After the commoditization of phones and tablets, companies are desperate to find the next big thing. Some believe that people really want smart watches. The only problem is that smart watches are stupid.
Smart watches are like the old 1980s Casio calculator watch but without the tiny buttons and sightly smarter. Take the Galaxy Gear for example: One huge Android-based slab of metal and glass with colorful wristbands. Oversized, underpowered—a device with no clear objective and very limited functionality. Sorry, but you are not smart, you stupid watch.
The Galaxy Gear is not the first smart watch. The first modern smart watch is the Pebble Watch, which was a failure perhaps because no regular consumer gives a damn about a crowd-funded watch. But before that there was the Microsoft's SPOT watch, which was another failure. I suspect the same will happen with the Galaxy Gear. Because it's equally ultra-nerd-only stupid.
Another one is the Qualcomm Toq, as in tic-toc. How stupid is that?
It also looks huge, uglyish, and not terribly useful. And offensively stupid.
They are not the last smart watches you are going to see. Other electronics manufacturers are trying to push these things down our throats, even while nobody really asked for them. Apple, Microsoft/Nokia, Google—all of them are rumored to be working or thinking about these devices. No matter who makes them, I can't imagine any of these rumored gimmick-o-watches being especially different from the ones above. They will all be 50 shades of stupid.
Can these things be desired by the non-ultra-nerd consumer market? I doubt it. There's nothing that most people need in these eyesores—unlike smartphones and tablets, which are incredibly useful and convenient devices. The latter have clearly purposes. But these thingamajigs? Why should I need a smart watch except for especial uses like running? They will not work as a fashion accessory either, unless your preferred fashion is Stupid Hipster With Stupid Watch.
But perhaps I'm mistaken and these will be as big as the A-bomb.
Do you want to be like Dick Tracy and carry a smartwatch on your wrist the size of Captain America's shield? Do you seriously think that these things will catch on? Everyone in Gizmodo except Eric Limer think they are stupid. Are we wrong? Tell us in the comments.