Siri thinks it's about time the Apple Watch arrived. Photo: Apple
The tech world is eagerly awaiting the arrival of the Apple Watch and Siri, it seems, isn’t any different. With the launch of Apple’s debut wearable just a month away, the iOS virtual assistant is apparently just as obsessed with the device as we are — as a simple “What are you doing now, Siri?” question will attest.
Check out some of the amusingly geeky responses below.
If you thought Continuity was annoying before, just wait till it lands on your wrist. Photo: Rated WTF
We’re all looking forward to the Apple Watch, but there’s one thing I’m definitely not looking forward to: the ability to answer phone calls on my wrist. And this clever video shows exactly why.
Are Apple Watch apps an 18-karat opportunity for indie developers? Photo: Apple Photo: Apple
With high development costs and uncertain prospects, now is a risky time to build Apple Watch apps. But like many other indie developers, I’m working on one anyway.
The Apple Watch gold rush is about more than money.
Where no camera crew has gone before. Photo: ABC News
Apple rarely gives tours of its facilities, but it showed ABC News the inner workings of its top secret health lab for the purpose of hyping the upcoming Apple Watch.
Located in an unassuming lot near its Cupertino headquarters on 1 Infinite Loop, Apple employees have been working out for years in secret to collect valuable health and fitness data.
Will you read the news on Apple Watch? Photo: Apple
Developers are making a mad dash to finish their first Apple Watch apps before the wearable goes on sale in April. Yahoo is among those looking to make a big splash with must-have apps, and when it comes to bringing you the news, the company is hoping you’ll want it in bite-size chunks.
Yahoo’s Nick D’Aloisio sat down with Bloomberg today to talk about how digesting the news is going to change once you slap a tiny Apple Watch screen to your wrist. To bring long-form news to wearers, D’Aloisio says Yahoo Digest will focus on giving you the most salient pieces of a story, accompanied by little visual elements called atoms.
Watch Nick explain the news revolution Yahoo plans to unleash:
Apple Watch - useful, or just a trend? Photo: Apple
One of the biggest questions surrounding the Apple Watch is how well its value will stand the test of time. Will Apple offer some sort of upgrade program for the opulent 10K Edition model? Will the tech-laden timepiece on your wrist be obsolete in two years?
Gazelle is banking on there being a thriving market for used Apple Watches as early adopters upgrade, much like there already is for used iPhones and iPads. The company announced its new trade-in program today ahead of the Watch’s April release.
Countdown to your date with the Reaper. Photo: Rehabstudio
Tim Cook touted Apple Watch’s supreme timekeeping capabilities at last week’s Spring Forward event, but Rehabstudio plans to give wearers a unique look on time — by counting down to their death.
Life Clock is an upcoming Apple Watch app that’s like the reverse of an activity tracker. Rather than giving you a readout of actions you did in the past, Life Clock tracks all the positive and negative actions you take throughout the day to calculate when you’re going to kick the bucket.
This Apple Watch is brick-tastic! Photo: Chris McVeigh
Are you still trying to work out how to scrape together enough money to buy a $349 Apple Watch, let alone a $10,000-plus Apple Watch Edition? If so, an answer could be the neat solution dreamed up by Chris McVeigh: Build one out of Lego.
Rather than waiting until April 24, by following master builder McVeigh’s instructions you can have the joy of building a Lego Apple Watch from the privacy of your own home, even putting up “Do Not Enter” signs and making your spouse sign nondisclosure agreements to achieve that fully authentic Apple effect.
We got our first look at Apple Watch knockoffs at CES earlier this year, and while those junky devices were about as basic as they could be, more advanced knockoffs have hit the market since.
From right out of China, behold this shameless Apple Watch clone running Android:
Disgraced app developer Belle Gibson was profiled on many TV shows, including "Australia's No. 1 breakfast show." Photo: Sunrise Photo: Sunrise
An Australian indie developer who was flown to Cupertino by Apple to work on an Apple Watch app alongside giants like Twitter and BMW has come under fire for reportedly falsifying a story about suffering from terminal cancer.
Created by healthy-living proponent Belle Gibson, iPhone food app The Whole Pantry has been pulled from the App Store, while an accompanying Apple Watch app has vanished from Apple’s list of “coming soon” apps for its upcoming wearable.
Keep your Apple Watch alive for longer with Nomad Pod. Photo: Nomad
It seemed like it took accessory makers forever to make battery pack cases for the iPhone, but companies are wasting no time with Apple Watch accessories, and the first portable battery for Apple’s wearable is already here.
Nomad introduced its answer for the Apple Watch’s battery woes with the Pod, a small portable power station for your Apple Watch that will keep it ticking well past the 18 hour battery life Tim Cook promised.
You know that old saying about buses: you wait ages for one and then several turn up at the same time? Well, according to analyst Timothy Arcuri from Cowen & Co, the same is about to prove true of Apple Watches.
In a new note to clients, Arcuri claims that an Apple Watch version 2.0 will turn up later this year and that, unlike its predecessor, it won’t require an iPhone to be tethered to it in order to work. Arcuri also thinks this will be Apple’s first device to boast an OLED screen exclusively supplied by Samsung.
Is that an Apple Watch band box sitting on the table? Photo: Apple
Apple might have just leaked some packaging for the upcoming Apple Watch.
The Apple Jobs website received a nice update today — including a new image of what appears to be some of the Apple Watch packaging that will hit Apple Store shelves April 24. The boxes look too thin to hold the Apple Watch and its inductive charger, so they’re more likely just for bands, but we couldn’t help but notice they look just like Swatch’s iconic boxes.
We know which part of the store we're, err, Watching. Photo: Macotakara
Considering that the Apple Watch goes on sale in a little over one month, Apple has still provided relatively few details about how exactly it’s going to be selling its upscale wearable devices.
Some images posted by Japanese Apple blog Macotakara offer a few hints, however. The photos show an Apple Watch booth or mini-store at the upmarket Isetan department store in Shinjuku, Tokyo. The sign reads “WATCH: Coming Soon.”
Having spent more than a year throwing smartwatch concepts a wall, only to discover that very few of them stick, Samsung’s taking a bit of a break from the wearables game.
But a newly-unearthed patent suggests that the South Korean tech giant could come back with a vengeance, thanks to a ripoff Apple concept bold new interface design based around an iPod-style rotating bezel. The idea would be that this rotating bezel could allow users to scroll through different apps, lists and menus without having to obscure the miniature display with their finger.
So, yeah, it’s basically the Apple Watch’s digital crown idea — only “different” enough to not be a direct analog.
Christy Turlington Burns wants you to buy an Apple Watch. Screenshot: Cult of Mac
During last week’s Apple Watch event, Apple brought our 46-year-old Glamour supermodel Christy Turlington Burns to stand alongside Tim Cook and explain a little bit about how she’s using the Apple Watch to train.
After the event, Vogue caught up with Turlington Burns to talk to her in more detail about what it’s actually like to use the Apple Watch. And while there’s no new details, it’s still interesting to hear someone who is so influential in the fashion world have such a “gee whiz” moment about Apple’s new wearable.
This week: we break down all that we know (and still don’t!) about the Apple Watch, and Leander says why the $10,000+ gold editions are totally opposite Steve Jobs’ vision for the company he co-founded. Plus: Apple quietly kills their iconic glowing logo; what we love and don’t about the new Macbook, and why some are not thrilled with its new “butterfly” keyboard; and with HBO Now coming exclusively to Apple… could big AppleTV changes be on the horizon?
Our thanks for Freshbooks for supporting this episode. FreshBooks is the easy-to-use invoicing software designed to help small business owners get organized, save time invoicing and get paid faster. It also makes tax time a cinch. Get started now with a 30-day free trial.
Apple put an unbelievable amount of care into crafting its smartwatch. Photo: Apple
No Apple fan is oblivious to the huge amount of science, technique, expertise and care that Apple puts into every product. Apple doesn’t design its products the way it does because it has to, but because it is compelled on a profoundly spiritual level to do so.
For the Apple Watch, Apple has taken that care to the next level. And if you want to see just how much artistry, skill, craft and passion has gone into creating the latest revolutionary Apple product, there’s no better way to spend the weekend than reading about the behind-the-scenes manufacturing process of the Apple Watch.
Amazon, coming soon to your Apple Watch. Photo: TechCrunch
Amazon is in the business of making it as easy as possible to spend money in their online store. It should surprise no one, then, that Amazon is already developing an Apple Watch app, which will let customers search for products and purchase them with a single click, all from a user’s wrist.
One of the biggest selling points of the Apple Watch might be that it will free you from the attention-sucking clutches of your iPhone. A new study by the Transport Research Laboratory in Wokingham, UK, found that using your Apple Watch while driving is significantly more distracting that your iPhone 6.
Safety advocate firm SmartWitness is calling for a ban on smartwatches after the study discovered that drivers reading a text message on their smartwatch take more than a half second longer to respond to an emergency than someone reading on a smartphone.
Apple placed another app that can’t be deleted on everyone’s iPhones with the release of iOS 8.2. For now, the Apple Watch companion app is just a useless tease if you don’t have an Apple Watch yet, but iOS developer Hamza Sood has cracked it open and given us a preview of what the app will look like once you get your watch.
Sood tweeted some interesting tidbits about the app, revealing its beautiful dark theme along with details about the settings, how to add friends, mute notifications, and other interesting features.
It's been an Apple Watch kind of week, right? Cover Design: Stephen Smith
It’s been a crazy, Apple Watch-filled week, with Apple’s Spring Forward event on Monday fueling quite a bit of energy both here at Cult of Mac an on the internet itself.
We’ve got our very own head man in charge, Leander Kahney, writing up four insightful op-eds on Cupertino’s latest foray into the luxury watch market with that stunningly high-priced Apple Watch Edition. Enjoy four long-form essays worth reading. In addition, we’ll check out what your favorite apps will look like, how the new ResearchKit may change medical research forever, what your Apple Watch purchase might get in the analog watch world, and the seven biggest shockers at the Spring Forward event itself.
All this, plus much more, in this week’s Cult of Mac Magazine, available for your free download and no-cost subscription right now.
Mickey Mouse is already on Android Wear. Photo: Killian Bell/Cult of Android
The Mickey Mouse face that ships with Apple Watch, and has twice been demonstrated by Apple at its Watch events, is now unofficially available on Android Wear — complete with moving hands and feet.
The Apple Watch isn’t available for preorder yet, but that hasn’t stopped accessory makers from proudly showcasing their wares for the upcoming device.
We still don’t know if Apple will let Apple Watch accessories connect directly into the smartwatch’s mysterious port, but there will be plenty of fancy stands and even some third-party bands.
Here are 12 Apple Watch accessories to trick out your fancy new wearable: