 for those that like a status symbol.

For sure this first generation watch needs an iPhone for some of it's features. But then the original iPod needed an Apple Mac for it's first generation, and that didn't stop it from becoming a huge hit product. More than the iPod, most people that might be early adopters of an Apple Watch will already be iPhone owners.

I doubt I'll be buying one either. But I do quite like the fitness feature. And I can see there is a big market there.

What's this "leave the office" and adding 5-10 minutes bit? As soon as you stand up, your 5 minutes starts, and it only ends when you sit down again. Walking down the corridor counts. Walking down and up the stairs if your office isn't on the ground floor counts extra.
Total time required = 5 minutes.

Besides, even shorter periods will help. I believe Apples Watch gamification of fitness targets one minute of standing/walking for each hour of sitting. Which would certainly be an improvement for a lot of office workers.

Going to talk to colleagues in person rather than using phones or email every once in a while is a good way to get moving whilst still working.

You're accusing me of hyping an obscure possibility, saying that a hypothetical threat may not be happening in significant numbers. And in the same paragraph presenting that fingerprint hack as a serious threat.

Come back when you want to be serious.

Huh? TFA doesn't say anything about one-off codes.

NFC certainly is both hackable and is actually hacked on a day to day basis. That's why your bank has probably set a limit on your daily NFC transactions. You may not have hit it yet.

Search Google for NFC fraud.

Apple's system provides a higher level of security.

I haven't ever had any fraudulent transactions on my credit card. That doesn't mean credit cards are secure. It's just means personal experience isn't data.

I'm also in Europe, and there was a report on BBC Radio 4 about "phantom" transactions with NFC cards. And if they are covering it, this isn't an obscure possibility.

Here's the first result that comes up for NFC fraud on Google. There are many more if you want to do your own research.
http://www.channel4.com/news/m...

The Apple system isn't susceptible to this though. Both because it negotiates one off payment codes from the payment processors, and because you need to approve a payment at the time of purchase with your fingerprint.

If you're going to sell a smartwatch, the first thing you need to do is make is a great watch. Which it looks like they've done. Than you need a compelling feature that an ordinary watch can't do. That's the fitness facility. If fitness were your thing rather than music, then you might find this awesome, whilst being less impressed at the time of the original iPod.

A smartwatch will never replace a phone, any more than a phone replaces a laptop. They are different categories of device. The iPod DID replace the Nomad.

Plenty of people will want the smaller phone. I doubt they've abandoned that form factor. Perhaps they'll be on a 2 year cycle, smaller device next year, lager ones the year after. After all most people replace their smartphones on a 2 year cycle as that's the way the typical contract goes.

Stop blaming the victims.

You're making the mistake of thinking this is the same system. It's not. It's far more secure than your Android NFC, and even more so than credit and debit cards.

http://www.apple.com/iphone-6/...

Perhaps you should watch or read before you comment. You make the mistake of thinking that there's only one way to do an NFC payment system. Apple's payment system is indeed new, and does away with all the known security holes of your Android phone.

Apple's system isn't simply an NFC chip as used in payment cards in Europe. It gets a one off payment code from VISA or Mastercard or whoever for each transaction, using the device ID and TouchID. Unlike your device, a hacker can't just sniff this protocol and misuse it.

It's not skepticism, it's denialism. Skeptics stop making an argument when it's shown how they are wrong. Deniers keep on repeating it.

She never entered my head let along made it into my post. I'm talking about the AGW deniers that post here. The mainstay argument is saying that there hasn't been any warming in (NOW-1998) years, regardless of how many times it's pointed out that cherry picking an outlier and drawing a straight line to the current year does not a trend make, nad no matter how many times El Nino is explained it never sinks in. That's not skepticism, that's denial, ignorance and intellectual dishonesty.

It's not a caricature, it's a fact. I guess you're one of them, huh.

Sadly it'll be a while before they can be expected to run for decades. The last one ran for 76 days. And in these early experimental days it's vital to be collecting data, and to adjust parameters based on experience, so it's either radio or cable attachment. If I were the patient I know which I'd prefer.

As to other forms of radio, you just want something off the shelf. At this stage you don't want to be inventing something custom. That's not where to spend development time and expense.

I certainly wouldn't expect the doctors and engineers to stop improving at the time they inserted the heart. I can certainly imagine that they can improve their responses to changes in the body over the months and years to follow.

But what the fuck anyway? Why is this discussion even taking this path. Here's a fucking breakthrough that could be life saving for millions of people in the future. And we're quibbling about wifi security?!

Who is John Galt?