A musing or too much?

January 27, 2004

2nd warning for Scoble
Category: Technology

Well… Scoble just got a SPOT watch and despite my previous warning he insists on giving the damn thing praise. I suppose the below can be considered an open letter to Scoble.

You are certainly blowing the "usefulness" out of proportion.

I'll give you $1 if you can answer yes to 2 of the below questions:

1) Have you ever looked at the weather and done anything with it (that you wouldn't have actually ended up doing from your computer anyway)?

2) Have you ever "acted" on the stock quotes?

3) If you read 1200 feeds per day, do you actually find new information that you “need”?

Truth be told, you have just switched to an ugly watch that gives you three more ways to waste your time. Your three examples are redundant information. I’m all for information, but the people over at SPOT completely missed the point.

For SPOT to be at all useful, they need to deliver what I would term “actionable information.” Give me something that I can use! They need to insert SPOT into the decision-making process.

Examples:

1) Subway routes and delays.
2) Ski slope run/lift information.
3) Movie times (and how full the theater is).

Each of the above items affects a large group of people (isn’t personalized data) and could be used to make decisions. *That* is the real power behind SPOT. To pretend that SPOT as we know it is a good product is ludicrous.

(If you thought that this post was interesting, why not read another? Perhaps a random link? Or you could just read about me.)

Posted by Stephen Speicher at January 27, 2004 10:06 AM

Comments

Well it looks like my dollar is safe. ;)

Posted by: steve at January 27, 2004 02:52 PM

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Unfortunately, at this point I hardly find you a useful reviewer of the product. You immediately expect the first generation of a product to solve all of your problems. Forget the fact that those things you asked for are coming. You want them NOW, whether or not that feeling is rational. The things is pretty darn useful to begin with, and it will only get more useful later on. I've seen them, and I think they're pretty useful. I have a feeling you won't find it so until it can send electric implulses to your hand to automatically scratch your ass whenever you need to without you having to think about it.

Posted by: Robert McLaws at January 27, 2004 08:57 PM

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"I have a feeling you won't find it so until it can send electric implulses to your hand to automatically scratch your ass whenever you need to without you having to think about it."

I think that you are being a bit unfair here. I am not asking for 2 way communication. I just want useful information. My point was simple; if you really stop and think about it, the device is likely to waste more time than it saves. 99.9% of the people don't do jack with stock quotes. Giving you another place to see them is a time-waster. Do you really need real-time weather? Look up! There, you have it. (and it's going to be more accurate).

My point wasn't that the watch *won't* be useful. My point is that it isn't NOW. I have no problem with people saying, "I wanted a new gadget." Nor do I have a problem with people saying that, "..the technology has promise."

I just don't want people to pretend that it is better than it is.

Furthermore, I wasn't trying to give a review of the product. You don't need me to tell you that it is big. It is ugly. It doesn't work for women. It needs to be charged too often, etc. People are saying that already.

I was just giving an example of where I thought that they should go. They should have at least attempted to include one bit of "actionable information."

Posted by: steve at January 28, 2004 01:03 PM

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dude

Posted by: Darryl at January 29, 2008 07:38 AM

( ? )

Posted by: Darryl at January 29, 2008 07:38 AM

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I love Japanese music, i think it's cool. It is something you can dance to and be happy about.

Posted by: Darryl at January 29, 2008 07:40 AM

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Or J-Rock like L'arc-en-ciel.

Posted by: Darryl at January 29, 2008 07:41 AM

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