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Thread: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

  1. #49
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    Re: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

    Nope. Pointless extravagance IMO.

    I own a watch, but haven't worn one since mobile phones got displays with the time showing on them.

    If I won smart watch, I'd sell it without even opening the box.

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    Re: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

    Quote Originally Posted by Friesiansam View Post
    No, I see no need whatsoever also, why would I need sleep tracking? I know when I have been asleep and know when I have had enough sleep, don't need a watch to tell me.
    Even basic smart watches like the amazfit bip can tell you how much deep sleep your getting, how might light sleep, if you fell asleep too late, and how you compare to an average. Personally I find it quite useful when I wake up in the morning and feel tired and realise its because I did not get enough deep sleep. Can then adjust my patterns for the next day (such as no video games 2h before bedtime) and see the beneficial results.

    Overall feel better for having it, plus it monitors all my step counts so ensures I get my bonus from healthcare provider (e.g. do not have to always have my phone on me).

    Not to everyone's taste, granted, but don't know why some attack smartwatches as if their sheer existence is offensive!

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    Re: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

    Quote Originally Posted by ubiquity View Post
    Even basic smart watches like the amazfit bip can tell you how much deep sleep your getting, how might light sleep, if you fell asleep too late, and how you compare to an average. Personally I find it quite useful when I wake up in the morning and feel tired and realise its because I did not get enough deep sleep. Can then adjust my patterns for the next day (such as no video games 2h before bedtime) and see the beneficial results.

    Overall feel better for having it, plus it monitors all my step counts so ensures I get my bonus from healthcare provider (e.g. do not have to always have my phone on me).

    Not to everyone's taste, granted, but don't know why some attack smartwatches as if their sheer existence is offensive!
    It's not about right to exist, but about data privacy. Smartwatches are to privacy-conscious consumers what hollow wooden horses were to citizens of Troy.

    It's bad enough with smartphones tracking where you are, where yoy've been and wgat you do on the web without smartwatches providing industry with a detailed profile of your health.

    Personally, even if I was convinced by the benefits, there is no way I'd wear one of these unless I received cast-iton guarantees that my health data wasn't collected at all, beyond my personal control.

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    Re: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

    Fair point. I already know China has most of my data as I have a OnePlus 5, so no concerns for me with Xiaomi having the same

    GDPR rules apply, but US already has most of the data anyway as they obtain the 'right' to break the encryption used.

    If you are using google chrome as a browse, and/or gmail, then google also has most of your data anyway. Same for Facebook; its not just mobile although this does increase the number of metrics captured...

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    Re: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

    I have a ticwatch 2, really like it. It lasts about 2 days, has a gorgeous OLED screem.

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    Re: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

    Quote Originally Posted by ubiquity View Post
    Fair point. I already know China has most of my data as I have a OnePlus 5, so no concerns for me with Xiaomi having the same

    GDPR rules apply, but US already has most of the data anyway as they obtain the 'right' to break the encryption used.

    If you are using google chrome as a browse, and/or gmail, then google also has most of your data anyway. Same for Facebook; its not just mobile although this does increase the number of metrics captured...
    GDPR rules apply, but if the comoany concerned operates outside of UK and/or EU jurisdiction, that will be next to impossible for individuals to enforce.

    If you have a smartphone, then various companies will already have a wide variety of data, but what they won't have is a highly granular level of health and physical activity data.

    There are already cases where employers have issued staff with FitBit-tyoe devices and used the data on staff activity levels (snd bear in mind, this is at least potentially 24/7 monitoring) to negotiate reduced cost insurances.

    Where is the dividing line between a smartwatch and a fitnezs monitor? As some posters here have made clear, some 'features' of smartwatches are starting to include step counters, even sleep monitors. And of course, fitness monitors can generally display date and time.

    So if employers are monitoring steps, heartrate, sleep bours and depths, what next? Is your annual bonus at risk is you went to bed later than 10:30pm more than a handful of times the night before a working day?

    Maybe when you go for your next interview, yoyr prospective employer will pass you over because of too many 2am finishes, or because your at-rest pulse rate is too high?

    Or your car insurance premiums go up based on your health data? Don't for a moment imagine that that, especially, couldn't or wouldnt happen, because I'll bet my left gonad right now that if insurance companies can get their hands on the data, they can and will use it. They already do use a remarkable array of apparently irrelevant factors, like your surname, if and where their accident statistics suggest a correlation. And it's legal to do so, too.


    All that being said, yes, the GDPR gives some protection. But .... have you read the T&C's not just of the smartwatch supplier but their 3rd party partners and especially any app providers? I don't mean glanced through, but read, carefully, and considered exactly what they mean, what you're agreeing to? I have, and it's a major reason why I don't even have a smartphone.

    So, GDPR? Fine, it's gives some protections .... but not where you signed up and consented it away.


    I imagine a lot of people will read this, and not care? Fine, your choice, if you do. But bear in mind, if you change your mind in a year, 5 years 15 years the historical data and the data-mining profiles generated from it will still be there. Your actions now coukd ge what loses you a plum job in 15 years time.

    Fanciful, I hear people saying. That's what they said some years ago when I (and like-minded cynics) warned about being careful what you said on Facebook, Twitter, etc, but now, many MANY companies (or their agents) understake a social media trawl and audit before iffering jobs to potential employees, especially at more senior levels, and some people have been fired over social media comments.

    The problem is the vast, and ever-growing mass of ever-more-detailed and granular data being collected, stored and then, criticslly, deep-mined, on all of us and smartwatches can, at a minimum, add a level of data not collectable any other way. The more "features" they have, the more dsta they collect. Why not just let government or big dsta implant a tracing chip at birth, because it's not that far beyond what people are paying good money to sign up for voluntarily.

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    Re: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

    Oh, and Ubiquity .... I agree about Google, Gmail, etc, which is why I don't use them. As for Facebook, (and other social media companies) I don't have, never have had and never will have, any of them, from FB, to LinkedIn, to dating apps, to ....well, anything like that. I don't even use email very often. Last checked mine about 2 months ago.

    I also very rarely shop online, rarely use credit cards, NEVER use store/reward cards, and do grocery shopping for cash.

    I grant you, I'm an exception not the rule.

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    Re: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

    Quote Originally Posted by Saracen View Post
    Oh, and Ubiquity .... I agree about Google, Gmail, etc, which is why I don't use them. As for Facebook, (and other social media companies) I don't have, never have had and never will have, any of them, from FB, to LinkedIn, to dating apps, to ....well, anything like that. I don't even use email very often. Last checked mine about 2 months ago.

    I also very rarely shop online, rarely use credit cards, NEVER use store/reward cards, and do grocery shopping for cash.

    I grant you, I'm an exception not the rule.
    I'm very careful with what I give away on Farcebook and I'm also very careful with whom I connect on it. I did download my file which contains all the data they have collected on me and (whilst other people were shocked at what they held) there were no surprises at all. I actively feed them disinformation in order to throw them off and have a good giggle at the "targeted" adverts I get. Last one was for frozen baby rats to feed to snakes. They also advertised rainbow face paint for gay pride at me. They have me down as a gay snake owner who was attending pride and works in the 7th circle of hell.

    Suffice to say this is not an accurate description of me.

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    Re: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

    I would suggest perhaps there is a happy medium between the two extremes.

    One being sharing all the information about yourself online with everyone, and the other become a reclusive hermit wearing a tin hat and whispering 'they are always listening... always' to random strangers.

    I agree that not enough people understand the implications, but personally I prefer adverts and coupons based on what I would actually like rather than tampons (damn shared loyalty cards), and the advantages on excessive personal information capture mean a better understanding of the individual rather than a blank page, even if they could potentially be used for nefarious purposes.

    Off topic, but one of the major things is that you are not infact in charge of your own privacy. As soon as you friend someone on a social media platform such as Facebook, they are now in-charge of your privacy as, by default, they can post 'not safe for work' pictures and tag you. Certainly an interesting subject area. My BA dissertation was on 'Delusions of Altruism' and it was scary to find out first hand how many people did not realize what Facebook was doing with the data they gather, or how their business model operated...

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    Re: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

    Quote Originally Posted by philehidiot View Post
    One, messages without having to pull your phone out.
    If I get a message, I will most likely have to reply to it at some point, so might as well pull the phone out and do it anyway...

    Quote Originally Posted by philehidiot View Post
    without having to look like you're navigating by tricorder.
    And just what is wrong with tricorders?

    Quote Originally Posted by ubiquity View Post
    don't know why some attack smartwatches as if their sheer existence is offensive!
    It's more the adverts for them, and the insistence by the rabid, sanctimonious owners that your life is pointless unless you own one... kinda like electric car owners, really!!

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    Re: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

    I have a Ticwatch E and it's brilliant, have had a ticwatch 2 and Moto 360 previously. The E is the best of the lot.
    Yes it needs to be charged daily but it is very very useful and my phone stays in my pocket most of the time.

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    Re: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

    Ermm... yes and no. Had a Samsung S3, which started to lose battery life after a year, so got rid. Got given a Fossil Q Explorist which I still have but rarely wear. I have an Omega (for the classy stuff) and an ever increasing collection of Casio GShock and Protrek models, which are all fun, waterproof, solar powered, atomic, ABC (Altimeter, Barometer, Compass)...

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    Re: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

    Quote Originally Posted by Ttaskmaster View Post
    If I get a message, I will most likely have to reply to it at some point, so might as well pull the phone out and do it anyway...


    And just what is wrong with tricorders?


    It's more the adverts for them, and the insistence by the rabid, sanctimonious owners that your life is pointless unless you own one... kinda like electric car owners, really!!
    1) For me, at work, it's handy to know if a message requires urgent attention or not whilst I'm dealing with a patient. I won't pick up the phone with a patient in the room unless it's potentially really urgent but a glance at a watch is less intrusive. That said, we can't wear watches anymore, but don't get me started on the insanity of some of the infection control regulations.

    2) Tricorders are awesome, but they do distract you from where you're going. I would make an ultrasound based tricorder that scanned the area actively but the frequency required would drive dogs mad. And I like dogs. Oh and I have neither the technical expertise not the money or the ability to make such a thing. Small detail.

    3) You ARE pointless unless you own an electric car. Whatever damage you are doing to the environment with your dirty deisel, you could increase it by at least 50% with an electric car. I find your lack of fait....effort disturbing.

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    Re: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

    Nope.

    And rather than what's stopping me it should be why should I get one.

    No need.
    Grab that. Get that. Check it out. Bring that here. Grab anything useful. Take anything good.

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    Re: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

    Quote Originally Posted by ubiquity View Post
    I would suggest perhaps there is a happy medium between the two extremes.

    One being sharing all the information about yourself online with everyone, and the other become a reclusive hermit wearing a tin hat and whispering 'they are always listening... always' to random strangers.

    I agree that not enough people understand the implications, but personally I prefer adverts and coupons based on what I would actually like rather than tampons (damn shared loyalty cards), and the advantages on excessive personal information capture mean a better understanding of the individual rather than a blank page, even if they could potentially be used for nefarious purposes.

    Off topic, but one of the major things is that you are not infact in charge of your own privacy. As soon as you friend someone on a social media platform such as Facebook, they are now in-charge of your privacy as, by default, they can post 'not safe for work' pictures and tag you. Certainly an interesting subject area. My BA dissertation was on 'Delusions of Altruism' and it was scary to find out first hand how many people did not realize what Facebook was doing with the data they gather, or how their business model operated...
    I take your point, but to further complicate the equation (between sacfifice of privacy and derived benefit ... like targeted advertising) there's another fsctor .... the value you put on the purported benefit.

    I mean, preferring targetted ad's (that may be useful) is a value judgement and a perfectly valid one. If, and I stress IF advertising and data-gathering companies were open and honest, and offered cknsumers the choice (the alternative being 'useless' generic ad's and no data collection, then that would be fair enough. Those who perceive tzrgetted ad's as having value, as being preferred, could make that choice. Of course, they don't precisely because they don't care whether we prefer it or not, they just want to bombard us with ad's.

    Personally, I see no benefit, at all, to targetted ad's becsuse on principle I never respond (or at least, not positively) to adverts and my ideal world is to not to get any, and if I have ti receive any, I want them generic. Under absolutely no circumstances do I want targeted ad's.

    As for who controls privacy on FB, etc, I take that point ... it's one reason I don't use FB etc

    In fact, philehidiot made the point .... the only real control of personal info is to NEVER give it out in the first place. I do everyyhing I realistically can to do exactly that, but there are limits go how far even I will go.

    As for disinformation, philehidiot I take that point too, but do be aware even that only wprks up to a point and mass data processing will weed a lot of that out over time. Bear in mind the data to be mined is sn ever-growing vein and the mining gets better and better every year.

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    Re: QOTW: Do you own a smartwatch?

    Completely agree its value vs cost. Value being the intrinsic value you see in the product vs the cost of giving out that data to a third party.

    Cant abide people who argue there is no value for anyone, but can easily understand how some would see no value in the product. Equally, those who see value in the product should have an understanding it comes with and underlying cost (e.g. privacy).

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