Pebble, the E-Paper Watch for iPhone and Android: Kickstart This!

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Here’s a project that is already a winner and it still has 9 days to go before backing closes down. (That isn’t quite true, so read on.) This smart watch is “Pebble is the first watch built for the 21st century” and it clearly struck a cord with many of us. Yes, the funding goal was a mere $100,000 but as of this post they have raised close to $10,000,000 from backers. WOW!!

Read on to learn more about Pebble.

Project Title: Pebble: E-Paper Watch for iPhone and Android

Status: In Progress

Closing Date for Funding: Friday May 18, 2012

URL of the Project: Find it here.

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From the Creatives:

Pebble is the first watch built for the 21st century. It’s infinitely customizable, with beautiful downloadable watchfaces and useful internet-connected apps. Pebble connects to iPhone and Android smartphones using Bluetooth, alerting you with a silent vibration to incoming calls, emails and messages. While designing Pebble, we strove to create a minimalist yet fashionable product that seamlessly blends into everyday life.

CUSTOMIZE WITH APPS: Apps bring Pebble to life. We’re building some amazing apps for Pebble. Cyclists can use Pebble as a bike computer, accessing the GPS on your smartphone to display speed, distance and pace data. Runners get a similar set of data displayed on their wrist. Use the music control app to play, pause or skip tracks on your phone with the touch of a button. If you’re a golfer, feel free to bring Pebble onto the course. We’re working with Freecaddie to create a great golf rangefinder app for Pebble that works on over 25,000 courses world-wide. Instead of using your phone, view your current distance to the green right on your wrist. These apps will be the first, with more in the works!

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Who at Gear Diary Backed It: Judie and Dan

At What Level Did We Back: We, along with 39,747 others!!) both backed at $115. That means we will each get a Jey Black Pebble when the watch is released in September

Why We Backed It: Judie backed this because it looks like an amazing accessory that adds ease-of-use and functionality to a smartphone. Dan backed it because of peer pressure. 🙂 (Okay, that and the fact that it is totally cool!)

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How’s Communication From the Creatives Been?: Amazing! There are 9 days to go and there have already been ten updates from the team behind the Pebble. Better still, the updates have been meaningful ones. Among them-

We’re limiting Kickstarter rewards to 85,000 Pebbles

Just wanted to let everyone know that our current plan is to limit the total number of Kickstarter rewards to around 85,000 Pebbles. As soon as the total exceeds that, all rewards will change to being ‘sold out’. Right now you have claimed 75,000 watches, that leaves only 10,000 more before Pebble is sold out!

We’ve thought a lot about this decision, and we feel it’s time. You, our backers, were the first group of people to believe in Pebble, and we want to return our focus to creating the most awesome watch possible for you.

That was impressive. This was too-

Bluetooth 4.0 – inside every Pebble!

All Pebble watches will support Bluetooth 2.1 (as before) as well as Bluetooth 4.0 (Low Energy)

Here are the details:

– Bluetooth 4.0 is the latest Bluetooth standard

– It’s backwards compatible and works with all phones for which we originally pledged to support

But they even went to far as to be clear that BT 4.0 will not be active when the Pebble ships but will come with a firmware update at a later point. That kind of transparency is what makes Kickstarter Creatives great!

What Has the Experience Been: Amazing! This is a great idea that comes from people who clearly respect the people backing them. And it is already a home run for the team who had n initial goal of just $100,000.

Would You Recommend this Kickstarter Project?: YES! But jump in soon since they are close to the 85,000 backer rewards cutoff point.

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About the Author

Dan Cohen
Having a father who was heavily involved in early laser and fiber-optical research, Dan grew up surrounded by technology and gadgets. Dan’s father brought home one of the very first video games when he was young and Dan remembers seeing a “pre-release” touchtone phone. (When he asked his father what the “#” and “*” buttons were his dad said, “Some day, far in the future, we’ll have some use for them.”) Technology seemed to be in Dan’s blood but at some point he took a different path and ended up in the clergy. His passion for technology and gadgets never left him. Dan is married to Raina Goldberg who is also an avid user of Apple products. They live in New Jersey with their golden doodle Nava.

12 Comments on "Pebble, the E-Paper Watch for iPhone and Android: Kickstart This!"

  1. “Darn you! Darn you Dan & Judie all to heck…!!!!!!!!!!!”  😉

    Sigh. I broke. I invested in one too. And I don’t really have an Android or Apple as a primary device, just an elderly iPhone 3G and my “old” Samsung Galaxy S (Captivate)! But it’s such a cool toy!!!

  2. Clark Thomson | May 9, 2012 at 1:48 pm |

    I rely heavily on my watch to tell me the “Correct” time. My watch HAS TO BE accurate, so I use a Casio G-Shock that updates and corrects the time from satellite every night to get the time from the atomic clock (in Boulder,CO I believe). 
    The one thing that what make me jump on this is if it updates time from your phone since they are always correct if you have them updating the time from the towers.
    Can anyone tell me if this is the case?

    • Yes, the time on your phone is the time on the watch face, whenever it is connected by BT it syncs to the phone.

  3. Ian Stearns | May 10, 2012 at 11:44 am |

    Thank you for bringing me to this project!  I was the last one to get on board before they were sold out.  What an awesome device

  4. Ian Stearns | May 10, 2012 at 11:44 am |

    Thank you for bringing me to this project!  I was the last one to get on board before they were sold out.  What an awesome device

    • That’s awesome! SO glad we started the Kickstart This!! series last week! Timing is everything.

    • That’s awesome! SO glad we started the Kickstart This!! series last week! Timing is everything.

  5. I want one.  No question.

  6. Hey where can i buy this cool watch ?

Comments are closed.