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What if the project is actually honest. They are using a generic watch manufactured by some Chinese company, which means almost visually identical watches alre

by deletes 13y ago

What if the project is actually honest. They are using a generic watch manufactured by some Chinese company, which means almost visually identical watches already exist on the market. They value they are adding are the custom operating system, apps and connectivity. EDIT: I encourage anyone to comment.

estel 13y ago
I could entirely believe that to be the case, but the creator's alleged responses on the comments page would seem to cast doubt on him at least telling the truth about that.
lanaius 13y ago
They have a lot of shots of hardware design and testing that at most charitable strongly imply they built the hardware from the bottom up. Having done so and then being intentionally vague about any of the hardware is offsetting. That's not to mention the fact that the ONLY stretch goals are about making more apps for the watch. If you're serious about building a smartwatch you better offer people a damn good reason to buy it, not sit on your ass waiting for people to pay you to make the thing useful.
Nursie 13y ago
If they said that, fine. It's not what's said though. They make claims to be the hardware developer, with lots of pictures of circuitry and apparent prototyping. It smells like a scam.
drzaiusapelord 13y ago
I don't recall the name of the product but there's this little bluetooth bracelet you can buy that got big on kickstarter. Turns out that its almost identical to one at alibaba.com. The guy running the kickstarter said that they more or less copied the physical design but modified the internals a bit for better BT connectivity and to a newer version of BT. This could be going on here with the Z3 watch. Instead, we have an out of control witchhunt. I think it makes a lot more financial sense to modify a proven design than to start from scratch. If you're on kick starter, you probably don't have deep pockets and an engineering department to begin with. Not to mention that hardware is kinda a commodity now. Good software is the hard nut to crack. Think CM vs Touchwiz on the same phone.
- Nursie 13y ago
  >> This could be going on here with the Z3 watch. Instead, we have an out of control witchhunt. I think it makes a lot more financial sense to modify a proven design than to start from scratch. Right, except in this case the guy claims never to have heard of it and to be making stuff from scratch, has lots of pictures of prototyping and implies it was all developed in-house, spammed his own comments section repeatedly for hours and hours with a bunch of non-answers to questions people had raised then claimed he'd been hacked and that wasn't him (but still didn't answer any questions)... Basically acting very shady. I sure as hell wouldn't be giving him any money.
  - deletes 13y ago
    Probably he wanted to distance himself away from similar products. It certainly didn't help him to never mention that the watch housing is not(probably, why would he then make the same design) manufactured in-house. As for being hacked, maybe he was hacked( internet can become very vengeful for almost no reason )and that person/competitor succeeded discrediting the project.
    - Nursie 13y ago
      See this comment - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6862280 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6862280 It appears that the PCB is even the same one as in the other watch. I'd have no issue whatsoever with a KS that said "we found a pretty cool watch and we want to make it more awesome with some hardware tweaks and our own ultra-cool software stack!" But that doesn't seem to be what's happening here. >> maybe he was hacked( internet can become very vengeful for almost no reason )and that person/competitor succeeded discrediting the project. It's certainly possible, though it seems that the communication in the repeatedly spammed (and then denied) message was similar in style and content to the guy's previous comms and even if you ignore that he hasn't given any answers to his backers' questions.
      - deletes 13y ago
        >>All this power is packed into our compact smartwatch without sacrificing power consumption. It’s a beautiful balance between the power processing and the power management of our dual processor architectural design.<< That is pretty misleading. I will set this to remind me in march or so and we will see the resolution( in case it's backed ).

by deletes 13y ago

estel 13y ago

I could entirely believe that to be the case, but the creator's alleged responses on the comments page would seem to cast doubt on him at least telling the truth about that.

lanaius 13y ago

They have a lot of shots of hardware design and testing that at most charitable strongly imply they built the hardware from the bottom up. Having done so and then being intentionally vague about any of the hardware is offsetting. That's not to mention the fact that the ONLY stretch goals are about making more apps for the watch. If you're serious about building a smartwatch you better offer people a damn good reason to buy it, not sit on your ass waiting for people to pay you to make the thing useful.

Nursie 13y ago

If they said that, fine. It's not what's said though. They make claims to be the hardware developer, with lots of pictures of circuitry and apparent prototyping. It smells like a scam.

drzaiusapelord 13y ago

I don't recall the name of the product but there's this little bluetooth bracelet you can buy that got big on kickstarter. Turns out that its almost identical to one at alibaba.com. The guy running the kickstarter said that they more or less copied the physical design but modified the internals a bit for better BT connectivity and to a newer version of BT. This could be going on here with the Z3 watch. Instead, we have an out of control witchhunt. I think it makes a lot more financial sense to modify a proven design than to start from scratch. If you're on kick starter, you probably don't have deep pockets and an engineering department to begin with. Not to mention that hardware is kinda a commodity now. Good software is the hard nut to crack. Think CM vs Touchwiz on the same phone.

Nursie 13y ago
>> This could be going on here with the Z3 watch. Instead, we have an out of control witchhunt. I think it makes a lot more financial sense to modify a proven design than to start from scratch. Right, except in this case the guy claims never to have heard of it and to be making stuff from scratch, has lots of pictures of prototyping and implies it was all developed in-house, spammed his own comments section repeatedly for hours and hours with a bunch of non-answers to questions people had raised then claimed he'd been hacked and that wasn't him (but still didn't answer any questions)... Basically acting very shady. I sure as hell wouldn't be giving him any money.
- deletes 13y ago
  Probably he wanted to distance himself away from similar products. It certainly didn't help him to never mention that the watch housing is not(probably, why would he then make the same design) manufactured in-house. As for being hacked, maybe he was hacked( internet can become very vengeful for almost no reason )and that person/competitor succeeded discrediting the project.
  - Nursie 13y ago
    See this comment - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6862280 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6862280 It appears that the PCB is even the same one as in the other watch. I'd have no issue whatsoever with a KS that said "we found a pretty cool watch and we want to make it more awesome with some hardware tweaks and our own ultra-cool software stack!" But that doesn't seem to be what's happening here. >> maybe he was hacked( internet can become very vengeful for almost no reason )and that person/competitor succeeded discrediting the project. It's certainly possible, though it seems that the communication in the repeatedly spammed (and then denied) message was similar in style and content to the guy's previous comms and even if you ignore that he hasn't given any answers to his backers' questions.
    - deletes 13y ago
      >>All this power is packed into our compact smartwatch without sacrificing power consumption. It’s a beautiful balance between the power processing and the power management of our dual processor architectural design.<< That is pretty misleading. I will set this to remind me in march or so and we will see the resolution( in case it's backed ).