Smartwatch trends in Germany

BITKOM (the Bundesverband Informationswirtschaft, Telekommunikation und neue Medien) recently published a new study on smartwatches following on from two similar studies conducted in 2013. Given the changes in the smartwatches available in 2013 and today (pre-Apple Watch days) the results should be taken with a pinch of salt. Nevertheless, regardless of how seriously we can take the figures they do make interesting reading.

Growing Demand?

According to the studies, in June 2013 only 31% of the 1006 respondents were interested in a smartwatch. In September of the same year this had risen to 38% (1008 participants). A year and a half later, the latest study of 1011 people aged 14 or over found that 40% were interested in a smartwatch. That means that in 2015 there are 28 million potential smartwatch owners in Germany - an increase of six million more than in 2013! The first study in 2013 also looked at how much people would be willing to pay for a smartwatch - the average amount was about 87€. Given that now the cheapest watches still cost about €100 this could be the biggest potential stumbling block for widescale adoption at the moment.  

Typical Users

Perhaps unsurprisingly, men are more interested in smartwatches than women. In June 2013, 39% said they would definitely or probably use a smartwatch compared to only 23% of women. Age also played a role here. In June 2013 49% of all 14 to 29 year olds were interested in getting a smartwatch compared to only 31% for all age groups.

LG G Watch pretending to be an Apple Watch with a Pebble for company!

 Reservations

The latest study does also list some reasons why participants weren't interested in getting a smartwatch:

• 45% said they hadn't considered it
• 36% didn't want to give up their current watch
• 36% were worried about privacy issues
• 29% said that smartwatches are too expensive
• 19% didn't like the design
• 11% said that the battery life is too short

Adressing design and battery life issues shouldn't be too difficult and privay concerns may just be a case of confirming what exactly happens with any data the watch gathers. The price is a factor which will typically fall when the devices become more popular so maybe getting people to give up their current watches or even consider having a smartwatch in the first place could be the most difficult challengs to face.

Sources:

Report, April 2015: https://www.bitkom.org/de/presse/8477_82146.aspx

Report, September 2013:  http://www.bitkom.org/de/presse/78284_77281.aspx

Report, June 2013: https://www.bitkom.org/de/markt_statistik/64026_76561.aspx

Smartwatches at universities - article by Andreas Bischoff

Andreas Bischoff of the University of Duisburg-Essen has made an interesting post (in German) on smartwatches and their implications for higher education. If you can read German or trust google to translate you can find it here:

http://blogs.uni-due.de/zim/2015/04/21/smartwatches-an-der-hochschule-das-wissen-der-welt-am-handgelenk-oder-uni-schummeln-4-0/

Whilst Andreas doesn't directly define what a smartwatch is he gives a nice overview of the distinctive features of a smartwatch: notifications, sensors, speech input, display, apps and battery life.  Speech input doesn't apply to pebble watches so far but it is common to most other models.

Andreas also wonders about the societal issues of smartwatches and for universities, most importantly, whether smartwatches will mean the dawn of a new age of cheating in exams. The possibilities provided by an app like Attopedia on an Android smartwatch are given as an example.

Lastly, and most interesting for me, Andreas ponders whether smartwatches might mean a renaissance in microlearning.

Take a look, I am sure you will find the post very interesting!

http://blogs.uni-due.de/zim/2015/04/21/smartwatches-an-der-hochschule-das-wissen-der-welt-am-handgelenk-oder-uni-schummeln-4-0/

Mobile learning with the Apple Watch

Probably the most hyped smartwatch ever, today was the Apple Watch's official launch date. Unless you are Beyonce you probably won't have one yet but some journalists have already been exploring the phones possibilities and the first apps have already appeared in the Appstore.

Not surprisingly, one of the first of these is a vocabulary-learning app, ivocabulary 3, which has now been updated to support the Apple Watch -

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/ivocabulary-3-your-personal/id471594761?mt=8

The app can show you a slideshow of vocabulary, set a multiple-choice test and give you some diagnostics on your performance. Sadly, I too don't have an Apple Watch to test this app out but it is surely just the beginning of a stream of similar apps coming to the Apple Watch soon. Whether they are actually useful or not is another question and that is what I hope, with my research, to find out.

Welcome to Smartwatch Learning!

Hi,

thanks for dropping by. My name is Neil Davie and this blog will hopefully grow to be a collection of articles, links and thoughts on the possibilities of using smartwatches for learning purposes. I previously researched the effectiveness of learning vocabulary using a smartphone app, called quizlet, for my Masters dissertation at Edinburgh Napier University. Now that smartwatches are becoming more widespread and affordable I want to explore whether they too can be used for any kind of meaningful learning experience. This blog will be a repository for all the information I gather and for my thoughts on the subject as I delve deeper.

Please stop by again soon for new articles and links. And as a starter - here is the duolingo app in action on an Android Wear-powered smartwatch:

Hope to see you here again soon!

Cheers,

Neil