6 ms·

I wonder if there is a technical reason for that or if they aren't ready for possible cannibalisation yet. I was really hoping it wouldn't require a phone at a

I wonder if there is a technical reason for that or if they aren't ready for possible cannibalisation yet. I was really hoping it wouldn't require a phone at all.

askafriend 9y ago
It probably piggy backs off the SIM information from the "Master" device (which is the phone in this case).
- JigglyGigalo 9y ago
  So it has a software SIM? If so it's the first time I've heard of a device with one.
  - et-al 9y ago
    Yup. They call it an eSIM: https://techcrunch.com/2017/09/12/the-cellular-enabled-apple-watch-has-the-sim-built-in/ https://techcrunch.com/2017/09/12/the-cellular-enabled-apple... "The eSIM has to be provisioned via the device itself, which is handy if you want to switch between T-Mobile and AT&T in a hurry, but not handy if you want to switch to a carrier not supported by Apple, or sell your device to someone on a different carrier."
  - mark212 9y ago
    During the demo they described a small chip built in that worked as a SIM so I don't think it's purely software / eSIM.
- signal11 9y ago
  People who want a fully independent Watch will probably be disappointed, but for the use-case of "I want to leave my iPhone at home while I go out for a jog", the fact that the watch uses the same phone number as your iPhone is very good indeed -- having yet another number to manage for the relatively short duration of a jog/swim seems ugly.
gehsty 9y ago
I think it's technical. Apple are fairly comfortable with their own products taking over their own products (iPod -> iphone, and pushing people from mac to iPad). If they thought that the smart watch would cannibalise the phone market I'm fairly sure that they would make sure you didn't need to own an iPhone to use the watch.
- pm90 9y ago
  This is just not right. Apple didn't cannibalize iPod with iPhone: it recognized that people wanted it to build a phone and did just that. Apple didn't cannibalize Mac for iPad: it recognized that people were buying tablets in lieu of PC's and thus invested heavily in making iPad's more user friendly. Having spoken to many Apple engineers, the company is now as corporat-ey as any other BigCo and will NOT actively cannibalize a product unless it sees an expanding/new market.
  - wlesieutre 9y ago
    >it recognized that people were buying tablets in lieu of PC's and thus invested heavily in making iPad's more user friendly. Who was doing that? Before the iPad came out I saw tablets used in exactly one place, and it was a university research project on construction management and coordination between building trades. Even after the iPad came out, the people using them as PC replacements were using them mostly for the same set of tasks like email and web browsing, and (flat iOS 7 redesign aside) the experience for those is basically the same as always. EDIT - I suppose there have been major additions to iOS since then (like multitasking), but I'd argue it's less because they're threatened by users buying a Surface (or whatever crappy HP tablet existed at the time) instead of a Mac, and more because it's the obvious direction that iOS devices have been steadily improving in regardless of the competition. Apple's perfectly happy to eat the Mac's market with it if there are Mac users who can get by on better iPads.
    - KGIII 9y ago
      Maybe some selection bias? Tablets have been in use since at least early Windows XP days. I'm not sure I'd call them common, back then, but they were hardly unique. We used them in the field when collecting data.

I wonder if there is a technical reason for that or if they aren't ready for possible cannibalisation yet. I was really hoping it wouldn't require a phone at all.

askafriend 9y ago

It probably piggy backs off the SIM information from the "Master" device (which is the phone in this case).

JigglyGigalo 9y ago
So it has a software SIM? If so it's the first time I've heard of a device with one.
- et-al 9y ago
  Yup. They call it an eSIM: https://techcrunch.com/2017/09/12/the-cellular-enabled-apple-watch-has-the-sim-built-in/ https://techcrunch.com/2017/09/12/the-cellular-enabled-apple... "The eSIM has to be provisioned via the device itself, which is handy if you want to switch between T-Mobile and AT&T in a hurry, but not handy if you want to switch to a carrier not supported by Apple, or sell your device to someone on a different carrier."
- mark212 9y ago
  During the demo they described a small chip built in that worked as a SIM so I don't think it's purely software / eSIM.
signal11 9y ago
People who want a fully independent Watch will probably be disappointed, but for the use-case of "I want to leave my iPhone at home while I go out for a jog", the fact that the watch uses the same phone number as your iPhone is very good indeed -- having yet another number to manage for the relatively short duration of a jog/swim seems ugly.

gehsty 9y ago

I think it's technical. Apple are fairly comfortable with their own products taking over their own products (iPod -> iphone, and pushing people from mac to iPad). If they thought that the smart watch would cannibalise the phone market I'm fairly sure that they would make sure you didn't need to own an iPhone to use the watch.

pm90 9y ago
This is just not right. Apple didn't cannibalize iPod with iPhone: it recognized that people wanted it to build a phone and did just that. Apple didn't cannibalize Mac for iPad: it recognized that people were buying tablets in lieu of PC's and thus invested heavily in making iPad's more user friendly. Having spoken to many Apple engineers, the company is now as corporat-ey as any other BigCo and will NOT actively cannibalize a product unless it sees an expanding/new market.
- wlesieutre 9y ago
  >it recognized that people were buying tablets in lieu of PC's and thus invested heavily in making iPad's more user friendly. Who was doing that? Before the iPad came out I saw tablets used in exactly one place, and it was a university research project on construction management and coordination between building trades. Even after the iPad came out, the people using them as PC replacements were using them mostly for the same set of tasks like email and web browsing, and (flat iOS 7 redesign aside) the experience for those is basically the same as always. EDIT - I suppose there have been major additions to iOS since then (like multitasking), but I'd argue it's less because they're threatened by users buying a Surface (or whatever crappy HP tablet existed at the time) instead of a Mac, and more because it's the obvious direction that iOS devices have been steadily improving in regardless of the competition. Apple's perfectly happy to eat the Mac's market with it if there are Mac users who can get by on better iPads.
  - KGIII 9y ago
    Maybe some selection bias? Tablets have been in use since at least early Windows XP days. I'm not sure I'd call them common, back then, but they were hardly unique. We used them in the field when collecting data.