To be Free

I mean like seriously? THE DIGITALIAN? It's a strange name really. It could well be the title of a tech magazine. Or a magazine on cool digs in Italy. Hahaha.

Well I had a nap early last night, and then woke up just after 1 for the Apple keynote live streaming. The connection sucked really bad at first. I kept having to refresh the page, and many a times it didn't load. The video kept jumping back to some random earlier part too. I missed quite a bit of the iPhone 6 bits as a result. Oh and there was that irritating Chinese translation on top of the original at the beginning. I mean I can understand both languages, but it's irritating and distracting to have them both at the same time. And I can understand English just fine thank you.

Towards the end, maybe around the 40mins or so? It worked like a charm though. So I managed to watch all the bits about the Apple watch properly. And the irritating voice over was gone too.

So the rumor mill pretty much got everything down. I'm not surprised, nor am I disappointed. With factories all over the world producing various parts for Apple products, it's really hard to keep things secret anymore.

So iPhone 6 and 6 plus. 4.7 and 5.5 inches. I think my dad would be happy with that. The phones have more space for your buck too... dang, I need that! More space! Hahaha. My phone is practically FILLED already. Again. I've downloaded a lot more songs and that's partly the reason why. I'm still waiting for my iOS 8 though. Because as enticing as the new phone sounds, I just got my 5s last year so there's no way I will be getting the 6/6 plus. Unless I win some kind of lucky draw or lottery. Which is pretty much impossible. Tsk. I had been hoping for iOS 8 to be like... released after the event but nah... I guess I kinda got my ideas wrong hahaha. But still... where is my iOS 8! And Yosemite! Hahaha. I want em now!

Well the Apple Watch. That's interesting though. Details like weight, thickness, battery life are not released yet... but I'm liking the design and the amount of choices they are promising to give. I initially thought the price was the same as samsung's gear, but turns out Apple's is 50 USD more. I think the prices will be dropped later on though, like the iPad mini... so as tempting as it might be, I may still hold out for a 2nd gen Apple Watch. Practically I don't REALLY need an Apple Watch too. I mean it's great to see the notifications and all when I'm in the lab w/o taking out my phone - which would mean digging into my jeans pocket under my labcoat with my not too clean gloved hands, and having to press the passcode every time to unlock the phone because gloves cover up your fingerprints... But do I really, really need to see all my notifications? Nope... But well, Apple is really great at making you want things that you don't really need. I think my dad would like it though? He can get one and we can see how useful a smartwatch is hahaha! XD

I do like the use of the digital crown to scroll, and zoom in and out. Very smart of Apple and very like them to come up with an innovative solution to make interacting with the small screen. It's ability to sense between touch and tap sounds cool too. Though whether it really works is a different matter. Reports of hands on of the demo units says that it didn't work all the time... of course we'll have to see how well the end product actually works.

I think it's about the last we'll see of the 5c line? It was quite a failure and I don't think Apple will do a 6c...

So, 6 and 6 plus on the 19th of Sept. And the watch early next year. That the rumor mills didn't quite get right though. I think the delay in Apple Watch release is both to give more time for production, as well as to get developers on board. Apps are a huge part of the Apple ecosystem after all, and getting the apps to work well with the watch would be a huge selling point for the Apple Watch. Apps are what drives your mobile devices after all. And that's the huge advantage Apple has over Android. It give developers toolkits to make use of specific features of their devices, and developers do take advantage of that to make apps. Even though Apple is 'late' to the smartwatch game, I'm sure their smart watch will have much, much more apps than any other brand of smart watch soon enough. I can just feel it. Apple has a bevy of developers, who actively make new apps and update their old ones to take advantage of whatever new technology Apple has to offer. That's a huge reason why I think the Apple Watch has a larger chance of going mainstream than Samsung's Gear... And that's even though Samsung commands a way larger pie of the smart phone market than Apple.

Apple pay.
This one sounds really cool, and could pave to way to become something much, much greater. Theoretically that is. Practically there's always the ever persistent security issues to worry about... But I'm not a security expert so I shan't discuss that here. What I would like to talk about though, is how Apple has a much greater chance than anyone so far to make mobile payments mainstream. For a start they already have a large number of banks and merchants in the US onboard. And there will be a huge portion of people wielding iPhones 6, and future version of the phone. And where the US goes, other countries will eventually follow. Slowly at first of course, but if there's any company that can pull it off, than it's got to be Apple. Google too, had their foray into mobile payments with Google Wallet, but it never kicked off. I think partly because Google didn't spend as much effort making partnerships with banks and merchants to make it go mainstream. And they don't really need to. Google has so many other cool projects up their sleeve to focus on. Google Glass anyone? As controversial as it has become, you can't deny the fact that it's one hell of a freaking cool piece of technology. Yeah, I'm a geek so pardon me.

So all in all... very cool technology that Apple has announced, as for whether Apple can make mobile payments and smart watches go mainstream, only time will tell.