TinyPod – Apple Watch case with scroll wheel

I don't think this is silly in the slightest. There are lots of folks like me who deliberately want to break our phone addictions, which is why things like www.thelightphone.com exist.

My problem with the Light Phone (owner of version II) is that it's too limited. I don't want to be distracted by notifications or social media or doom scrolling on the browser, but I do need things that are essentially task-oriented tools: Uber/Lyft, Weather apps, Maps, Authenticator Code apps (and, now, using my phone as a passkey), etc.

I'm not an iOS user, but this makes be almost wish I were, because it's exactly what I'd want. It's too small to make me want to scroll YouTube randomly, but has all the tools that I don't want to forego. I think this is a fantastic product if it works as advertised.

it's of course very silly

Beg to differ -- this is quite valuable as a new kind of paging device that you want to keep around instead of your higher end iPhone's battery constantly draining, and more importantly, for people who'd like to keep radiation at a distance.

(Yeah, no, I'm not saying you should keep away from radiation, just that some people do prefer to and it's therefore a market segment.)

I've long wanted a lanyard for my watch. Maybe they can add an eyelet (loop?) to the bottom of these cases.

Does it at least do anything well? An iPod replacement would be fun, but the best thing about an iPod was the wired headphones.

This would only work with my AirPods, which almost never work without fiddling with something either in the UI or by taking them in and out of their case.

Funnily enough the inspiration may have come from Apple themselves, before the Watch was announced they covertly tested it in cases made to resemble an iPod knock-off.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bmgFk5hT6d8

It's of course very silly, and I'm sure commenters here are going to talk about all the ways that it isn't practical or that it's a niche idea, but I love whimsical silly niche hardware ideas that make it into actual hardware

It's crazy how I miss my 2nd gen iPod Nano, even though I wouldn't really have any use for it today. It was really a stupendously satisfying specialised device whose use is completely obviated today by general purpose smartphones.

But then again I wear watches...

It's art!

I think I love this too! An interesting concept for enhancing the functionality and aesthetic of the Apple Watch

The offline storage is a nice touch

Not even the pocket, all modern flagship phones are so large that I can't use them well with one hand. I'll stick with the mini till the day it does and just hope there's a better something out there by that time.

Pockets? So 20th Century. I’m seeing people wear their massive phones on lanyards around their neck all day.

if the apps are well designed a smaller screen is just fine.

This was the problem I ran into. They're not.

I held onto the iPhone SE for quite a while. Everything became progressively more cramped as the years went by. Some app UI controls were cut off. All sorts of web stuff was laid out funny.

While everything did _work_, I get too annoyed at knowing that I'm having a sub-par UX every time I see it.

My hope was that the mini would be a success and they'd eventually had a Pro Mini line, but sadly the mini form-factor hasn't sold well. I would buy a Pro Mini in a heartbeat.

We did? I don’t recall an accessory like that for the nano. Seems it would have been too tall (wide?) to function as a watch. Happy to be proven wrong though.

Oh man I loved my iPod nano! I had the square one, and used to fill it with music and podcasts through a cable. I wish I had known there were cases to turn it into a watch

I still own multiple nanos with the watch bands and the kids love playing with them as a ”more kid-safe Apple Watch”. Even after all these years they’re still immaculate and work great. More than can be said by lots of other more recent technology.

I was literally thinking what you said and I scrolled to your comment. WILD!

A bit ironic how the evolution of technology and user preferences can come full circle

strong disagree. as i scrolled, the animation blinked as it loaded the image sequence and felt very staccato and not smooth at all. at least what apple does works

I strongly disagree. It doesn't render correctly on FireFox on my Mac. And while those animated pages might look cool, they are very bad on giving you information. The product looks really cool, but as a Apple Watch owner I would really like to know what exactly it does and how.

My phone just chokes trying to render this page. That's on Chrome, Android, on a model that's a few years old (but not ancient).

I was going to rant how unusable this page is (it is) when I realized that it's just another form of content.

The web was created for providing documents, like research papers. Then it evolved into applications, like Google Maps. This kind of website is different from others: it's a movie.

Just like a movie it is expected you start at the middle and go through every single part in order until the end. You are not expected to start at the middle. You are not expected to search inside of it. You are supposed to consume it entirely from beginning to end.

I like movies because they entertain me; this website is trying to go the entertainment way and I highly dislike it. I want to understand what the thing does, how it can be used: I'm looking for information, not a pleasant time.

Wouldn't be hacker news without a comment shedding the bike to talk about the design of the page and make no mention of the actual product.

The scrolling worked fine for me for what it's worth, and is obviously a knockoff of apple product pages. Satirical even I'd say.

Rest assured the website is as smooth as gravel on desktop too.

It's funny, you can basically play back the first animation in dev tools by just scrolling through all the media requests. Each frame of the animation is a separate PNG.

I agree, but I also enjoy the way that they've emulated the apple website experience for product pages.

Agreed, at this point a lot of websites have become laggy human-powered movies.

I guess it looks nice when cached, but i am just scrolling empty page and when I stop, after a second I get random picture. An epitome of atrocious design

if your watch can call

https://www.uber.com/au/en/ride/call-to-ride/

https://support.apple.com/guide/watch/make-phone-calls-apdc3...

Completely speculating, but when an App Store review process can drive business decisions (we have to push the launch of X back because we're having trouble lobbying Apple to approve our changes), it's reasonable to see a second app as doubling the likelihood that you end up in that situation. And even if it weren't for the review processes, would every launch be at the mercy of reporters saying "this isn't supported on my watch, so..."?

It's also possible that each company simply lost all the people who knew the watchOS APIs, and the incremental revenue generated wasn't worth hiring for that role again, or trying to convince someone else at the company to add it to their scope.

Perhaps, as well, there was an expectation that Apple would be the one encouraging Uber to maintain and build the app, and give them favorable treatment on the App Store review processes as a way to sweeten that deal... and then when the larger relationships started to become more acrimonious, any ideas here fell by the wayside.

Yes! This is one of the critical things I need from an on the go device

My charged watch (series 6)on the table without any use runs out of battery in 24 hours…

My main reason why I don’t use my watch anymore is that it needs to be charged all the time.

It has to be mechanical, there are no input ports on the (current) Apple Watches.

tried to find that as well. the "How it works" section is completely useless.

I feel it must be mechanical since it interfaces with crown?

"What goes around, comes around! Rediscover the delight of tactile scrolling with tinyPod’s physical scroll wheel. And yes, it actually scrolls. How? Through carefully mechanized components inside, tinyPod's wheel makes direct rotation contact with your Apple Watch crown, letting it naturally scroll anything across the OS."

The how it works section says the following when you expand it:

Through carefully mechanized components inside, tinyPod's wheel makes direct rotation contact with your Apple Watch crown, letting it naturally scroll anything across the OS.

I absolutely loved the page. Had a lot of fun scrolling up and down and thought it was cleverly designed. Similar, but better, than what Apple does on their own pages.

clearly built on a macbook with smooth scrolling. My mouse has a discrete scroll-wheel -- it snaps to the next position -- it makes this site a stuttering, jittery mess.

There are lots of things wrong with that page, but I didn't expect getting dizzy, motion sickness was going to be one of them.

I guess it's my fault for putting up with such a garbage website because I was curious enough about the product...

Yeah, page is busted for me also, super janky, images flashing in and out.

Firefox on macOS

Firefox for Android here, it's a strobing mess. I have to purposely and very slowly scroll and wait for frames/images(?) to load in order to get any kind of cohesive experience/information out of the site. I think the product is really neat and I love the idea, but the site is insufferable.

I dont think the average consumer wants this. They want a big screen, and flashy features, and a camera that makes ugly people beautiful.

I'm on Firefox and it doesn't flash for me.

Yes, the top half of the webpage acts as a power point presentation, with image flashes - instead of a smooth animation. - firefox on linux

Flashes on first scroll for me as well, Firefox on Android here.

Implying apple products are not cancer on their own right.

Can you give some other examples?

It's a piece of molded silicone.

Maybe an iOS shortcut could do it? Could even add inputs for address or current location…

Looks like Maps lets you “request ride”, so possibly even the native maps method could work here.

Uber used to have a watch app that allowed you to do this. I assume they canned it due to lack of usage.

I haven't used my watch as a replacement phone, but my experience is quite different of the tech to yours.

Connecting AirPods is pretty straight forward. I don't recognise the pain. I also don't think it's always necessary, yes, not every call can be on speakerphone, but you can pick up, explain you're switching to headphones if necessary, it's fine.

I have AirPod Pros. The mic quality is great, even when on a busy street. Noise cancelling and adaptive audio is great.

I do not need my phone to be in the charger for call forwarding. I have the cellular version, and my watch buzzes on every call, no matter what state my phone is in. This might be a setting, I've never changed anything, but I absolutely do not have the experience you have.

Messages are fine if you realise the keyboard works as a swipe keyboard with auto-correct. You can also voice dictate, and the accuracy is decent, but then I'm British, so maybe it's trained on a data set that is more like my voice than many.

If your watch is getting hot, there might be a fault. I've had an Apple Watch since the Series 2, and I've never had it get hot unless it's in direct sunlight, and then it's like any other metal case watch.

Apple Watch requiring an iPhone is a major limitation, but I also don't mind it too much, as I'm always going to have an iPhone for those apps that I wouldn't want on my watch, but around me from time to time - banking, games, video players, and so on. I don't see my watch as a full replacement for my phone, but as a means to leave my phone home when it's too cumbersome - going out for a run, for example - or as a backup if my phone battery dies. Having it as Apple Pay and being able to use the transit card thing on TfL barriers in London makes it a slam dunk easy thing to use.

In short: it's still an extension of your phone, not a replacement. If you want it as a replacement, you might be waiting a while, and if you don't want to use speakerphone or figure out AirPods with it, that could be a frustrating experience.

I've tried this several times too and still do phone less days quite often thanks to the watch, but my big obstacle has been the lack of Uber/Lyft which I use instead of having a car. They used to have those apps on the watch but unfortunately they don't.

If I could use Uber/Lyft on the watch I would mostly leave my phone on the charger.

I think the biggest issue for many is using it in a car? As far as I know, the watch will not pair like a phone does for calls using the typical bluetooth standards that work just fine across all conventional cellphones.

Not being able to field calls in the car would make this an instant deal breaker before I even tried. If I have to bring a phone along to ensure car support, I'm stuck bringing a full-size cellphone with me most days anyway.

Losing Apple CarPlay (potentially no navigation app at all in your car) will also be massive detractor for a lot of folks. If you don't own a car, it's probably a ton more feasible with how the watch functions today though.

You can set up your watch using a phone, and then turn the phone off and the watch still works. What doesn't work is SMS messages from non-apple users, because they are forwarded from the phone.

I set up my daughter's Apple Watch SE which we got her because phones are depression machines for teen girls (according to the Biden controlled MSM anyway) and I just set it up using my backup phone. I then backed up her setup, restored my setup, and when I need to update her watch or do something else administrative I just restore her backup to the phone, do what I need, then restore my backup to the phone, ready to fill in at a moment's notice if my phone needs to be repaired or gets lost or whatever.

I also take calls on my airpods connected to my watch pretty frequently because I exercise without my phone. I've never really had a problem with it.

I also thought it was funny that they are listing features like apple pay and magnetic charging as if these features have anything to do with the case.

Plus I'd look goofy with my tan arms with my snow white watch tan mark.

I also seldom, if ever, leave my house with my iPhone.

One real feature: improved battery life. This might let me leave my phone in my bag and stop worrying about the watch battery.

I'd jump at this (or even just a straight Apple watch) to replace my phone if it didn't require an iPhone in order to use it (I currently use Android; seems a bit silly to buy an iPhone purely to enable a watch). Hoping they consider this use case eventually, and it's worth remembering that early ipods required a mac to use, and early iphones required a computer to set them up.

I just wear one AirPod, good enough for podcasts and phone calls.

cant that be disabled? I think it can be

You can turn off wrist detection so it stays unlocked.

i guess it's the same as phones, before biometric authentication? but in general yeah, the watch was not designed to be used like this and anyone who's used a watch should be able to predict how bad the UX is gonna be...

Agreed the pages that override scrolling are horrible.

was just gonna mention this it feels annoying having to scroll multiple times to see a fancy animation

I despise the flickering, it's intensely distracting.

You’re in luck because it does and that’s exactly how my daughter uses it at school.

Do you have any guides for that? I'd like to try my hand at it.

I have 0 old watches/ phones lying around - always sell them on or give them to recycling…

Works fine for me on FF and I have copious plugins installed.

Seems like they did, considering it works well for me on the latest version of FF.

do you have javascript disabled via noscript or ublock origin? It works fine on firefox for me.

I took my old iPod video and swapped out the hard drive for an adapter that just uses micro sd cards. I suppose you can’t use wireless headphones but it’s now ultra light and the battery life is great.

There is at least some market for it, judging by the amount of money raised by Tangara: https://www.crowdsupply.com/cool-tech-zone/tangara

I've thought for a while Apple itself could probably have some pretty decent success bringing back a new generation of the iPod. There's a (somewhat) popular community of people who mod old iPods to give them ssd's, better batteries, bluetooth, better screens, etc.

Apple could make a really cool product again, and pitch it as like the "anti-phone" or "anti-social media" vibe that seems to be gaining some popularity.

I'm imagining like a weeks long battery life, large screen (but not like an iPod touch), bluetooth for wireless headphoens, ability to have more apps (basically just allowing watch apps), WiFi+GPS, maybe speakers if they're feeling bold... idk it could be cool but maybe it'd be too niche still

Yep, How to make your smartwatch not have half of its interesting features.

If I’m reading your comment correctly, most if not all of that can be turned off. Turn off the passcode, and it no longer cares if you’re wearing it or not (“wrist detection “ is just to save you entering the passcode). Apple Pay and some other stuff won’t work, but if just want an iPod/tiny iPhone, it should be functional enough.

It's a fully mechanical shell with no electronics so you're asking for a jack in the watch itself which would be pretty comical. For this to add a jack you'd need Apple to have put in a port for 3rd party accessories and provide an API for using it.

Which Watch Ultra do you mean? Both Apple and Samsung products come up in web searches for "Watch Ultra" for me.

It's just a mechanical shell that connects the click wheel to the watch crown so in theory it should be about as good as the Apple Watch itself electronically. It might get a little gummy in the mechanism though.

There's 0 electronics in it. It should be fully water resistant, unless somehow there's an opportunity for the mechanical function on the scroll wheel portion to rust or something.

If its any consolation, their scroll hijacking is also hot garbage on desktop firefox.

Granted, its a hardware company, so I'm not that upset that their web design is atrocious, but the fact that a minimal level of review would've told them this was a problem suggests to me that the product itself won't be as polished as the videos suggest.

Must be a sad living being miserable all the time.

Let those warehouses full of cheap mp3 players rot, don't bother trying to upgrade an old ipod with a new battery and storage (which it wasn't designed to be upgraded with anyway),

Any of those can integrate into modern Apple ecosystem?

They might be able to C&D the name, but I doubt they'd do anything (or get anywhere if they tried) about the case.

How could they?

ok that's crazy :) and super interesting! also it makes me think there must be so much secrecy, paranoia and politics within apple

any other juicy stories??

That is neat. I wonder if the antenna is there for aesthetics ?

Also, would've been better if it folded up like a clamshell phone from the early 2000s.

Pocket watch -> wristwatch -> phones -> smartwatch - smart pocket watch

Don't forget to block every one of the sensors you paid extra for.

really nice DAC

Is there a Tidal app for WatchOS?

The main body could pretty easily be injection molded plastic, which can be very cheap and still quite precise. You could even overmold the plastic onto other components (at more cost, and depending on what the deisgn "inside" actually entails).

A teardown of this thing would be pretty cool to see what's taking the scrollwheel motion and translating it into movement on the watches crown. That could be a (relatively) simple set of gears set onto some stamped aluminum sheet, which can also be fairly cheap.

Also never underestimate a Chinese OEM when it comes to making something (at any scale) fast and cheap. They could maybe be in on a % of sales too or something? The company selling them may also be gambling and put an order in for 10s of thousands to get the price they want/need and may have to sit on their inventory for quite a while and are risking losing money on the whole. Who knows.

The website does say that it turns wrist detection off to save battery, so I wonder if that or some other combination of settings to turn off the ECG and stand notifications takes care of those potential issues.

Were you actually confused? Did you not read the title of the article but still somehow clicked it? really baffling comment

I think that's done as part of disabling wrist-detection

unless you find WiFi right? and that’s only for connection required apps, it can certainly do more than an iPod, GPS should even work without data connection I think? you just have to store the maps/media

Have you tried the Yoto player? Our daughter loves hers and they are pretty cheap. You can load them with your own mp3s too, which we download from BBC Sounds.