More iWants from the iWatch
This from my time in the fitness industry, and as a onetime long-distance runner as well as a current bicyclist:
* Some way to measure the distance I have traveled. Maybe a pedometer, maybe a GPS. I want this capability both in the great outdoors and in the gym. The "bike computers" I've purchased and installed in the past stink (maybe a GPS would work better), whereas pedometers seem to work fairly well when I'm a pedestrian. I would want a way to calculate average speed as well as average speed minus stops at stoplights.
* Some way of linking my workout data to my computer, where it can be properly displayed, collated, analyzed, and used as motivation.
* While I despise the practice of using headphones to listen to music or anything else whilst in the great outdoors -- my personal safety as well as the sights and sounds of my environment are too important to me -- it might be nice to have some way of hooking into an entertainment system while indoors. Ex: driving wireless headphones directly from the iWatch, or hooking into the audio portion of some video entertainment program. Others seem more amenable to using headphones on the trail.
* Some way of self-powering the device without requiring regular battery charges. I recall from my youth watches that would "charge" when they were shaken. These always seemed bulkier than regular watches, but surely that mechanical technology has advanced? Maybe a solar cell?
* Some awareness in the device if I've traveled this route before (perhaps I've selected it from a list I've pre-programmed onto my computer), plus some way of displaying how I'm doing compared to that previous experience(s). The most fun I ever had on an exercise bike in a gym was on one that had a nifty feature visually comparing my current ride to my previous best.
* Maybe some kind of emergency locator, like an emergency beacon for those times you're caught in a sudden raging snowstorm on the mountain, or need to call 911 when closer to home. This is trickier, as you wouldn't want to set off this feature except in an actual emergency.
Add these to the heart rate an blood pressure monitors I described in the post I'm replying to, as well as the previous-form-factor iPod nano(less than half the size of the current one), and I think you have a compelling device indeed.
For another perspective, here's an article I just found but haven't read more than the teaser for yet, but which seems to have a complementary theme:
AT&T Networking Exchange blog: M2M and Connected Devices Will Power the Future of Healthcare
Are Wearable M2M Solutions Becoming the Technology to Watch?
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