Article 11
Removability and replaceability of portable batteries and LMT batteries
1. Any natural or legal person that places on the market products incorporating portable batteries shall ensure that those batteries are readily removable and replaceable by the end-user at any time during the lifetime of the product. That obligation shall only apply to entire batteries and not to individual cells or other parts included in such batteries.
A portable battery shall be considered readily removable by the end-user where it can be removed from a product with the use of commercially available tools, without requiring the use of specialised tools, unless provided free of charge with the product, proprietary tools, thermal energy, or solvents to disassemble the product.
Any natural or legal person that places on the market products incorporating portable batteries shall ensure that those products are accompanied with instructions and safety information on the use, removal and replacement of the batteries. Those instructions and that safety information shall be made available permanently online, on a publicly available website, in an easily understandable way for end-users.
[…]
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A...
(This is active law; there is however a grace period for products until 2027.)
I don't think it's at all reasonable to expect such a product to have a user-replacable battery without doubling the cost. Sure it'd be nice, but the reality is sometimes it just isn't possible to accommodate.
We want to help people in the EU, but with laws like replaceable batteries, it's going to push us further and further away from being able to do that.
Our product is designed to be refurbished, but not user-replaceable.
At the same time, how many products do people give up on because of battery life, and is this a non-issue with future battery chemistries?
Do people replace their phones because the battery isn't good anymore, or is it more likely they've broken the screen, cameras, etc to the point where it doesn't make sense to replace those anymore? Or they just want the newest thing?
Eric said that the lifetime of the product is 'up to years'. Presumably because that's the limitation imposed by a disposable battery.
I wonder if the circular reasoning would fly in the EU.
The lack of battery charging/replacement is a bummer, but slimness is far more critical for a ring than just about any other device so I understand the tradeoff. I've also seen stories of injuries from battery expansion in fitness rings, so if the risk of this is significantly reduced by eliminating charge cycles, I personally consider that a notable benefit.
Even though, IMO, there are enough legitimate benefits to warrant this product's trade-offs, I imagine its disposable nature will ultimately make it unsuccessful. Off the cuff, it's easy to look at this as "saying the quiet part out loud" vis-a-vis planned obsolescence, and I understand why many would find that extremely off-putting.
Since you’re the target audience, I’ll ask you: How do you envision you’ll work through all of the captured notes? Do it all at the end of the day? Go back and look for something after you remember making the note?
I’m wondering if this product will have the same problem that many discover after they buy a Moleskin journal and think it will solve specific problems in their life: Recording the thought or idea is the easy part, but it only defers the action. Additional diligence is required to review the notes and act on them.
For a very specific type of person who is both forgetful but also diligent enough to process the notes thoroughly and in a timely manner I could see this being helpful. For the people saying this will help with easily distracted people I’m not so sure. It could easily become a tool which gives a false sense of handling a task when really it just blackholes the thought into an ever growing collection of 3-second notes that are never revisited. Like the person who clicks the “mark as unread” button on every email with the intention of responding later, but then has 100 messages in their inbox by the end of the week.
The advertised use case of recording 20 short thoughts per day means over 100 notes to process every week. For a highly diligent person who clears their inbox (and now audio notes) every day that’s nothing. For all of the commenters thinking this is going to solve their distractability problems, I have my doubts.
> Roughly 12 to 15 hours of recording. On average, I use it 10-20 times per day to record 3-6 second thoughts. That’s up to 2 years of usage.
I feel like I’m usually good about being able to imagine a market for different devices even when I’m not the target audience, but I’m having a hard time with this one.
Having 20 different 3-second thoughts transcribed to notes that I have to process every day sounds more like added complications than problem solving. If I stretch, I can think of a few things that flashed into my mind and then I forgot again for a couple days because I wasn’t in a location to immediately pull out my phone and put it on my todo list (which takes about 10 seconds because I put a shortcut in my lock screen). However, those locations weren’t something where I could be “whispering” to a ring, either.
So I don’t know. I hope repebble succeeds with everyone they’re doing, but this product feels like they went too far into the novelty end of the spectrum and neglected some of the actual usability that made the original Pebble popular.
EDIT: On second thought, maybe the lack of recharging is an acknowledgement that they don’t actually expect people to use this product a lot or for very long. Maybe the target audience is people who want to have something new and unique that they can also use as a conversation starter. Once the novelty wears off maybe it doesn’t get worn much. If it does become popular with a niche audience they can release a V2 with charging.
It sounds, though, like it doesn't solve a problem you have. I guess the only recourse you have about its existence is to not buy it.
Psychologically there's a sort of information hoarding aspect to this. I think a lot of people experience this with browser tabs, where they don't want to read something right now, but also don't want to just abandon it. So you end up with this backlog you feel you have to hold onto.
I've learned to just trust my brain more, where if something occurs to me is important, it'll probably occur to me again when its relevant, vs me treating random momentary insights like they're a priceless treasure.
> When I notice a micro-task like this, my instinct is not to do it, but to put it in the todo list. Then I try to do it immediately. And if I get distracted halfway through, it’s still there, in the todo list.
https://borretti.me/article/notes-on-managing-adhd
The problem with this approach is that recording tasks become a good amount of relative overhead compared to the 'micro-task' if it involves pulling out your phone, and pulling out your phone also introduces a potential distraction. So, having something that is single purpose and as low-friction as possible is appealing.
I'm skeptical that this is actually any better than using a smart watch that you can dictate to though.
And the ability to post-process the audio on my own, to transcribe it and then let an MCP server add the transcription to my notes in Obsidian removes all the hassle of micromanaging notes. Let's see how it works, but I think that this can be useful.
...But that battery life absolutely kills it for me. I'd feel like each time I recorded something I was burning lifetime off my device. (Technically also true of rechargeable battery lifetimes, but it's abstract enough and minimal enough I don't think about it.)
Some ideas if you have an app which can be integrated to other services:
* I feel sick today, notify my manager about it, probably I will stay home
* schedule a task to pickup a trash
* something to remember, colleague X told me he is using service A for data clean up
...
Frankly, I'm surprised this is a selling point, because I think it attaches too much importance to our "ideas". If it's a good idea that you'll pursue in earnest, you'll come across it again. And if you don't, so what?
I say this as someone who does quite a bit of reflection throughout the day. I jot down things I find interesting, which can be, paradoxically, a way to move past the musing and onto other things instead of having it nag and pull my attention from other things. So, in all likelihood, this product would likely lead to a bunch of crap being stored in memory that you'll never return to.
I know they mentioned that they thought of making this just a watch app, but didn't like the two-handed button press or raise to wake gesture. Why not just optimize for removing the gesture entirely? The microphone has to be better on a full size watch on your wrist vs the tiny ring further away on your finger.
This hits the same nerve in me as those single-use vapes with screens, except you can't harvest the battery out of this one.
Battery would last for decades just as a button.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/getpebble/pebble-2-time...
It was one of the devices I was most excited about way back when, and I'd still love to see it – button, headphone jack, running Android. I would love a headless (and thus longer-charge-for-smaller-device) Android device like that again.
Agreed, let the ring just be a button that can trigger recording on a watch or phone (among other tasks) rather than squeezing in a microphone and audio transmitter.
> I wonder if you could even make it perpetually powered by body heat + buffer battery if it's ONLY job was to emit a couple packets over BLE...
Neat! Or maybe a tiny solar cell? Perhaps the button itself is piezoelectric, like a wearable version of the EnOcean Nodon line of battery-free wireless switches -- a BLE advertising event costs less than 100 microjoules which a button press should be able to provide, though ensuring 100% reliability over BLE with such a tiny energy budget would be hard.
Alternately it could communicate with the watch using IR, but the knuckles might occlude line of sight. The button press could mechanically emit an ultrasonic tone, but that requires an always-on mic in the watch/phone and would be susceptible to shenanigans. Maybe pressing the button causes a specific vibration that a watch accelerometer can reliably recognize?
Now I want someone to find a way to make this work... but long term I expect that the real solution will be making hand gestures work reliably 100% of the time with no ring at all.
Exactly. The Pebble already has all the hardware to capture voice notes. There are at least a few third party Pebble apps that do this already. The problem that Eric has is limited to the activation of the feature, not the feature itself, but he overengineered a disposable standalone gadget instead of making an accessory for his already capable platform.
I'd just love the "customizable button on a ring" concept, and that battery could last basically forever.
Imagine I fall asleep with it on my finger and accidentally press the button with my head. It's recording me snore for 3 hours, and 25% battery life gone.
I think it's an interesting approach, in terms of hack-ability a non-rechargable device is pretty much bad - also just imagining that any sort of software or hardware glitch could easily just permanently render the device useless is not super decent either.
> Roughly 12 to 15 hours of recording. On average, I use it 10-20 times per day to record 3-6 second thoughts. That’s up to 2 years of usage.
Two years isn’t too bad, but at $99 the price is still a bit high for that.
Edit FTA:
> How long does the battery last?
> Roughly 12 to 15 hours of recording. On average, I use it 10-20 times per day to record 3-6 second thoughts. That’s up to 2 years of usage.
If we want to give this to grandparents to save their stories, we can want to have the stories too. If we want it for ourselves, we have to trust it.
Happy to answer any questions you have!
Example button: https://core-electronics.com.au/self-powered-wireless-switch...
I imagine the reason is reliability, but USD$99 plus international shipping every two years isn’t worth that to me, sorry.
Aside: I loved my kickstarter pebble and my steel, btw!
In general I really like the idea of a local-first, privacy-first, one-way/low-interaction digital assistant regardless of the form factor. A big frustration I have with Gemini as a voice assistant is that I have to wait out the other half of super simple interactions like setting a timer or making a note.
Also, I love the idea of providing 3d models for something like this that needs to be perfectly sized
Can we flash our own firmware to the device?
2. Can we pick our own transcription service or export audio to transcribe elsewhere if you transcription is not reliable or privacy is needed?
3. Is it waterproof? Can I wash my hands without taking it off?
Google's Recorder app makes this a big PITA if I don't want to enable upload to cloud storage, there is a very tedious manual way to export recordings.
I really just want plain old data and to be able to copy or delete files via the filesystem. And not be required to use some cloud service.
Is that an existing feature, or is that something possibly planned for future?
Best of luck with your project, Eric.
That said, I absolutely cannot buy a device like this without a replaceable battery. I don’t actually care about the recharge, I get what you’re trying to do with it, but given the state of the e-waste world and, bluntly, the history of hardware brands - a big, big part of the sales pitch for the pebble is the OSS nature of the device because we need to hedge against any one company for longevity. I’d seriously consider this if I knew the battery was replaceable, but I can’t bet on you being around in 4, 6, or 8 years, and I’m not willing to buy intentionally disposable tech anymore.
/s
Given the many smartwatches on the market which can do so much more, are lightweight and some of them with acceptable battery life (Garmin, Suunto, Amazfit), a smartring is of very little interest to me. But I often struggle to understand why certain products fascinate people, so I may be totally wrong and I wish the makers best of luck.
Edit: "It’s converted to text on-device, then processed by an on-device large language model (LLM) which selects an action to take (create note, add to reminders, etc)." This is perfect!
There is no risk of swelling with Index 01
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/wont
Also: I agree with your concern
On Android, it's called "Blitzmail," I'm pretty sure there's an Apple equivalent.
Beautifully simple app; on one touch it pops open a text box (which you can type, dictate to, also do "shares/attachments")
And emails to one and only one pre-specified address, usually "yourself."
From there, pick your poison. I personally have a dedicated address/account for these, and I have some bash scripts that pick them up and move them around, but I imagine for many "checking that email address periodically" would be sufficient.
I'm sure other musicians would love it as well, but are disqualified completely from the userbase. That's a shame as I think for us it would be really, really useful.
(The first iteration of a musical idea usually emerges somewhat spontaneously from an emotional state, and repetition always loses some important part of it. This ring could be an always-on photocamera for these spontaneous, naturally arising states.)
The solution is simple: market this as a trigger for the pebble voice. Only thatz. Nothing else. Make the electronics as simple and cheap as possible. Sell it as an option to the watch. Less than 30$ would be ideal.
Voila.
Bought and am loving my Pebble 2 Duo etc - still yet to charge it once in fact!
This device doesn't quite hit the mark for me, but I love the commitment to thinking about what's novel and useful, and putting a prototype out into the world. To use an Irish phrase, "more luck to them" - and hope we see many more projects from them!
Apple hire this man.
I very likely wouldn't have bought it anyway but I am surely not going to buy disposable tech.
Not sure how long my iphone can record for, but it's probably close to that. Afterwards I get to charge my phone instead of recycle it, though.
Apple, don't hire this man.
Edit for the downvoters: can my iphone not record that long or something? iphones can't recharge? Just hate Apple and love e-waste rings? Enlighten me.
It’s easy to make a battery last years if it doesn’t do anything. You can send your devices to Apple as well for recycling.
More broadly: Invisible wearable microphones are coming for everyone and perfect memory will follow. I'm incredibly excited about this for myself and simultaneously terrified about everyone else having it.
It's coming fast enough that I'm beginning to assume in any decently sized crowd of tech folks /someone/ is recording everything.
Isn't my watch always with me? Why not use that instead of have some new device?
> Initially, we experimented by building this as an app on Pebble, since it has a mic and I’m always wearing one. But, I realized quickly that this was suboptimal - it required me to use my other hand to press the button to start recording (lift-to-wake gestures and wake-words are too unreliable). This was tough to use while bicycling or carrying stuff.
Driving by myself and listening to podcasts is when I have so many thoughts I want to write down.
I'll give this a serious consider.
(Also, I do really want an excuse to switch from my Apple Watch to a new Pebble.)
The blog post says:
> Initially, we experimented by building this as an app on Pebble, since it has a mic and I’m always wearing one. But, I realized quickly that this was suboptimal - it required me to use my other hand to press the button to start recording (lift-to-wake gestures and wake-words are too unreliable). This was tough to use while bicycling or carrying stuff.
I don't understand how the ring makes any of this better.
You press the button with your thumb on the same hand.
In other words, I am apparently exactly the kind of weirdo who would use the heck out of something like this!
I'd buy a ring with just authentication, if it was rechargeable and did a few other things (pulse, sleep monitoring, etc.) even better, but the bare bones would be amazing so I could have something I wear for my authentication.
I would buy that oura-security ring in a heartbeat.
Where have all the hackers gone? Those who enjoy discussing technology, or appreciate something clever. Discussion of CPUs and sensors, or miniaturization and packaging.
Any other good forums where people discuss engineering and technology? Or even design and usability?
(I'm not against sustainability, but long discussions on EU regulations get tiresome. Yes, I collapsed them, leaving almost nothing.)
Commenters are discussing the design and usability. Not all of that is going to be positive.
If you’re looking for a positivity-only environment where no critical questioning is socially acceptable, maybe try LinkedIn or Product Hunt? There are forums where negativity is not allowed or not socially acceptable, but those forums are not good sources for actual critical thinking or discussion.
Water resistant, like how water resistant? Wearing in the shower OK? That's where I have all my best ideas!
I've worn rings, and they can rotate in place on the hand if they're not perfectly sized, and there aren't any half sizes here, so this would definitely rotate on my finger, making no guarantee that I can even reach the button without adjusting the ring with my other hand, or maybe awkwardly spinning it with my thumb until the button is in reach again.
And it only lasts for 10-15 hours of recording time. And there looks to be a cloud services upsell for better STT than the open source offering on device.
This seems like an early alpha version of something that might be a good idea, but as it is I can't imagine buying one.
Not even an attempt to make a replaceable or chargeable battery?
Also they point out oura rings need to be charged every few days, but that’s because they’re constantly chewing through battery monitoring your health stats. I’m willing to bet if they were in a constant state of deep sleep and only woken up to record short audio clips they’d also last for months at a time.
I know folks around here love pebble, but this feels like a miss to me.
That's a pretty long life, TBF. I appreciate your concerns, though, and do wonder if there was a better middle ground (maybe a micro sterling engine leveraging the heat gradient from my finger to ambient, ha!).
People are buying Fitbit charge6 products today and those probably have an 18 shelf life and cost more.. so maybe it's not totally left field - although the charge6 isn't advertised to fail so soon lol.
It's a memo recorder in ring form. Neat idea that seems really obvious but somehow I haven't seen it before
Edit: ah. "No charging: The battery lasts for up to years of average use. After the end of its life, send your ring back to us for recycling." Planned obsolescence
I generally like the idea. I use my Apple Watch for Siri and needing the other hand to hold Siri is not ideal. I do use “hey siri” a lot but it doesn’t always work, though pretty reliable.
The obvious voice commands that work only half of the time, can’t voice memo in bed with your parters, in the office, or in public. That leaves very limited opportunities for this to be useful.
It increases the surface area of your day where "I am able to take a note right now (because I don't have anything stopping me)" is a true statement.
> Initially, we experimented by building this as an app on Pebble, since it has a mic and I’m always wearing one. But, I realized quickly that this was suboptimal - it required me to use my other hand to press the button to start recording (lift-to-wake gestures and wake-words are too unreliable). This was tough to use while bicycling or carrying stuff.
I guess I don't bicycle or carry stuff enough for this to matter. And often when my hands are full, I have my AirPods in and can just ask Siri (and cross my fingers that she'll understand).
This seems neat, but I try to keep my life as simple as possible, which means not having a ring when I can use my watch/earbuds to do the same thing about 99% of the time.
My only wish is that I hope it preserves the audio file, in case the transcription is wrong, so you don't lose the thought. Google Keep does this well and it's a life saver sometimes, when the transcription comes through as "Eat the cat" or something ridiculous.
1. Distress/Emergency makes you Unable to speak.
2. While doing vipassana meditation to record how strong the feeling attached to a thought was.
3. Repeat previous action.
This is terrible. This is literally e-waste. They are literally asking people to buy a product that is discardable.
Besides, why not just put a dedicated button on the pebble to do exactly this? I don't even get the purpose of this device when the device they ideally want it to live with, could do exactly the same thing but much better in every way without carrying a ring around: At least in some cultures, men don't usually wear rings without a clear significance.
https://www.nngroup.com/articles/javaring-wearable-computer/
So does this mean that my lists have to be managed within the Pebble app? Or can the Pebble app interact with my Notes and Reminders apps? If I'm limited to the Pebble app's features, that would be more limiting. But I can't see how it would be able to break out and give instructions to other apps (at least beyond a preset list, via programmed Shortcuts).
https://www.reddit.com/r/Songwriting/comments/yd8jsv/what_do... is illustrative, as are EJAE's press comments on how she relied on voice memos for her now-quintuple-platinum melodies for K-Pop Demon Hunters.
This seems like a gadget just for the sake of having another gadget...
(Not speaking of the usability of this: if voice works for you, this can still be great for you, however)
Having an affordable single purpose device like this could be much better -- how straightforward will it be to post transcriptions of the recorded messages to a webhook via the Index 01?
Sounds like the device will natively support sending the audio or transcription to any service you like.
But in 2025, the disposable aspect is a crime... and wouldn't you be able to use the body of the ring to interface with an inductive charger?
This would actually be super helpful in the lab, dictating notes on a protocol ("I did something weird in this step") without needing to stop to write things down (sometimes protocol is quite time-sensitive).
Also, I'm counting the days until the battery in one of those things bulges while someone is on an airplane... again...
Seems like overkill, particularly when other rings do bio-metric tracking, so is this focused on a big enough problem to want to solve?
"Initially, we experimented by building this as an app on Pebble, since it has a mic and I’m always wearing one. But, I realized quickly that this was suboptimal - it required me to use my other hand to press the button to start recording (lift-to-wake gestures and wake-words are too unreliable). This was tough to use while bicycling or carrying stuff."
This interacts directly with the Pebble App, so I would be shocked if the watches never get an equivalent app.
As a tangential question, how do people find the new pebbles? I prefer a smartwatch that lasts more than a couple of days between charges. And want one with a screen that stays on. The Fitbit Charge 3 I had never detected raising my arm.
I think it would take a lot of heavy software to process and index the voice notes for the claim "Meet Pebble Index 01 - External Memory For Your Brain" is honest
But I wont pay you $75 for a product I can’t use anymore when the battery dies. I’d pay twice as much if I could change the battery myself, but this consumer-hostile, anti-ownership design is not something I will support.
Open source hardware is very cool but phones have already taken most of our portable needs. It needs to be extremely compelling to justify another thing to carry, charge, update, etc.
Index 01 uses silver-oxide batteries.
Why can’t it be recharged?
We considered this but decided not to for several reasons:
You’d probably lose the charger before the battery runs out! Adding charge circuitry and including a charger would make the product larger and more expensive. You send it back to us to recycle. Wait, it’s single use?
Yes. We know this sounds a bit odd, but in this particular circumstance we believe it’s the best solution to the given set of constraints. Other smart rings like Oura cost $250+ and need to be charged every few days. We didn’t want to build a device like that. Before the battery runs out, the Pebble app notifies and asks if you’d like to order another ring."
Uhhh... Huh... Ok. Welp, that's a nope from me then.
The target market might not be exclusively other engineers and tinkerers, but as an engineer and tinkerer, I'm eager for more details about the testing, verification, construction, etc., of such a solution.
On the other hand, cool!
I shared your concerns but I read this bit and I think it's all pretty reasonable if you ask me. They're open and upfront about it, and you can very quickly choose not to buy one.
Who's recycling their Oura battery anyway? Probably nobody.
This comes across much more dystopian than I imagine the author intended.
I use the todo app to speak to create my shopping list before going to the store. I look into the fridge and little room to check whats needed. In the shop I tick off stuff.
It is life changing? No, but one central place that is intelligent would be nice:
- remind me off - add to shopping list - etc
Unless you specifically are after a barometer, in which case I don't think the PT2 has that.
This seems like a _fantastic_ tool for that.
That button isn't always going to be facing your thumb. Maybe you rotate it back with your thumb? Or you need to use your other hand anyway to rotate it?
Literally take it, I just ordered.
I have been imagining this exact device existing and now it does, yay, thank you!
I would actually prefer a device that's twice as expensive but with a battery that you can charge or replace.
Man, if I even suggested this over lunch with my old Sparkfun colleagues, I would have been shot down before I finished chewing my bite of open-faced turkey sandwich.
A gesture on the watch that just starts the recorder seems a lot more practical, this ring just adds an unnecessary complication. Plus, $100 is a lot for something that they don't want you to service.
I'd rather much have a lot of big programmable buttons on the watch itself and have a smaller display or a separate BLE remote with lots of buttons.
why would a ring need a whole ass microphone and a non rechargable battery like yeah dude gotta have a $100 dongle you just throw away once in a while
if it's already compatible with the watch then why not just make it emit some sort of signal that turns on the watch's mic? or put the button on the watch itself?
I will be trying this at the very least and am optimistic they could figure out a better battery solution in future iterations as well. Obsidian plugin
It's an app. It's an app that will run on somebody else's platform. Putting that in a ring has so marginal benefits (you can't find a phone or computer or notepad or... to record ideas and do it better) and has so many limitations. It's a non-starter.
That’s it.
Nobody gives a single bit about your fancy ai-blockhain-voodoo features. How blind are you to real demands of normal people?
Take the phone, open app, done.
A weird disposable(!) voice recorder ring seems to go against pretty much all of the “open and repairable” image that the Pebble brand has been cultivating.
This product should probably have been “Core” branded and kept on a different website entirely. Its very existence seems kind of toxic to the Pebble brand, IMO.
Seeing them introducing One More Thing on the other side of the spectrum, deep in big-corp, locked down, consumerist throwaway territory makes me reevaluate that.
I guess they might overestimate the fanboyness of their clientele. I hope enough people find this as laughable as I do and ignore this.
Also,
>Wait, it’s single use?
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
I wonder how many years?
> The battery lasts for up to years of average use.
...how many?
> a battery that lasts for years
How many years does the battery last?
> That’s up to 2 years of usage.
Ah.
I guess "2" is the absolute minimum that you could describe as "years".
It's a shame because it does look like an interesting proposition. It might be more compelling if it was "send your ring back to us for recycling - and we'll send you a new one". I doubt the economics would work at this price point though.
This must be a joke.
But don't say "Privacy," then "data sent to your phone."
