Jan 2, 2019 · 22m · a16z
a16z Podcast | Apple Watch -- Looking for New Things Done in New Ways
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gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
In this a16z podcast episode, tech executives Steven Sinofsky and Benedict Evans analyze their first month using the Apple Watch, exploring app design paradigms, social etiquette, hardware continuity, and the future trajectory of wearable platforms.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. How this is scored →
The host as informed peer 2.5 Guest teaching 4.3 Guest disagreement 2.2 The host pushing back 1.8
speaking balance: gold is the host, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 2:37 Benedict rejects host's 'fashion' label
Benedict explicitly rejects the host's framing, stating that 'fashion' is not the right word because it implies frothiness, reframing the watch as a luxury accessory.
Hardest push from the host ▶ 16:38 Host challenges watch etiquette assumptionThe host directly challenges the guest's assumption that glancing at a wrist is better than pulling out a phone, asking 'Is it? I don't know.'
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 16:43 Sinofsky educates host on evolving technology social normsSinofsky reframes the host's worry about polite behavior by explaining how norms shift over time, using the historical precedent of laptop acceptance in meetings.
The host holds their own ▶ 20:15 Host infers eventual watch untethering from phoneThe host synthesizes Sinofsky's point about backend cloud processing to logically infer that the watch could eventually split from the phone entirely, which Sinofsky confirms.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | The host as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | The host pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Initial Impressions: Beyond the Smartwatch Category | 2 | 5 | 3 | 2 | The host sets up the conversation with introductory questions. Benedict Evans politely pushes back on the host's characterization of the Apple Watch as 'fashion', reframing it instead as a luxury accessory and explaining why looking for a single core use case misses the point. | |
| App Ecosystem and Early Magical Use Cases | 2 | 4 | 1 | 1 | The guests lead the discussion on app ecosystem evolution, contrasting old patterns with new paradigms like boarding passes and Apple Pay. The host acts as a conversational facilitator, prompting for examples of 'magical' moments. | |
| Managing Notifications and Actionable Verbs | 2 | 5 | 1 | 1 | Sinofsky and Evans educate the host on notification hygiene and the necessity of designing around actionable 'verbs' rather than raw alerts. The host prompts with user-focused questions about how to tune notifications. | |
| Social Norms, Etiquette, and Stand Reminders | 4 | 5 | 4 | 4 | The host questions whether checking a watch is socially acceptable compared to checking a phone. Sinofsky rejects the premise that social norms are static, offering historical context about how meeting norms around laptops evolved over time. | |
| Ecosystem Continuity, Navigation, and Future Untethering | 4 | 4 | 1 | 2 | The guests explore ecosystem continuity, haptic navigation, and client-side intelligence. The host demonstrates understanding by asking an insightful question about whether cloud processing will eventually untether the watch from the phone. | |
| Conclusion and Future Trajectory of Wearables | 1 | 3 | 3 | 1 | In the wrap-up, the host teases the guests for using the word 'magical' frequently, prompting Sinofsky to jokingly point out that the host asked for magical moments before explaining Apple's historical tethering dynamic. |
Statements from this episode (16)
Sinofsky: The Apple Watch is not a smartwatch
“Well, the first thing that occurs to me is that it's not a smartwatch.”
Sinofsky: Apple products defy predefined product categories
“When Apple comes out with a new product, it generally isn't one that fits in the predefined category notions that, that people have.”
Evans: Apple Watch won't fill a void like smartphones or PCs did
“And so asking, you know, what are the core use cases for this? Slightly misses the point, because it's not the one thing that you will own that fills this void in your life, the way a smartphone did, or a PC did.”
Evans: Most first-wave Apple Watch apps are not right yet
“So like the whole first wave of apps you look at, you know, most of these are not quite right yet.”
Sinofsky: Platform killer apps are only recognized in hindsight and take decades
“Going back historically, like things that were killer apps are always like in hindsight. Like, it's not like you knew right away that your PC was going to be good at making greeting cards or balancing your checkbook. It took decades for those things that, that…”
Evans: Smartwatch apps fail when squishing full smartphone apps onto the wrist
“The apps tend to loop, a lot of the apps remind me of, like, using a J-Me feature phone app in 2006, where, like, you'd squashed way too much stuff down onto that screen, and I think the stuff that really works is when it's just one thing that's almost, like, …”
Sinofsky: New device categories succeed by doing new things, not replicating old ones
“The wave of skepticism is really fixated on this, to me, on this notion that the watch needs to do everything the way that your phone did it. And so, like, that, that problem is that is never how a new device category evolves. Like, in fact, it, by definition,…”
Sinofsky: Push notifications are useless unless they allow immediate user action
“Because I just don't find them valuable because my view of notifications is I want to be able to act on it, and so seeing it and then having to swipe it and clear it and deal with it, I might as well just look at the app and see the badges that tell me which a…”
Evans: Twitter's watch notifications for trending terms are completely worthless
“Here are five new trending terms in Twitter, which is the thing that the Twitter app is sending me, which is completely worthless.”
Sinofsky: Apple Watch reading experience mirrors early BlackBerry adoption
“The watch is, is not a, it's actually a surprisingly good consumption tool, considering the form factor, and I remember I tweeted, like, it feels like the first time I got a Blackberry. You stare at this little pager thing, and you're like, there is no chance …”
Evans: Glancing at a smartwatch is better etiquette than pulling out a phone
“How, but on the other hand, it's better than taking your phone out.”
Sinofsky: Social norms around new technology cannot be predicted in advance
“You can't really project where the whole social norms are going to be. And like when laptops first came out, we had big fights about like whether it was appropriate to bring them to meetings or not, because it was super clear you were focused on whatever was g…”
Benedict Evans: Haptic walking directions are the Apple Watch's killer app
“I found walking directions to be almost like a kind of a superpower, because instead of walking, if you imagine walking down a street, a crowded street in Manhattan, you know, and you don't know quite where you're going, and you keep pulling your phone out to …”
Benedict Evans: Apple Watch strategy enhances iPhone, unlike Google's cloud approach
“I mean, I think, you know, to Stephen's point about platform, this is clearly, you know, and again, this is what speaks to the, again, a sort of thing I talk about a lot, which is kind of a difference between Apple and Google, which is for Google, there's a wh…”
Sinofsky: Personalized tech features do not require storing user data in cloud
“Well, and I think that the, this is one where, where I think people can overstate the need for the cloud side of it, or understate the amount that they can do based, sort of, not really Cloud, but, or clients, but like on a client side way, I mean, if you thin…”
Sinofsky: Apple is on a path to untether the Watch from the iPhone
“The one thing I will say that's going to be magical is how Apple Like, evolves, their historic way of doing things has been to tether them, and then untether them over time, and so what I think is going to be interesting to see is if they can untether the watc…”