[Editor's Note: This was originally posted on the Embedded Master]
I found my wristwatch the other day, and I realized I have not used it for more than ten years. I originally stopped wearing the watch (and rings) when I suffered from an acute case of tendonitis in my wrists. However, I never went back to wearing a watch on my wrist because I found another way to carry the time and date with me – the humble pocket watch – except this pocket watch also doubles as a mobile phone and offers a slew of other useful functions to boot. This got me wondering, do people still wear wristwatches? Is there a correlation between age of the person and whether they wear a wristwatch? What are the reasons that people do or do not wear wristwatches?
I think the answers to these questions may provide some useful insights to embedded developers about making assumptions. HP’s current plans to complete a prototype of a “Dick Tracy” watch within a year suggest that these questions might not be so silly and frivolous. According to the CNN article, the U.S. military plans to test the prototype with a small group of soldiers; the watch may eliminate the need for soldiers to carry cumbersome gear and backup batteries. The article mentions that the watch will use a plastic display and flexible solar panels.
It is not clear that the wristwatch prototype would be able to do anything better than a smart cell phone except that the user can wear it on their wrist instead of somewhere else on their body. Because this watch will be worn on the wrist, the size of the display is necessarily limited; otherwise the watch could become a safety hazard if it is significantly larger than the user’s wrist size. In addition to the constrained display size, there are not a lot of options for providing the user a comprehensive input capability to support the implied sophisticated integrated electronics.
I suspect developing this prototype will cost a large sum of money and engineering resources, and the fact that the money is available for this project makes me wonder if I have underestimated the purported advantage that a wristwatch from factor offers over the form factor flexibility for a cell phone/pocket watch that can be secured to the user in a myriad of ways.
So do you wear a wristwatch? Do you wear one only under certain circumstances? What are your reasons for wearing or not wearing a wristwatch?
If you would like to suggest questions for future posts, please contact me at Embedded Insights.