Suggest to HN: Build a standalone watch phone supporting tethering

1 pointseze13y ago2 comments

Since many smart, entrepreneurial folks read HN, and in view of PG's take on the current hardware renaissance [1], I humbly propose an idea that may have been unduly overlooked.

I understand and share the excitement over the upcoming Pebble [2] and the welcome attitude toward less satisfying smartwatches in the market. However, the only downside is that the setup is backwards: you essentially never leave your wristwatch at home, but on many occasions you may feel like leaving your phone. It would be great if the SIM card belonged in your phone, and could tether from there as needed. Yes, most of the time you will have your phone/phablet/tablet with you, and probably a WiFi connection, for that matter.

The closest device I have come across is the VEGA (-Z1) watch [3], which is downright ugly, quite pricey ($425), only offers USB tethering with poor support [4], all of this under an old version of Android. (This would arguably be the least significant point.)

I think the greatest usage barrier to this is the idea of using your phone for conversations, while all your shiny phones become tablets (unless you want two lines...).

OK, that's my proposal. What do you people think? Will this be the standard setup within 10 years?

Cheers!

  [1] http://www.paulgraham.com/hw.html
  [2] http://getpebble.com/
  [3] http://www.3gwatches.com/vega.html
  [4] http://www.linuxslate.org/Review_Z1_Android-2.2-Watch.html

2 comments

mooism213y ago

Do you mean that you want your sim card to live in your wristwatch, and then your phone/tablet/laptop to access the wider world via your wristwatch using wifi/bluetooth/whatever?

My uninformed opinion is that I'd worry about battery life (both because you've got to run two receivers/transmitters, and because you've got less space to fit it in).

ezeOP13y ago

First off, thanks for commenting! The (wild guess) idea is that a large sector of the market do most of their phone/tablet browsing at home, at the office, but not when they're away. Then most people may take pictures, videos, etc. (I guess this could hurt geotagging), but I claim that tethering would remain off most of the time.

Come to think about it, with the low-end SIM cards available today a second SIM card would make sense and eliminate the need for tethering altogether.

A good start in my wish list would be greater (and prettier!) competition to VEGA.

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