Hyper-Swatch
I have a fair amount of respect for Walter Mossberg, the Wall Street Journal’s personal technology reviewer. He tends to pay close attention to the basic sensibility and usability of a device, rather than being blinded by the bullet points. Yesterday’s review of the new Fossil Palm watch is a great example–he confirms that the PDA aspect of it is dorky and impractical, but is intrigued by its incidental ability to dynamically change the virtual “watch face”.
Swatch really pioneered the concept of the wristwatch as a downmarket fashion accessory that you could swap to fit your mood and outfit. (I’ve heard that in the interests of keeping their designs interesting and fashionable, they have a voracious appetite for fresh young designers, which they dismiss after bleeding them dry for 6 months or so.) As Mossberg points out, this is the true mass-market appeal of the high-res digital watch–in theory, you could choose from a near-infinite number of interesting face designs, and switch to a different one in a moment’s change of heart. Personally, I’d love to use it to simulate some older, baroque timekeeping designs, like Chinese water clocks, the lion fountain from the Alhambra, or some of the experimental 24-hour designs that people tried before they standardized on the modern 12-hour face.