Monday, January 12, 2009

James Bond Watch to Debut

Watch out: you too can be James Bond. At the CES Show in Las Vegas, LG debuted a new watch that will launch in 2009: the mobile phone watch. The watch is actually incredibly well designed; it is sleek and sophisticated and amazingly discrete. It offers not only 3-G capability, but also Bluetooth, texting, and still and moving video capabilities. I've read major news reports that the watch will be available in Europe and the U.S. in 2009, but after speaking with an LG representative, there are no plans to launch the watch in the U.S., and certainly not in 2009. It will, however, be available to the European market in 2009, so it's a great gift for someone abroad. Do I really think people will buy it? Yes, a certain market will. It will not replace conventional mobile phones as it's too difficult to use as a phone, but it's certainly a great travel gadget for the person who has it all and wants to seem like he's on the cutting edge of technology. What would really make it sell? If LG could figure out how it could interface with mobile phones so that when a call came in, you could just look at your watch and know if you want to answer your phone. Also, it could be very useful either in the case of an emergency, or for a younger audience provided the as-yet undetermined price is not too expensive for that market. In any outcome, the LG Mobile watch is a fun gadget and made a great splash at CES. Send someone in Europe a great gift, and send us their feedback!

St. Andrews from the Cathedral