@Git Em SteveDave loves this guy->★: "yeah, but my watch is solar powered and isn't controlled by Verizon."

So, were you the guy lugging around the sundial at the Gizmodo meatup?

@taodude: As an Amish person (Mennonite, actually), I have my problems with cell phones as well. But at least it doesn't scrape against the side of my face if all I'm trying to do is pick my nose.

@Lupus_Yonderboy: Well, that's the thing. It's like people having a post outside their house to tie up their horse because it's quaint and cool even though the world has moved on to horseless carriages. And sure, there's a lot of "cool" watches. But the coolness seems almost desperate to me at this point, an attempt to shoehorn in even more precious gems, and hip ideas. It's only because watches are anachronistic relics that so much effort is made by talented designers to keep them on life support. Otherwise, everyone would have to admit that their clammy old Timex has basically joined their grandfather's typewriter and grandmother's bustle in tech heaven.

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Then consider the fact that my cell phone gets nervous being within five feet of any water, so my waterproof to 300 meters Nixon watch wins that battle outright.

There's also the leash factor with a cell phone. Do you REALLY want people to be able to get ahold of you absolutely all the time? I can understand most of the time, or almost all the time, but ALL the time? When you don't want your employees calling you on the weekend, but would still like to know what time it is, I'm going to go with the watch over the phone.

Lastly, there's something to be said for the style of a slick watch. A good looking watch can make you stand out in a crowd when worn right.

Oh, and even more lastly, a watch doesn't sit near your crotch-al region and zap your gonads for hours at a time with radiation either...

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Function...

the issue sounds to me like urgency of knowledge, as in how much do you need to know what time it is all the time, instantly?

How many people really need regular, instant time checks that can only be satisfied with a watch? There are now enough other sources of time that dedicated devices tethered to limbs providing a singular function are unnecessary. People might as well be carrying around egg timers strapped to their arms, or the instruction manual for an Ikea bookshelf.

Sure, my cell phone can't get wet, but I've had no problem learning the time when I am. (If you're diving and monitoring O2, yeah, wear a watch).

As for the leash, how many watch wearers aren't also carrying a cell? It's not like they're emancipated from their leash, they've simply supplemented it with a handcuff providing redundant information.

And, you know, you could always put it on silent and not answer. Or go without both.

But the comparison isn't cell or watch, since cells have won. I think the first 5 year dissemination of cell phones matches the first 50 year dissemination of land lines. It's nostalgia for watches, a reluctance to let go.

As for fashion...

The fashion, as I see it, is like the tail of a comet. All the history, design, and fashion of watches trails the nucleus of function that drives their use. Sure, some are beautiful and cool, but we probably respond to them because they're rooted in a past in which their function was essential. As fashionable as they are, would you wear one that didn't work?

If it were mandatory, or a precondition of, say, house arrest, you would rue the day you ever put one on.

Free yourself, brother, take off that watch, throw it in the ocean, mock your mortality, silence the swiss action marking the evaporation of life one tick at a time, and run naked into the hills holding nothing but your cell phone in one hand (on silent) and a thermos in the other!!!

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Beer?

Coffee.

Beer?

Cof-fee!

Be-er?

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Now I know what to buy Plaxico Burress for Chrismukkah.

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ouch, you should buy him some free gun handling lessons too. Like always have the safety on.

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Why is everyone so negative?

Can't a highly-paid athlete with no marketable skills save the ability to catch a ball and run the 100m dash in under 10 seconds go out drinking at a nightclub the night before an important game with an unlicensed loaded firearm concealed in the elastic waistband of his sweatpants in violation of a well-publicized state law and in direct contravention of both his employment contract and morality clauses of the NFL to which he expressly consented with the paid advice of highly-competent legal counsel in exchange for compensation far in excess of all but the top 1% of the world's population?

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Best. Post. Ever.

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