NEW YORK (AP) – For all those who hailed the iPhone as the “Jesus Phone” in 2007, the Apple Watch’s arrival has hardly been the second coming.
Sure, it can do many useful, even delightful things, such as showing us incoming texts and email, tracking our heart rate during exercise or letting us send digital doodles to friends. But is that enough to spend $350 or more, especially when it requires wearing a watch again? After all, smartphones have negated the need for watches to tell time.
Early Apple Watch owners seem generally happy with it, but Apple’s bigger worry should be those on the sidelines – even hardcore Apple fans, not to mention the rest of us – who are waiting to take the plunge. Apple hasn’t released sales figures, but its quarterly financial report Tuesday suggests that they were lower than many Wall Street analysts expected, even though they exceeded Apple’s internal projections.
Some people are waiting for early kinks to be worked out and others, for an “aha moment.”
“It’s been cast as a want, not a need,” said Matt Quick, a Topeka, Kansas, engineer and Apple fan who is holding off on getting one. “I’m kind of waiting to see what next year’s model will bring.”