The Election Won’t Be Rigged, But It Could Be Hacked - the_duck
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/14/opinion/campaign-stops/the-election-wont-be-rigged-but-it-could-be-hacked.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=opinion-c-col-left-region&region=opinion-c-col-left-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-left-region&_r=0
======
micaksica
Of course it will be hacked. I find it hilarious that people think that our
political parties have some type of moral code they actually use to play by
the "rules", whatever nonexistent rules those are. As long as they aren't
doing something directly illegal or can deflect the blame for illegal behavior
to an underling that "misunderstood the directions", the incentive is there
for ALL political parties to play as dirty as they possibly can. Democrat,
Republican, whatever, doesn't matter.

The party's game is to win seats in Congress and the Presidency. Not win
fairly. Not win "by the rules". To win, at whatever cost, as long as that cost
isn't the elected positions themselves.

~~~
ianlevesque
Exhibit A: Gerrymandering

~~~
ktRolster
I think someone pointed out here that gerrymandering would be useless if
people didn't reliably, blindly, vote based on party.

~~~
fatbird
In the normal case, wouldn't a person usually vote in the next election the
way they voted previously? A party's platform is generally the same election-
to-election, and if I voted previously for that platform, I'd tend to continue
voting for it unless I had a pretty significant change of heart--and then
changed it again for the election following? Unless either the party or the
voter swung wildly around, gerrymandering doesn't require "blind" allegiance
to a party.

~~~
ktRolster
The issues favored by one party or another change dramatically over a period
of even a decade. "Party" is just a way to make people feel like they're part
of a team.

------
sverige
I was an election judge in Colorado in 1994, '98, '00, and '04\. I observed
elections in North Carolina in 2006 and '08.

The Colorado elections used paper ballots (complete with "hanging chads") and
from what I could tell were run pretty fair and square. One year there were
some problems with some of the kids from the local college where rich
Easterners send their lower-caliber offspring when they can't get into the Ivy
League. They flooded a particular precinct insisting that they be given
provisional ballots (name not on the list and ballots not counted unless it's
close). They didn't meet the requirements even for those ballots and some
threw a hissy fit. The local prosecutor discovered that many had already voted
absentee back in their home state. They were not prosecuted, unfortunately.

In North Carolina in '06, the precinct captain ran it by the books. In '08,
same precinct, same captain, many were allowed to vote provisionally even
though they didn't meet the requirements (didn't live in the county they were
trying to vote in). Others told me it was similar in other precincts.

Paper ballots, ID, and lots of well-trained observers seem to be the best way
to avoid the threats from social engineering and hack attacks on the integrity
of the voting process. I would even go for the purple dye they use on the
thumbs of voters in some countries to prevent people from traveling precinct
to precinct to vote for dead people and people who have moved away who are
still on the rolls. (There are more than you probably think.)

In general, my observation has been that the voting process has become more
corrupt over the past 20 years. It's just damn hard to catch it if the people
who are supposed to enforce the rules don't care to.

~~~
marcoperaza
But here's the problem: "You want to check ID at the polling place? You must
be a racist! Here's how that represents a tiny, yet unacceptable burden, for
some underprivileged group."

This is actually where we are as a country. It's depressing.

~~~
IIAOPSW
I think that the issue there is not with the ID per se, but with the cost (in
time and money) disproportionately affecting the poor and also with the fact
that it de facto creates a national ID system (which some are ideologically
opposed to).

I would be ok with voter ID laws which accepted a multitude of valid existing
documents. E.g if you allow passport, driver license, state ID, SS card and
birth cert then there probably does not exist a person whom does not have at
least one of those.

~~~
imjustsaying
> E.g if you allow passport, driver license, state ID, SS card and birth cert
> then there probably does not exist a person whom does not have at least one
> of those.

Passports, driver licenses, and state IDs are dependent upon first having an
SS card and/or birth certificate, depending on the state. Therefore, we can
narrow the nexus down to a birth certificate or an SS card.

There are plenty of domestically-born citizens who do not have an SS card
(based on some state birth procedures I am familiar with, acquiring a federal
SS number at birth is optional at the choice of the parents).

There are also plenty of people who were not born in the US, but have become
naturalized citizens.

So it seems that there would be plenty of people who have neither of those
nexuses.

~~~
NhanH
> There are plenty of domestically-born citizens who do not have an SS card
> (based on some state birth procedures I am familiar with, acquiring a
> federal SS number at birth is optional at the choice of the parents). There
> are also plenty of people who were not born in the US, but have become
> naturalized citizens.

I don't have ball in the game (not US citizen), but your argument is flawed,
specifically in two cases:

\- Domestically-born citizens who do not have an SS card but have a birth
certificate.

\- Naturalized citizens without birth certificate but have SS.

You didn't specify why it could happen that these two cases would not cover
everyone in your two listings.

~~~
imjustsaying
A person doesn't necessarily get an SS number at birth. And a naturalized
citizen doesn't have a birth certificate. Therefore, some people might not
have either one of these documents.

Of course, a citizen is normally eligible to get such documents by applying at
whichever bureau. But, it is conceivable that some people don't have them.

Practically speaking, it is difficult to live life in the US without an SS
number/card. You can't open a bank account, get identity documents, (get a
passport?), get student loans, or be a employee in a company that wants to
record your SS for tax compliance purposes.

Anecdotally, I have read that some people refuse to give their kids a number
at birth via SS. This then means they have to go through extra paperwork later
in life if they want to get one when they are adults.

Also anecdotally, I was renewing my driver's license recently, and I overheard
the 40+ year old woman at the counter next to me tell the clerk she never had
a driver's license or a state ID.

She seemed pretty embarrassed about it, probably because without a driver's
license or state ID, it's clear that she wasn't able to participate in things
like opening a bank account, for which a photo ID is required (unless she had
a passport).

If this all seems kind of crazy, just consider that in the US, the federal
government, state government and individual are all sovereign, just in
different and sometimes overlapping ways.

~~~
foldr
Just a small correction. You can in fact open a bank account without an SSN.(I
did so without any problem when I was studying in the US.)

~~~
imjustsaying
That's cool, I'm glad to learn that.

Regulations on some things, for example driver's licenses, private mailboxes
(and maybe bank accounts?), got tightened up/federalized with the passing of
the Patriot Act/Real ID Act in (2004?). For example, to open a private
mailbox, I have to fill out a federal form now. Additionally, I can no longer
use that mailbox as a registered address for a bank account.

Did you use any kind of federal identifier, for example an EIN (something you
can apply to the feds to get, often used for businesses), or did you use your
passport/passport number, or none of the above?

~~~
NhanH
The Patriot Act requires bank to keep home address of foreigner in the foreign
country on file. But otherwise, you only need to provide passport + 1 more
type of picture ID to open the bank account. This was in 2010

~~~
foldr
I only had my passport as ID and didn't have to give my home address, so it
can be even easier than that in practice.

------
gizmo686
I submitted this as its own post, but it didn't get much traction, so I'll
link it here as well.

[http://static1.squarespace.com/static/579f40a01b631bd12f10c2...](http://static1.squarespace.com/static/579f40a01b631bd12f10c29e/t/57a759c2f5e231cfd155331b/1470585287273/000+An+Electoral+System+in+Crisis.pdf)

This paper argues that the 2016 primaries were hacked based on the fact that
(among other arguements):

There was consistent discrepencies between paper and machine voting results,
favoring Clinton and against Trump.

Clinton and Trump support was corralated with precinct size

Demographics are not sufficent to explain the above observations.

I have not verified the accuracy of this analysis, or found other commentary
on it.

~~~
ktRolster
If someone hacked the voting machines, I would expect them to only find
vulnerabilities in some of the machines, not all of them. Thus if the paper
finds a discrepancy that isn't related to the type of machine, I would expect
it is some other kind of cheating (or just an anomaly).

~~~
DavidPlumpton
You don't need to hack voting machines. If you control the body that allocates
them in your area you send more of them to areas favourable to your desired
outcome. So in other areas the lines get too long and some people don't get to
vote. That alone will swing things a few percent.

------
aYsY4dDQ2NrcNzA
I wish that we would abandon the concept of all-in-one electronic voting
machines and instead incentivize _ballot printers_.

They could have a happy touch screen UI that is easy to localize, and then
print out a human-readable paper ballot for the voter to review and then drop
into a physical ballot box. And you could have one machine with a special
printer to produce raised-character printing for blind voters to verify.

All the advantages of a computer UI and very few of the disadvantages of the
DRE voting machines.

~~~
r00fus
The electronic voting machines used by many districts are not only insecure,
but run by former felons (link from 2003!) [1].

The only reason I can see why we use voting machines run by criminals is that
the powers-that-be want it that way. No amount of ineptitude can survive for
15 years without a small group benefitting immensely (and then selling that
access).

[1]
[https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20031218/0933248.shtml](https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20031218/0933248.shtml)

------
toodlebunions
Lack of paper trail has been an election complaint for at least 16 years now.

------
elihu
Is there any practical difference between rigging and hacking? Whether the
election outcome is manipulated by government officials, one or both major
political parties, Vladimir Putin, corporate insiders at the vendors that
supply voting machines, some guy named Chad, or some collaboration between any
of the above, it amounts to the same thing: the loss of voter's right to hold
their elected leaders accountable.

Most election tampering requires a pretty big conspiracy and is therefore hard
to pull off on a large enough scale to change the outcome without being
caught, but electronic voting with no paper trail makes it possible for
someone to do just that without more than one or a handful of people knowing
about it, which I think makes it the biggest threat to the accuracy and
credibility of elections in the United States.

Even in the absence of real election fraud, if the voters have no credible
reason to believe it didn't happen, then the election system ought to be
fixed. Ideally, the burden of proof should be on election officials to show
that the results are correct, not on activists to prove fraud.

------
ktRolster
Sounds like a challenge! If any of the precincts turn up 100% for Jill Stein,
you'll know it was me.

------
jack9
It is rigged AND is going to be hacked. That's a given.

~~~
skrowl
After the Wikileaks releases, we know without a doubt that the Democrat
primaries were rigged for Clinton. Multiple people were forced to resign from
high paying DNC posts over it.

I see no reason to think that the actual election in November won't also be
rigged to the maximum extent possible for Clinton.

~~~
roywiggins
Why was Clinton so effective compared to the GOP's old guard? They absolutely
despise their nominee- why weren't they able to pull enough dirty tricks to
sink Trump?

And, again, in the general, I've seen no evidence that the Clinton camp is
vastly less moral than the GOP/Trump camp- why attribute all potential rigging
to Clinton when the GOP has just as much reason to pull the same tricks?

~~~
em3rgent0rdr
Maybe because GOP primaries isn't more corrupt than Dems. Maybe the GOP
constituency actually does consist of the type of people who want Trump.

~~~
roywiggins
Similarly, the Democrats have a lot of people who wanted Clinton, and 3
million more of them appear to have turned out to vote than did Sanders
supporters.

I just don't see how, if widespread primary rigging is effective and not all
that difficult (since the DNC, who really aren't all THAT clever, supposedly
"rigged" it without much in the way of repercussions) Trump could end up the
GOP nominee against the wishes of the GOP elite.

It's quite easy to explain Clinton's win without any shady "rigging." It's
quite difficult to manufacture 3 million net votes- that's either a lot of
ballot-box stuffing or a huge voter disenfranchisement campaign and there's no
evidence of either. The simplest explanation is that the Dem constituency
consists of people who want her.

------
vaadu
It could easily be rigged without a papertrail or having to show ID to vote.

~~~
ethanbond
What on earth makes you think IDs are secure?

Have you been near a college campus anytime... I don't know... Ever?

~~~
ams6110
Faking IDs on a scale necessary to influence a presidential election, without
being detected, would be a bit more difficult.

~~~
ethanbond
Uh yeah, because it's impossible to manipulate an election from the voting
booth under basically any circumstances. That's why ID laws make no sense.

The physical ID manufacturing isn't the hard part and never would be. It's
finding the identity you're masquerading as and then actually standing in line
at a voting booth.

~~~
ktRolster
_it 's impossible to manipulate an election from the voting booth under
basically any circumstances._

That's just a lack of creativity. A popular mechanism in the past was the
false-bottom ballot box (the man who first brought that to SF in the 1800s was
rewarded handsomely, reported by Irving Stone).

You can have ghost voters, for example. People registered at addresses that
don't exist, then bus people from precinct to precinct voting multiple times.
Also, people register to vote in two different places:
[http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/200...](http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2004/10/people_who_vote_twice.html)

I have seen foreigners vote with my own eyes. I don't know how common that is
(or any of it is, actually), but that is something that happens.

~~~
XorNot
_I have seen foreigners vote with my own eyes._

How could you _possibly_ know they're not entitled to vote? Did you know them
personally? Were you aware fully of their immigration status?

~~~
ktRolster
_How could you possibly know they 're not entitled to vote?_

You listed two possible ways in your post.

~~~
XorNot
Which you didn't seem to think were relevant to list while making your claim.
And which are both odd things to "just know" about a person. Did they say one
day "oh yeah, I voted illegally lol"? Doesn't seem like the type of thing
which comes up in conversation easily.

EDIT: To be clear, I am asking specifically _how_ you know you saw people who
were ineligible to vote voting. A follow up would also be why you observed
this and didn't tell anyone.

~~~
ktRolster
To be honest, I don't know you at all. If you don't believe me, if you think
I'm lying, that's fine.

------
shireboy
If the election gets hacked, won't it by definition be rigged by the
hacker(s)? I just don't see how it's "ridiculous" to think the vote somewhat
impacted by 1) some people voting more than once since many jurisdictions are
basically "honor system", 2) exploits of vulnerabilities in electronic voting
systems, and 3) ballot stuffing and other illicit activities by poll workers.

How prevalent those are, the full impact, etc. are debatable, but it seems a
little naive to say those things never happen at all or that people who
suspect they happen are crazy conspiracy theorists.

~~~
lotso
I don't think you understand how voting works in the US. Voting isn't even
close to the honor system. The people who run precincts are incredibly
decentralized and individual precincts have such a small impact on national
elections.

~~~
shireboy
In my area (and most without voter ID) anybody can give any name and address
and vote as that person. The "honor system" refers to the fact people are
trusted to not just look up a name/address and vote as someone else.

Yes, the electoral system and general statistics of the election mean in any
one case that doesn't necessarily sway the outcome. Which is why I said the
impact is debatable but to deny it could happen is naive.

~~~
leot
Could someone please describe a plausible scenario in which an election is
impacted by so-called "voter fraud"?

While elections have been rigged from the very beginning (ballot stuffing
etc.), "voter fraud" is an invented concept that didn't exist before passage
of the Voting Rights Act.

~~~
shireboy
Not sure how many more times I can say "the impact is debatable" in
recognition that individuals voting as other individuals would be an
inefficient way to sway an election. However, it is fairly well documented
that this happens to some degree:
[https://ballotpedia.org/Dead_people_voting](https://ballotpedia.org/Dead_people_voting)

and that it is completely feasible to pretend to be another person when
voting: [https://youtu.be/pZMU2oMJNHU](https://youtu.be/pZMU2oMJNHU)

But, since you asked, here is a scenario that I think is entirely plausible: A
group of over-zealous activists travel to a very tight state with a handful of
close precincts. They look up recent deaths in the areas and get a list of
1000 names and addresses that they then use to vote, each voting multiple
times. They simply go in, give the name and address, and vote, then go to
another polling location and repeat. Other groups decide on other tactics. A
poll worker decides to stuff a box. A hacker changes a few 100 votes just to
see if she can. No one technique alone would have swayed the election, but in
concert they push it to the opposite of what a 100% fair election would have
been.

In this scenario, note that there is no big evil conspiracy - just a handful
of misguided people taking actions with a collective big consequence.

Obviously the risk of fraud has to be weighed against the risk that someone
due a vote will be unable to do so because they couldn't obtain an ID or lost
it. It's also worth pointing out that before the general election, the various
shenanigans of the primaries and two parties mean that the general is not
really "fair" before it even starts. Again, my point is that it's not
"ridiculous" to posit that US elections have systemic flaws that could sway
the outcome.

~~~
leot
It still requires some cooperation, which means it's subject to game theory
and defector risk. And there are numerous after the fact approaches to
enforcement.

Just make a $1,000,000 reward for anyone exposing a conspiracy to rig an
election, and audit the voter rolls on close elections, and impose stiff
penalties for voter fraud.

These are all cheaper and probably more effective than voter ID laws.
Strangely, these kinds of approaches come up far less than imposing an ID
requirement. Also, mail in voter fraud is a far greater risk, yet is also
ignored.

Voter ID laws are a cynical and despicable evil.

------
ruffrey
OSET is trying to help with this. They are working to make open source voting
systems available.

[http://www.osetfoundation.org/about/](http://www.osetfoundation.org/about/)

~~~
taserian
I'd be interested in seeing if a transparent, fair and honest voting booth can
be achieved with commodity hardware: \- Raspberry Pi with a multiple checksum-
verified OS image \- simple receipt printer with a verifiable hash of your
vote \- etc.

------
nxzero
>> "A recent poll found that 34 percent of likely voters believed the general
election would be rigged."

Even if it the US election was rigged, very possible US wouldn't even care.

~~~
micaksica
I would suspect whomever voted for the winning "team" wouldn't care at all.

~~~
nxzero
Given only 40% of living Americans vote, and that it's likely 35-45% voted for
the party that benefited from the fraud - that would leave a very small group
of people to force a reversal.

Again, possible that all Americans would reject it, but seems possible that
they would not.


Why Skee-Ball Doesn't Change - prismatic
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/11/why-skee-ball-doesnt-change/509117/?single_page=true
======
dottrap
But something did change, at least where I went.

When I was a kid, I remember the ball effortlessly glided off the launch ramp
into the air for the holes. Sometimes I would roll as hard as I could just to
see how high it would go (into the top net and ricochet down into the scoring
holes).

I recently went back and the launch ramp is like a speed bump now. The balls
no longer smoothly roll and launch into the air. Instead they smack hard into
the bump and lose most of their momentum and barely make it to the holes.

I can't for the life of me figure out how to actually get the ball in the
highest value holes any more. The harder I roll it, the harder is smacks into
the bump and it goes nowhere near the holes. Don't roll that hard, and it
barely makes it over the bump.

I really hate the change and I stopped playing. It is no fun anymore.

~~~
deelowe
I thought it was just me. I guess this is to make it difficult to rack up
points, making it more a game of chance than skill?

------
GnarfGnarf
I was a carny in 1968, handing out prize tickets to Skee-ball players. The
owners disallowed "banking" (bouncing the ball off a side) because it improved
player accuracy too much.

I could not believe how much people were willing to spend to win a prize of
lesser value.

~~~
freditup
I've played skee-ball quite frequently and done well using this banking method
(as taught to me by my grandfather!). But I'm not sure why it's better. Do you
know what makes it easier when banking as compared to rolling the ball
straight?

~~~
wernercd
I assume it's the same reason that basket-ball players bounce shots off the
back-board more often than they go for the swish...

[https://www.wired.com/2011/07/st_cheatsci_basketball/](https://www.wired.com/2011/07/st_cheatsci_basketball/)

[https://hiphopandhoops.wordpress.com/2011/04/14/bank-it-
stud...](https://hiphopandhoops.wordpress.com/2011/04/14/bank-it-study-
reveals-that-using-the-backboard-can-increase-free-throw-shooting-by-20/)

A quick look shows some interesting starting points that goes with my "gut"
about basketball and banking off the backboard.

I don't see any similar articles relating the two (banking Basketballs and
banking Skeet Balls), but I bet there's some sweet spot that you aim for and
get better with practice.

~~~
douche
Shooting basketballs off the glass is something of a lost art, at least
outside of point-blank layup range. Not too many people bother to invest the
effort to learn the geometry to bank shots from each particular spot on the
floor, compared to shooting for the rim, where your aim point and mechanics
are pretty much always the same.

It's rare enough nowadays that it was something of a signature move for
players like Tim Duncan.

------
ebbv
This article is wrong about skee ball being "pure" unlike other carnival games
that are skewed against the customer. It is just as easily and often
manipulated by proprietors just like any other carnival game. The collars
around the holes can be taller and/or narrower, the angle of the ramp can be
manipulated, the weight of the balls, the amount of points for each hole, the
return and price, etc.

It is fun to play once in a while, I'll usually do a few rounds every time I
go to Cedar Point. But it is subject to the same machinations as all the other
carnival games.

~~~
evanelias
I haven't seen evidence that manipulating skee-ball machines is a common
practice by owners, and I've played at a lot of places. Several of the
modifications you mention aren't easy to make. (At least, I can say that's
true when it comes to the official machines made by Skee-Ball Inc -- I usually
avoid the knock-offs so I don't have much experience with those.)

I was saddened to learn that the company was acquired by a rival earlier this
year and relocated production from the Philly suburbs (where it had been over
100 years) to Wisconsin. Strangely, no mention of any of this in the article.

------
xiaoma
It didn't used to have the 100 point holes on the sides. The 50 in the middle
was the highest.


I've written a game Now what? - joeyspacerocks
http://pixelated.postagon.com/8xz7e15m1

======
emsy
The graphics look nice. Definitely better than the average App Store crap
imho. The particle effects are a bit too much for my taste though. While I
found the graphics polished, I can't find anything in the video or app
description that would make me want to play this game right now. Something
that would let me think: "F __* it, what 's 99 cents?". That may be a well
thought of combo mechanism, dual ship power-ups, size modifiers etc. And if
they're already there, show them!

I think the strength of games like this lies in competing with yourself and
others. For example I thought Flappy Bird was a terrible game, but I HAD to
beat my brothers highscore. So that would be another way to generate
downloads. In fact I think another strength of Flappy Bird is that you don't
have a warming up phase regarding the difficulty which keeps you in the flow.
Players in the flow keep gaming on and on and therefore expose your game to
others.

I hope my thoughts can help you to improve your game. Regards, a fellow indie
who has yet to launch his game.

~~~
joeyspacerocks
Thank you for your comments! Yes, that's the crux of it - you need a hook or
something to nudge people into giving cash for it.

I also suspect that I haven't done myself any favours with the trailer or the
app icon.

Still, onwards and upwards :)


Ways in which the WannaCry ransomware could have been much worse - Mojah
https://ma.ttias.be/ways-wannacry-ransomware-much-worse/
======
jobigoud
Wow the second point, encrypting the files but providing transparent access
for a while thereby corrupting even the backups is really scary.

Although maybe this would be detected when your incremental backups start
saying that all the files have just changed. Some softwares will require
manual action if more than x percent of the corpus needs to be resynched.

------
RichardHeart
One option I don't see in the list, is just basic, file wiping, instead of
encrypting. People are lucky there's even an option to unencrypt.

~~~
theoh
But why would you pay if there's no "hostage"?

~~~
RichardHeart
I'm saying that a virus that wants only to destroy, instead of get paid, is
more dangerous than a virus that wants paid. It's the difference between a
kidnapping and a murder.

~~~
bigbugbag
What's the incentive for such a virus ?

~~~
sushid
Do you not remember viruses in the 90s like the ILOVEYOU virus? Plenty of
hackers wrote viruses that maliciously destroyed data just because they could.


Tablets are a fad - VonGuard
http://www.sdtimes.com/blog/post/2011/06/20/Tablets-Meh.aspx

======
michaelpinto
It reminds me of all the talk that "PDAs were just a fad"

------
Synaesthesia
Tablets as opposed to iPads.


Microsoft Band - N0RMAN
http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-band/en-us
======
guylhem
All the sensors + apparently a very lightweight OS + small form factor = I
like it.

The killing feature is the integrated GPS. As mentionned on the website, you
can go without your phone. That alone could make it a buy if it supports
wireless charging (I don't want to bother with wires in 2014)

Also, it is multiplatform, which is a big plus. I do not want an android watch
or an iwatch, but something that will work regardless of the cellphone I
chose.

I wonder if there's a devkit to read the data. If some HN is from Microsoft,
I'd love some links to the devkit page (simple stuff, like retreiving GPS log,
heartrate log, etc)

~~~
felixrieseberg
Hey, I'm an Open Source Engineer with MSFT (and the msft dude for YC) - there
isn't anything out yet, but we have always released SDKs for pretty much
anything we build.

~~~
jmsdnns
What does "the msft dude for YC" mean?

~~~
jacquesm
It means: try to get companies that otherwise would not go for Microsoft
products to give it a try through free product samples, and talking down
companies not microsoft.

I really wished that companies like Microsoft, Google and so on would not have
a 'HN guy' (and would not have non-disclosed HN guys either, Felix is at least
above board on that), it can make it a lot harder to figure out what is a
genuine user experience and what is product placement.

Unless the Microsoft stack is something you already have experience with
you're _much_ better off using non-proprietary stack software. Anything coming
out of Microsoft will sooner or later cause a bunch of licenses to be sold
somewhere down the line or monthly invoices for metered usage to appear so
make sure you know exactly what you're getting into. $50K in freebies will
have to translate into $50K more profit somewhere along the line.

~~~
radmuzom
The "much" better off is an assumption. If I remember correctly, Fogcreek
primarily uses a Microsoft stack; so did lot of people who used to hang around
in the Business of Software forum run by Joel Spolsky. Most of them had
bootstrapped companies rather than use a lot of VC money to buy expensive
tools. Most of them did quite well making money with their business. Using
open tools is not a criterion for both technical or business success.

~~~
ghshephard
Joel Spolsky - former Microsoft Product Manager? Yes, it's not particularly
surprising that they would use Microsoft Products - their incredible
familiarity with the product would offset any downstream licensing costs.

Small business usually get everything for free (or nobody bothers to check in
on their licensing status, at the very least, they run on a massive discount
using "developer editions").

Very large businesses have so much bureaucratic overhead, that unless their
core business is Software/service (I.E. Amazon, Facebook, Google, Dropbox,
etc...) - the cost of software licenses is minor, and anything they can save
by going with something "Standard and Supported" is worth the offset.

But, anybody interested in trying to run their small-medium business on
something like Oracle Enterprise edition on their 16 Core Server will quickly
start taking a second look at Postgress/MariaDB once they see what the annual
licensing costs for Oracle are. Partitioning and Optimizer are only worth so
much...

------
sytelus
While everyone is trying to make a watch that looks as traditional as
possible, Microsoft is thinking radically different for how the future watch
should look likes. That's some guts.

At $200 this looks like great device with built-in sensors including GPS and
UV that also talks to whatever phone you own. I also like the fact that heart
rate monitor is always on. Addition of barometer could have been nicer,
however.

Other tidbits:

-Screen looks too small to do much of an interaction so I'm guessing type of apps would be mostly notification types.

-I seriously hate all these stock photos and videos. Marketing seems to be out of ideas and creativity yet again. Show the f __*ing product, not random faces.

-48 hr battery life

-Cortana works only for Windows Phone

-It's supposedly made for the right hand which is very weird.

-Sleep quality monitoring seems pretty cool

-The whole thing is projected as health device and makes me feel that it's designed for fitness nuts. This is going to severely limit the audience and very bad marketing strategy. Apple's watch is much more human/teens oriented that anyone wearing watches wouldn't mind to wear regardless of its health related features and probably mostly just for fun (send my heartbeat!).

~~~
piotrkaminski
They claim a battery life of 48 hours under "normal usage" (read: no GPS),
with a charging time of 1.5 hours. Though if it's supposed to be used as a
sleep tracker, I kinda wonder when we're supposed to charge it.

~~~
eitally
If you compare it more closely to a Garmin than to a Fitbit, this is
reasonable/comparable battery life. A Garmin GPS watch will track 8-15 hours
of activity, if you're lucky ... but without GPS and in pure watch mode will
last a couple of weeks.

I'd buy this to replace a Fitbit any day of the week.

~~~
scblock
Unless you compare it to a Garmin Vivosmart, which does notifications and
lasts about 7 days. No GPS, but fully waterproof.

Or if you compare it to the just-announced but not yet available Fitbit Surge,
which claims 5 days without GPS.

Two days is not much time in this space.

------
steven2012
Finally a Microsoft product that isn't stupidly handcuffed to their ecosystem.
Microsoft has amazing engineers still, and they must be frustrated that they
aren't allowed to produce the best device they can, regardless of os. I hope
for their sake this thing does well.

~~~
madeofpalk
> Finally

This isn't 'finally'. This 'new Microsoft' has been doing this for a while.

~~~
thescrewdriver
Visual Studio doesn't seem to install correctly on my Ubuntu box.

~~~
darklajid
Last time I tried running Unity on my Windows box I ran into some issues.

(Put differently: The argument is nonsense)

~~~
thescrewdriver
It installed fine for me. Get the latest download here:
[https://unity3d.com/unity/download](https://unity3d.com/unity/download)

Perhaps you were installing an older version?

~~~
feld
wrong unity

[https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/unity](https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/unity)

------
orbifold
I certainly would not want a bracelet that tracks so much information from a
corporation that is known to cooperate with the NSA. The bracelets they force
repeat sex offenders to wear track less information about them. The only way I
would consider using such a device was if both the hardware and software were
available for public review.

~~~
Void_
I'll be happy to share my data with Microsoft or NSA for that matter, I'm
pretty sure nobody there cares how I spend my days, and I don't think they're
interested in your days either...

~~~
orbifold
Well western governments are experts in keeping their population docile and
politically disinterested. So I'm not surprised a growing percentage of their
population is fine with being monitored and spied on. The majority of the
population might not really need protection from the state, but the few that
do, dissidents, political activists definitely do.

By establishing a culture, where people are happy to share their data with the
government anyone who isn't will automatically be a suspect. For example
people who use TOR are put on a list. I don't know what live you lived, but
some of my friends were under police surveillance (some police officer lived
as a student for several years before his cover was blown by an acquaintance)
because the government thought they had to keep taps on far left student
organisations. Considering how much effort they went through to do that, I'm
sure they monitor much more benign activity electronically.

~~~
blumkvist
>because the government thought they had to keep taps on far left student
organisations.

That's a perfectly sensible thing to do. I would do the same thing. Any
enlightened person would do it.

~~~
orbifold
I agree but there are different ways of going about it. In the particular case
I know of, a police officer infiltrated all left leaning student organisations
in order to get access to the more radical ones. By infiltrated I mean that he
went to their meetings, was invited to parties and reported all their personal
information. In any case, I just wanted to defuse the argument that the
government is probably not that interested in your data. Its far easier to
turn devices such as this against you, I mentioned the case where they
recorded the phone numbers of every mobile device at a largely peaceful
demonstration. Since there is no reason to ever delete this data, you not only
have to trust that the current government is benevolent and reasonable, but
also that this form of government is stable, does not crumble and you don't
end up on a kill list 20 years later. This might not be an issue in the West,
but there are countless cases around the world, where based on much less
information political activists / dissidents were murdered.

~~~
blumkvist
I'm not a proponent of this unsupervised mass data collection. I wanted to
point out that your example is an especially counter-productive one.

------
cyanbane
I went and picked one of these up at lunch from local Microsoft Store/Kiosk.
No line, walked right up. Sales person was very informative, helped with wrist
sizing. Came with some small swag (Starbucks gift card, water bottle, etc).
There were two other people at the store - one looking at Surface another
started looking at Band as I was leaving, I noticed they were looking at mine
as I tried it on. Not hard to purchase one, no line.

I walked by the Apple Store on the way out and there were people queued up
outside to get in, probably about 10-12 deep.

It was a sign of the times, as someone who purchases products from (and
develops for) both camps, I am really happy to see the competition. Happy to
see MS embrace iOS devices with their new tech and happy to see Apple allow MS
apps in the app store. Its not all pats on the backs between Apple and MS, but
the competition benefits all us and is great to see. Plus, some cool gear is
coming out of it.

~~~
ssully
I would be really interested to hear any feedback you have on the device

~~~
cyanbane
Been wearing it since lunch, don't really notice it all that much however I
usually wear a watch. I didn't opt for the opposite hand. It has time as a
large numerical on the initial UI display, so felt it could take place of my
watch. I do use it with the screen on the inside of my wrist, so when I want
to look at device I hold up my arm, palm towards me. Feels a lot more natural
than wearing it and viewing the UI "as a watch".

Went for a run, tracked the run well. I forgot to set the device to record for
a run, but it did track my steps, mileage, etc pretty well (compared it to
Moves App on iOS).

Getting texts and phone call alerts on it is pretty nice, actually. I have
phone off to side charging and this is a good alert system (I'm using iOS as
phone).

I wish they had a button press configuration that allowed for a "flashlight"
like app to display all white-light on LCD. Would almost feel magical/wizardry
when taking the dog out to pee.

Will try sleep (one the main reason I bought) tonight. I use "Sleep Cycle" app
on iOS (I sometimes have problems sleeping) so will be interesting to compare
Band vs that app's morning results.

------
Encosia
I was pretty underwhelmed by Apple's watch and have actively disliked the
Android watches that I've seen so far. I use a Fitbit One every day currently,
so the new Fitbit Charge bands with some phone integration kind of piqued my
interest, but seemed very feature poor.

After seeing the functionality this thing offers and that it will work with my
iPhone instead of requiring a particular phone OS, take my money.

If it really does as much and works half as well as the promo video suggests,
MS may have a big winner here.

~~~
lhl
The only thing that's a bit of a bummer is the battery life (the Peak Basis
claims 4 days and the Fitbit Surge claims 5 days) and the MS Band is only
"Dust- and splash-resistant" while those other devices are waterproof to 5ATM
(usable for swimming), but the sheer number of sensors is really impressive
and I'm much more confident about software/data access. At the very least it
looks like MS Health pipes data into HealthVault, which is API accessible),
but I'm most looking forward to getting access to the raw data stream
(considering it's _my_ biometric data they're collecting).

------
somberi
Quoting an article from The Economist.com:

"... Strikingly, one-third of users discard their devices after six months,
according to research by Endeavour Partners, a consultancy. Some industry
insiders speculate that the true number may be much higher than that. ...The
novelty of being able to track your steps, calories or other metrics is
appealing at first, but swiftly wears off. ..."

Full article - [http://goo.gl/hR5LxJ](http://goo.gl/hR5LxJ)

~~~
ethomson
To compare Microsoft Band to a FitBit doesn't do the Band justice. FitBit is a
toy - counting footsteps isn't "fitness" and a few LEDs isn't feedback. With
GPS and an actual display, the Band actually has the ability to compete
against Garmin and Suunto and _actual_ fitness watches.

My Garmin is bulky, can't lock a signal in a neighborhood with tall buildings
and has software reminiscent of an Atari. And it was more expensive than this.

I'm _very_ excited about this. (Though, disclaimer, I work for Microsoft.)

~~~
blumkvist
Hey, you seem to know to be an enthusiast about fitness tracking, can you give
me a quick advice?

I want a fitness tracker, but I don't want the display. I want it to be
lightweight and comfortable to wear, ideally wrapping around my wrist. Sweat-
proof. Pedometer, accelerometer, and have decent sleep tracking. A killer
feature for me for me would be measuring jumps, as in rope jumps.

Does something resembling this exist somewhere?

~~~
somberi
@blumkvist.

I own and use Argus (on the Iphone), FitBit and a Garmin Forerunner and in
that order. The way I "teach" Argus is to first create a sample set of data
and add it as an "new" exercise. In your case, I would count the number of
jumps you do in a minute, obtain the calories burned online, and feed both
into Argus. With Garmin afaik you cannot do that. FitBit has a funky "Steps
climbed". I don't know what to make of the number it shows.

~~~
yaur
Fitbit uses a barometer/altimeter to work out the floors climbed so in place
jumping shouldn't trigger it.

~~~
blumkvist
Is this too hard to make? Shouldn't 3 axis accelerometer be able to do it out
of the box, if you program it?

If somebody from these companies is reading... this is a killer feature! Lots
of people jump and would throw money at you if you can integrate it into a
fitness app.

~~~
yaur
Suunto supports third party "apps" and has a "rope skipping" app[1]. Can't
vouch for its accuracy (I'm personally more interested in hiking/climbing
features), but it exists.

[http://www.movescount.com/apps/app10028993-Rope_Skipping_R3](http://www.movescount.com/apps/app10028993-Rope_Skipping_R3)

------
curiousDog
Wow, this actually looks fantastic. Microsoft has always killed it in the
hardware department. Looks like it connects to their cloud service as well.
Will probably consider getting one.

~~~
beggi
Erm, always killed it? Zune, Surface, Lumia?

~~~
curiousDog
Hardware-wise, I'd say yes. I haven't used a Lumia but the Zune-HD and Surface
were actually well made.

~~~
lotharbot
There's an old Microsoft joystick (the Sidewinder 3D Pro) that hasn't been
made in at least a decade, but several friends of mine still use them (with
custom gameport-to-USB converters specifically designed for that stick.) Yet
another quality piece of Microsoft hardware.

~~~
prawn
With my RMBP, I use a Microsoft wired mouse that would be about 15 years old.
I want to get a wireless mouse, but I don't want to lose the feeling of this
one!

------
nilkn
While so many competitors are scrambling to make smartwatches that can't
competently track your fitness and can't competently replace your phone, this
Band has all the sensors necessary to be a legitimate fitness tracker, the
form factor will ensure it's more accurate, and it also can function as a
useful proxy to your phone. While it may not have all the features of the
Apple Watch, it seems to have all of the most useful ones, like delivering
important notifications straight to your wrist. And it's cross-platform!

It seems to me that Microsoft has found the two areas where wearables really
excel -- quantified self and notifications -- and focused on these features
above all else. It's not high fashion, although the band form factor is hard
to be offended by, especially if you have the screen facing down. It doesn't
take photos, but why would you take photos with your watch?

This is not unlike the iPod, which focused on storage space and an extremely
simple interface above all else.

------
frade33
Jesus! it's perfect. and because MS got it right. compared to apple or pebble.
in short, 'band form factor' is the one I was hoping, when apple introduced
its watch. I was bit shocked when it was actually rounded-square shape. with
this form, you get more with less.

~~~
CamperBob2
Yep. Apple gave its customers the proverbial faster horse. This looks like an
actual step forward.

------
webXL
Besides the landscape content not being oriented to your eyes when your
forearm is across your body, a la Samsung Gear Fit, this looks very nice. The
orientation obviously depends on how you wear it (the screen on the top or
bottom of your wrist), as others have pointed out.

I don't know how big of an issue that is with limited content, but it drives
me nuts when a touch device isn't oriented the way I want (in bed primarily).
They could give the user options to lock the orientation one way or another or
detect how the user is wearing it somehow, but my money would be Microsoft to
figure that out much faster than Samsung.

As a Pebble owner, and potential Apple Watch buyer, this seems to have the
best of all smart-watch worlds technology-wise. Cross-platform is huge.
Battery-life, reliable software, comfort and style (in order of importance)
will make or break this.

------
suprgeek
Got a nice package of on board sensors:

Optical heart rate sensor

3-axis accelerometer/gyro

GPS

Ambient light sensor

Skin temperature sensor

UV sensor

Microphone

Haptic vibration motor

The 2 day battery life is the one turn off for me. Otherwise this is actually
quite nice for $199 cross platform fitness wearable

~~~
rplnt
Just curious, what is UV sensor good for?

And I'd really like altimeter for this kind of device.

~~~
molmalo
According to the site, "Get a quick read of the UV Index so you can decide to
apply sunscreen before you hit the road."

~~~
joosters
Couldn't you just look up at the sky to answer this question?

~~~
k-mcgrady
As much as I agree with you the same thing is often said about weather apps.
However the really accurate ones (e.g. Dark Sky) that can predict to the
minute and give intensity are really useful. For example I was able to plan my
lunch break using it yesterday so I was out of the office in the 30 mins of
dry weather between rain showers. The the UV sensor you could probably work
out what strength suncream you need and if people apply the correct strength
maybe in the long term skin cancer rates will fall. Small change in behaviour
due to better information, big improvement for society.

~~~
joosters
(Thanks for highlighting Dark Sky, that looks like an interesting app!)

Don't your arguments (and app recommendations) point _against_ a UV measure as
being useful? If you want to know whether or not to put on sunscreen now, for
a day out, knowing the current UV strength is no use since the conditions will
be different later. That's where weather prediction comes in and makes your
one little watchband UV datapoint useless. Looking up at the sky and observing
weather conditions will always be better than that, and better weather
prediction will beat looking up at the sky.

~~~
k-mcgrady
Ah, very good point I didn't think of that. I suppose it could function as a
warning system. You're go out in the morning and it's cloudy and suncream
isn't required. As the day goes on the UV levels increase and your fitness
band can warn you that you should think about applying suncream as the UV
levels have increased.

------
darklajid
\- Click on 'Buy'

\- See 'you need a store to find out the right size' (reasonable)

\- Click on 'Find store'

\- Notice 'Only available in the US'

\- Close tab. Fail.

~~~
meta
I was wondering if anyone had information about this.

It looks like it ties to Microsoft HealthVault. That is not available in
Canada. It appears (from the outside) that MS sold the "rights" to HealthVault
to Telus, whom did absolute nothing with it. Does anyone know, is that the
right read of the situation? Can MS ever offer HealthVault to Canada or will
we have to hope that Telus will?

Also, to the people below. As far as I can see, even a service to forward the
hardware from the US to Canada, this probably will not work. If you register
your live account in Canada (which you probably would, so you can put a CC on
it) then you will not be able to active HealthVault on your live account - it
will send you to a Telus page.

~~~
goatforce5
Oh. Huh. This was the first product that I would have entered a Microsoft
Store to look at. I might have even bought one.

You've just saved me a trip. Thanks!

------
blackaspen
This is what the modern "software driven company that happens to make hardware
looks like". And I'm glad it's Microsoft. This looks awesome.

------
itsravi
I spent about 8 hours using this today. Some notes.

      + It does feel heavy at first, but I got used to it pretty quickly.

      + I plugged it in to charge and it seemed to be stuck at 80%. This may be because of the port I was using so I can't lay blame on Band.

      + The charging mechanism is solid and feels great.
      + I keep wanting to swipe the screen to turn it on (you need to press the "home" button).

      + I went for a 1.5 mi run. It took *4 minutes* to lock in GPS. This is in a fairly populated area, but the I was kind of in the woods. My iPhone has zero issues locking into GPS.

      + It mirrors all my notifications from my iPhone which I love.

      + After running, I went straight to Starbucks and tried to pay with the band but failed because the screen does not respond to sweaty fingers. This is partly my fault.

      + Haven't detected any UV yet.

      + HR locking is quick.

~~~
jimueller
Your phone can't lock to GPS faster because it can use cell towers to narrow
down your position first. The Band should lock more quickly now that it has a
general idea of where you are. I have a Garmin GPS watch, and the initial lock
does take a long time.

~~~
itsravi
Thanks, you are correct. I tried again a few hours later from home (about 50
miles away from my initial test) and it locked within 30 seconds.

Edit: I've had it plugged into my MBP to charge for about 35 minutes and it
still said 80%. After turning it completely off and back on fixed this (now
says 100%).

Edit2: I really wish I could play music via bluetooth with this.

~~~
ygra
The very first GPS lock for a device in a new area takes a while because it
has to download the satellite positions first. After that (if you haven't
moved too far away in the meantime) subsequent GPS fixes should be much
faster.

(Quoting Wikipedia: »in order to obtain an accurate satellite location from
this transmitted message the receiver must demodulate the message from each
satellite it includes in its solution for 18 to 30 seconds. In order to
collect all the transmitted almanacs the receiver must demodulate the message
for 732 to 750 seconds or 12 1/2 minutes.«)

------
turnip1979
This actually seems better than Android Wear. I like their form factor more
than a watch. It might give Apple a run for their money.

~~~
ghshephard
They are chasing after slightly (but not completely) different markets. This
is a (very capable) fitbit competitor. Apple is definitely targeting fashion.
Microsoft is marketing a < $200 band. Apple will be selling a $5K+ Gold Watch
amongst its offerings.

In some ways, the Microsoft watch is actually much more capable than the Apple
Watch (Hello, untethered GPS!) - but nobody is going to put it on the front
page of vogue.

------
astrojams
This looks really good. I love the new Microsoft - it feels good to root for
them again.

~~~
webwielder
When would you have rooted for them in the past?

~~~
digisign
Last time I remember was when they provided Basic for my C64 and were biting
the hands of IBM.

------
FlyingLawnmower
At first, the $199 pricepoint seemed high, but it seems to be a cross platform
high end fitness tracker with basic smartwatch functionality. Incidentally,
this puts the price point right in-between FitBits and Android Wear watches
(and also the iWatch).

Furthermore, 2 day battery life is a very welcome addition. I wouldn't mind
putting one of these on my wrist.

~~~
josu
My problem is that if it's also a sleep tracker. When are you supposed to
charge these things?

~~~
imajoo
1.5 hrs to full charge, 30 min to 80% charge. I'd charge it while making
breakfast.

~~~
josu
>30 min to 80% charge

That's impressive. But why does it take 60 minutes to charge the last 20%?

~~~
kevingadd
To put it really simply: Batteries are nonlinear. Charge/discharge rates vary
based on the current amount of power stored in the battery.

~~~
josu
That makes a lot of sense, thanks.

------
twodayslate
The battery lasts for two days

[http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-band/en-
us/support/hardwa...](http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-band/en-
us/support/hardware/battery-life-tips)

~~~
stephengoodwin
Not surprising with all its features, but for wearables, that's a killer. My
Fitbit can do 5-6 days, and I would consider that on the shorter end of decent
battery life.

~~~
jmspring
The overall quality of the fitbit (both as a band and a clip) is complete
crap. My wife, hardly a heavy user of such, has had the clip die within two
months, the band (a replacement) started acting up within about 3 months.
Bought at two separate times from two different places. Friends have similar
stories.

I haven't delved into wearables yet. I mostly have used my iPhone 5s (now 6)
for the motion tracking, but it certainly doesn't catch everything (let alone
doesn't catch vitals) since I don't carry it everywhere.

~~~
stephengoodwin
I haven't had any issues, but my wife's Fitbit battery wouldn't stay charged
for more than 2 days, within a month of getting it. Since her replacement came
in, we've had no issues.

My biggest complaint with the Fitbit is the lack of any battery meter on the
device itself. Unless you sync frequently, you wouldn't know when your battery
is running low.

------
Hytosys
Awkward, cliché, and yet still effective advertisement video. The work-out and
skydiving bits were neat, but the graduation text message bit and the "keep
your head up" catchphrase (you look down to see the watch) made me feel
stubbornly aware and annoyed at the problems that this device still causes;
the disconnect with reality.

Also, I don't know that anyone looks back at the time they got a Facebook
message while holding their newborn ("the small moments you never forget").

I'm not sure of the problems to these alleged solutions, but I suppose time
will tell.

~~~
72deluxe
Haha that's a very good point. "the small moments FACEBOOK NEVER FORGETS"
should be the tagline.

------
mpg33
I actually like the look of these bands more so than the watch look Apple is
going for...

------
tuxguy
To me, MSFT's efforts to become a centralized hub for fitness& health data, is
the more exciting bit of news. [0]

With machine learning & cloud pieces in place, MS health could _potentially_
be HUGE !

Health care data is all over the place, & if msft can become a central
repository for all/a significant portion of fitness/health data, it will be
really valuable.

from [1], "There's just one problem. "Most of these things are individual
islands," Mehdi says — there are a million options, but they're all siloed to
a single platform, app, or gadget. "You'll use device X or Y, some stuff is in
the cloud, but we think that there's kind of a next step that's coming, which
is the ability to unify all that data and democratize it, and then add some
real value on top. And that's where we see the ability to kind of get to that
next level.""

0\. [http://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2014/10/29/introducing-
micro...](http://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2014/10/29/introducing-microsoft-
health/)

1\. [http://www.theverge.com/2014/10/29/7118533/microsoft-
health-...](http://www.theverge.com/2014/10/29/7118533/microsoft-health-band-
hub-for-fitness-data)

------
RayVR
also, this: [http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-band/en-us/get-
started](http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-band/en-us/get-started)

~~~
RayVR
optical heart rate monitor and UV sensor are interesting but not enough to get
a microsoft phone

Edit: works with iphone and android. [http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-
band/en-us/support/hardwa...](http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-band/en-
us/support/hardware/system-requirements)

------
mrigor
Promo video is up
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CEvjulEJH9w](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CEvjulEJH9w)

~~~
davmar
for maximum effect, watch this first: [http://funny.garrytan.com/this-is-a-
generic-brand-video](http://funny.garrytan.com/this-is-a-generic-brand-video)

~~~
wes-k
Thank you, I needed this after the video started with cheesy music and the
words "life is made up of moments".

------
roxtar
Look pretty slick. It's interesting that it's marketed as a fitness device but
is actually a smart watch. I own a Garmin Forerunner 305 which can last 6-8
hours of active use. I know that the recent Garmin devices last close to a
day. The Microsoft Band doesn't tell us how well it does on battery with the
GPS -- without the GPS it claims 48 hours.

~~~
pedalpete
If you're using gps to track running and such, you aren't running 24 hours a
day, so you can save battery by turning it on and off. I think that's a great
feature. But it would have been nice to say 'GPS' time, like phones describe
'talk-time'.

~~~
jackalope
There are times I wish I could leave GPS tracking on all the time, with a
simple way to add markers either now or later, and with the ability to share
the data with any app I want. There are times I just want to hop on my bike
and ride without doing some dance with a finicky GPS app that I have to
remember to stop at the end (and hope it doesn't crash during my ride).

~~~
eli
For what it's worth, any Android phone with Google Now already can track you
(albeit without super high resolution) 24/7\. It's actually kind of cool; it
looks at where you are and how fast you're going to infer walking vs biking vs
driving.

------
slackgentoo
Background story from Microsoft:
[http://news.microsoft.com/features/microsofts-new-cloud-
powe...](http://news.microsoft.com/features/microsofts-new-cloud-powered-
wearable-keeps-fitness-and-productivity-insights-a-glance-away/)

Interesting that MSR also helped developing activity recognition algorithms
for the device.

------
nnutter
This looks intriguing. Much more so than Apple Watch. However, the thickness
of the band has me concerned. I stopped using UP because the band was thick
enough it made my hand fall asleep when typing. (Having to take it off negated
one of its main purposes alarm.)

------
nnd
I just got it.

First impressions:

* the UI is a bit laggy

* voice commands work only with windows phones

* it's pretty awkward to use, one has to twist his hand to be able to use the touch display

* step measurement has a high lag, an it seems to be inaccurate

I like the design of the watch though, but I wouldn't say it fits perfectly
for me.

------
viggity
in general, I'm a pretty big MS fanboy (win phones since 7, surface 2, etc).
And I am suspect of the category as a whole, but the orientation of the screen
just seems so dumb.

Also, people keep saying it is so small, it certainly doesn't look like it to
me, especially on the sides it looks relatively thick.

I'm going to be out in Redmond soon, hope to see some in the wild.

~~~
BinaryIdiot
> but the orientation of the screen just seems so dumb.

I thought this at first but after thinking about it I think it's really
intuitive! When you use a watch you have to turn your arm in a non-natural way
but when you turn your palm up it's actually easier because of the way the
mussels are laid out. Also that's how you always look at your phone.

I wouldn't mind trying one out.

~~~
TheTaO
yes exactly what I was thinking. For reading anything on this it will help to
have it worn with screen inside which is more natural for me.

------
grimlck
I'm really impressed, I was set on getting an apple watch until now, but this
may change my mind - great form factor and style, has the sensors I'm looking
for, and cross platform. I'm eagerly waiting a review.

------
pzaich
This looks like the perfect form-factor for a more powerful wearable swim
watch. Most of the other options are bulkier or too limited in their feature
set. Unfortunately it looks like it's only splash resistant.

------
pradn
Anyone know if the data will sync to the iOS Health app? I use it to track my
fitness goals and such.

------
jafingi
Am I the only one who thinks the screen orientation is totally off? When you
have it on your wrist, you cannot look at it without having your arm in a
totally awkward position.

~~~
Joeri
Not if you have the screen on the underside of your wrist.

------
netcan
It's an interesting time. People are incredibly interested and open to
technology and that is an opportunity.

HN probably has a thousand joking references to calculator watches of the 90s,
how goofy they looked and how they marked you as chronically uncool. There's
something to that. Sensibilities have changed and there is an expectation that
gadgets will evolve and unlock all sorts of cool magic. People are so open to
this stuff today.

My reading of these bands/watches/wearables is that they're still exploring.
They're not getting enough data passively and they aren't really working to
the point where they're a permanent addition our lives. Basically, not good
enough yet. Maybe they need 10X better battery life. Maybe they need better
sensors or somesuch. Maybe it's a killer app they need. I just see around me
people buying one, playing with it for weeks or months and then not using it
anymore.

Either way, device makers are being tossed a soft ball by consumers. They're
willing to buy and try them and help explore. I hope this means they'll get
someplace useful. But, people are ultimately fickle and these need to start
delivering fast. I hope this isn't a misfire, too early to really achieve
something.

------
PeterisP
Is it just me or the advertised pictures look as something that I wouldn't
want to put on my hands even if I had bought it?

I.e., visibly bigger than the wrists of those models and hanging loose, which
is uncomfortable, and a rather long (much longer than most watches) flat
segment in a spot where any comfortable wristband should be with a curved
inside.

OK, seeing isn't touching, we'll have to wait for the wearer reviews for that.

------
jeffmk
Somewhat tangental to the actual story here, but is there some way to make
something like Microsoft Band, Fitbit, Jawbone Up, or Nike+ FuelBand self-
contained to your own server?

I'd love to use one of these devices, but I abhor the idea of my very personal
movement/biometric data to be in the hands of a third party. If this data
could be contained to my own server, I'd be all over it.

------
stephengoodwin
"A full charge can last up to 48 hours, but can vary significantly depending
on your settings, usage, and other factors."[1]

That doesn't make me optimistic about using the GPS for very long.

[1] [http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-band/en-
us/support/hardwa...](http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-band/en-
us/support/hardware/battery-life-tips)

------
nilkn
Even though I'm not much of a fitness buff, the sensor array that this has is
something that I view as more or less necessary in any smart wrist wearable.
This sort of quantified self tracking is something that a smartphone simply
cannot do in any reliable and persistent way.

So I think this is a huge step in the right direction. So much so that it'd be
a nearly guaranteed buy if I were more assured that it'll be fully functional
with an Android phone. The lack of Cortana support for non-Windows phones,
though, is not reassuring. I can live without that, but will I still be able
to get notifications with an Android phone? If I wanted _only_ a fitness
tracker, there are other options out there.

It'd also be awfully nice if it supported wireless charging. I'd really like
to see the sort of charging dock for this that the Moto 360 has (transforming
it into a snazzy desk clock). I think this could look even better on such a
stand, since it wouldn't have the watch strap hanging off the sides.

------
hardwaresofton
This is probably said pretty rarely on the internet as a whole (and even more
rarely here), but way to go microsoft for knocking it out of the park and
creating a great product.

Bravo for committing to cross-platform support also, thanks for putting user
value above locking people in (in hopes they'll buy other MS things)

------
ambrop7
How much of the advertised functionality does it have if you don't want to
turn your data over to Microsoft?

------
scotchio
Dang it! I was just about to buy it. Looks like Cortana will only work if you
have a Windows phone. That missing killer feature IMO is a deal breaker.

From the article: "Cortana: If you’re using Windows Phone 8.1, you can take
notes and set reminders with your voice using Cortana personal assistant."

~~~
WorldWideWayne
It's got a microphone and bluetooth so it might just be a software limitation.
I wouldn't be surprised if Apple actually locked third parties out from using
Siri like this though.

Are you saying that you want Cortana even if you're using Android or iOS? I
don't think that's going to be possible.

~~~
nilkn
It'd be nice if you could get Google Now on Android at least. I doubt Apple
would open up Siri, though.

~~~
crojach
They have the SDKs available so it's up to Google and Apple to integrate...

------
skc
If this thing catches on they will end up with a literal treasure trove of
useful data that can be mined for some pretty mind bogglingly accurate stats
on some aspects of our health.

I like this sort of thing but I can also understand why some people might feel
a bit uneasy about so much data gathering.

~~~
SideburnsOfDoom
Not just health - also location, activity levels (meaning a reasonable guess
at to if you're awake) etc. This is basically a tracking bracelet.

Also "can be mined" is putting it mildly. Apple, Microsoft and google are all
NSA partners. If the data's there, the incentive is to utilise it....

~~~
crocowhile
Those are all pretty much data that are available already to whoever is
accessing your smartphone. Google has been tracking activity and location for
years now
[https://maps.google.com/locationhistory/b/0](https://maps.google.com/locationhistory/b/0)

~~~
SideburnsOfDoom
I'm not disagreeing with you; but this is not an argument in favour of going
further down this road by using a bracelet instead.

------
stevebot
You had me at "Works with Windows Phone 8.1 update, iOS 7.1, 8 and Android
4.3-4.4 phones, with Bluetooth"

If that's true, this is pretty awesome. Funny I had to read the small print to
even find this feature of the band.

Sucks that Apple Watch + Android Watch are not cross platform.

------
gelatocar
Do you wear it on the inside of your wrist? Otherwise wouldn't the display be
sideways?

~~~
nilkn
It looks like the display is meant to be facing outward from the bottom side
of your wrist (i.e., down, if you put out your arms straight in front of you).
A lot of the videos show people just flipping their wrist around to correctly
orient the display. It's a little unusual but doesn't really seem like it'd be
any sort of issue to me.

My only concern would be scratching the display.

~~~
Gigablah
Well, apparently some people wear their regular watch that way as well.

------
KobaQ
Damn, recently MS nails it with their web design.

------
ilaksh
I want a device with the band form factor that actually has real phone calling
and receiving functions. There is at least one smart band or smart watch out
there that does that. This doesn't.

The smart watches out there are big and flashy, like most watches for men. I
am a heterosexual male, but I find the large watch faces to be immodest. I
certainly do want to show off with a watch, but in a more subtle way. And I am
not a really big person so the large watch faces don't fit my anatomy that
well.

So I actually want my smart watch to look like a smart band and act like a
real smart phone (to the degree that is possible).

------
ggchappell
Something I can't quite tell from the site: how big are the characters on the
display?

This kind of device might get a good reception among, say, men in their 50s.
But presbyopia[1] presents some challenges that younger engineers & designers
might not think about. If a guy has reading glasses, but (as is likely)
doesn't wear them while exercising, then a Band with small characters is
pretty much a non-starter for him, even though it looks perfectly readable to
a 30-year-old.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presbyopia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presbyopia)

------
robomartin
Wow!

This.

Is cool.

And $199?

Just ordered three of them. Happy to see Microsoft put out something like this
and, to some extent one-up Apple. While the i-everything world is interesting,
not sure I want to shackle myself to a single company like that.

Swimming? Is it waterproof? Any swimming apps?

~~~
robomartin
Ah, not waterproof. That's OK.

~~~
rplnt
It's weird though, isn't it? I would expect it to be waterproof. If not
swimming, then just not having to worry about it when being in rain, washing
hands, etc..

~~~
robomartin
Agreed. Yet not one of my cellphones from iPhone and my old Blackberry back
though various motorola's have been waterproof and that worked out OK for me.

On a watch form factor this is kind of strange. These are the kinds of things
that make me wonder what designers might be thinking sometimes or perhaps
question the design process itself. Do they wash their hands? Do they cook?
Have they ever had to walk a few blocks in pouring rain? Or bike? Do they go
fishing? Swimming? Surely the question had to come up. Who said "no" and why?

I still bought them. I want to support this and see where it goes.

Is the Apple watch waterproof?

~~~
brlewis
Fitbit Flex: [http://help.fitbit.com/articles/en_US/Help_article/About-
the...](http://help.fitbit.com/articles/en_US/Help_article/About-the-Fitbit-
Flex)

While it is water resistant and can be submerged up to 10 meters, Flex is not
designed to track swimming activities. If you want to better reflect your
swimming activity and calories burned, we recommend logging the activity on
the Activities page of your dashboard.

There are similar "About" pages for the other Fitbit trackers that you can get
to easily from the page above. Most say something like this: Your Charge is
water-resistant. It is rain and splash proof and can stand up to the sweatiest
workout. Remove before showering or swimming.

------
ojbyrne
I wanted to see Strava in the partner list. I would have clicked Buy Now if
so.

~~~
gggggggg
I am surprised with a Find, that this is the only mention of the word strava
on this page. Or have I not understood the device right?

------
ezxs
This could be an iPod moment for Microsoft.

~~~
AdamTReineke
That's a bold statement, care to expand? Why isn't this just another fitness
band? (From a current MS employee to an [ex?] MS employee.)

~~~
psbp
Maybe he means that MS has made an attractive device that supports its
competitor's (more popular) platforms?

------
basicallydan
The video is actually pretty good. There's a lot of build-up but they do show
the product working in a realistic manner to wrap it all up at the end, with,
"Keep your phone in your pocket".

------
cyanbane
I wonder what considerations were taking for wearing this device while using a
mouse. Most people are right handed, so this device on your right would
certainly need to have a hearty outside surface I would think. It has been
noted that "in front of computer" time may be "charging" time due to minor
activity, but I have always thought (for me at least on the computer/mouse 5+
hours a day) an opposite hand device would be hard sell with people who use
mice with that hand.

~~~
jader201
I thought most people wear their watch on the opposite wrist?

~~~
cyanbane
They do (right hand users), watch on left hand (opposite), use mouse with
right hand. This device would be on the right hand for those people - the same
that they move the mouse with. My question is, will it interfere with using a
mouse?

~~~
jader201
I'm confused then. Why would one wear this _and_ a watch?

~~~
cyanbane
Good question. The initial UI displays time. I picked one up today and have
been wearing it on my normal "watch" hand. That being said I have been wearing
it so that the UI is on the inside of my wrist. Definitely feels more natural
when sing the UI.

------
boh
Just tried the band. I wanted to want it but I wasn't into it. Wearables in
general have some ways to go aesthetically. Every band/watch I've tried so far
has fairly unflattering proportions (which is totally understandable given the
hardware). Wearables would ideally disappear into the fabric of your life but
so far they're mostly big plastic chunks you strap to your arm. I definitely
like where things are going, but they haven't gotten there yet.

------
tdicola
Looks interesting and good on Microsoft for finally getting in front of a new
hardware trend. I kind of wonder if all these health trackers are just going
to be a fad though. Do you really need to micromanage every calorie and heart
beat with a $200 gadget? There's a ton of hand waving about combining all the
data, synergies, etc. but what are the actual benefits of these devices over
just regular checkups with a doctor?

~~~
dominotw
Yep definitely a fad. I used up band religiously for a year couple of years
when it came out. After a while I got sick of one more thing to keep track of,
was just too overbearing.

I see a counter trend where technology becomes invisible, fades into
background and still works for us instead of being in out faces all the time.

Smartphones, smart glasses, smart watches everything that wants a piece of our
attention is going away soon.

I want to learn the routes around my neighborhood and not need a map in my
eyeglasses. I want to talk( or not talk) to friends in real life not text
message them. I just want to come home an play my piano not read a twitter
battle on my phone. I want fall asleep talking to my partner/dreaming about
future, not obsesses about my deep sleep rem cycles. I want wake up when I am
done sleeping not by a smart alarm keeping track of my sleep cycles. I just
want to eat eggs and toast for breakfast not powdered rice from a plastic bag.

I don't want any of this smart* shit. Please make it stop.

~~~
antjanus
I completely agree with you, I like the concept of "disappearing technology"
because just about anything I want to do is somehow stupidly tied to a device
with a screen. It's annoying.

With that said, one of the main things I wish I could have during my workouts
is something to track what I do without me having to manually input it. So, if
it can count the number of reps I do, sweet. If it can count how many steps I
took within my 3 mile treadmill run, awesome. If i can see my heartbeat at a
glance, great! Because treadmills fucking suck at that.

HOWEVER, and one of the reasons why I'm not considering the band, I don't want
tweets, or messages, or updates, or any of that shit even more in my face. I
don't want another touchscreen vying for attention. The new Fitbits do that
but (luckily) not with WIndows Phones. I have one, and I see this as a FEATURE
rather than a detriment. Why the fuck do I need to see stupid notifications
while I'm trying to run?

~~~
lhl
It looks like you'd have the ability to control/turn off all the notifications
you don't want. Why would you assume that wouldn't be the case?
[http://www.microsoft.com/Microsoft-Band/en-
us/support/phone-...](http://www.microsoft.com/Microsoft-Band/en-
us/support/phone-app/manage-tiles-and-notifications)

~~~
antjanus
i never assumed it wasn't the case.

~~~
lhl
Then why would you complain about getting alerts if they can be disabled? Or
are you complaining about the idea of other people being able to get alerts
because you don't approve of the concept?

~~~
antjanus
This is going to sound silly but here's my thing: the Band is built around
receiving notifications, that means that even if you disable them, you'll
still see text message icons, emails, etc. even if you can't use them.

I want to look at my watch and see "hey, you've walked 30,000 steps today",
not "you know, you can check all this crap on here!".

It's the concept, and it's also that mental reminder that you MAY have
notifications. I hope that makes sense!

~~~
lhl
Actually, I think the psychological weight of both notifications and infoglut
in general is a very valid concern, but I think making crazy assumptions /
rants is silly.

Case in point, what if I told you not only can you turn off the notifications
completely (which we established earlier), and that no notification icons show
up on the main screen (which is obvious from the video/screen shots - we're
not talking about old-school LCD stencils, after all), but that you can
further manage the tiles so even if you can't control yourself from actively
swiping around you won't see anything?

Because now that I have the device on my wrist and the app on my phone, that's
exactly what you can do.

I have very little skin in this game (it annoys me slightly to see rants w/o
any basis necessarily in reality, but life's too short for arguing on the
Internet), but maybe it can be better to be more reserved about a product
critique until having seen how it actually works?

~~~
antjanus
I totally get what you're saying and am happy to hear that it works that well
but, I haven't seen anything like that in the shots. The only thing I've seen
is the "do not disturb" mode which is probably what I'll do when I get it.

I'd love to hear more about what you like about it and how it is. My main
concern was basically not having yet another phone-like device that will annoy
the crap out of me. And the Band is begging for it.

~~~
lhl
Here's my first day thoughts: [http://randomfoo.net/2014/10/30/microsoft-band-
overviewrevie...](http://randomfoo.net/2014/10/30/microsoft-band-
overviewreview)

~~~
antjanus
very useful! So I saw that you said it's uncomfortable? That's a major concern
for me. I spend the entire day typing. I wonder if my strangely-shaped wrists
will alleviate that though.

------
slackstation
Why the fuck is Starbucks a launch partner for a fitness band? What could
interest could they possibly have in my health other than undermining it?

~~~
phatfish
Because Starbucks is packed with the sort of hipsters that syphon as much data
as possible about their personal lives to the databases of multinational
corps, obviously!

It really is easier than anyone could have imagined to get people to part with
data. Smart phones provide a genuine quality of life improvement, but unless
you are a professional athlete is the privacy cost really worth the gain of
seeing your heart rate at the gym?

It seems for Hacker News it is a resounding yes...

------
bane
This looks fantastic. I was really disappointed with all the possible
directions Apple could go with their smartwatch, they just iterated on a
design Samsung's been out with for a few years now. _This_ is actually a good
rethink, looks like a good v1 device, isn't overpriced, has basically the
functionality you'd want and works cross platform.

Absolutely fantastic.

------
sorahn
I use a laptop and usually my wrists are resting on the desk. A face down
display seems like it would just scratch up immediately.

------
richev
"Only available in the US" \- unless you arrange for a friend in the States to
get one for you ship it to you.

However, it looks like the accompanying Windows Phone Microsoft Health app is
not available if you're outside of the US. (not sure if this also applies to
the Android and iPhone apps as well)

Workaround anyone?

~~~
richev
Found a workaround for Windows Phone: In settings, go to region and change
Country/Region to United States. Restart phone, go to Store, and you'll see
Microsoft Health in there. After installing you can change your regional
settings back to your own country and the app is still available on your
phone.

------
kolev
Better than Basis Peak... except it's missing the galvanic skin response
sensor. I'm really happy about the UV sensor (although I already backed
SunSprite, which is a disaster)! Best of all, Microsoft Band will have APIs
unlike the data-stingy Basis!

~~~
dataminded
I can't figure basis out. So much potential. They should be crushing the
market.

~~~
kolev
Yes, I thought so, too, but they suck at material choices and ergonomics.
Also, they don't have an API. Since Intel bought them, Basis Peak seems to
look and feel better, but where's the API? Anyway, Microsoft just made a no
brainer to decide - they offer everything that everybody else has (except
pulse oximetry that Amiigo was supposed to have - not sure if they delivered
it) and much more at the same price.

~~~
lhl
I've had a B1 for 1.5yrs. They've promised a public API since before that
time, but it still doesn't exist. In fact, I have a hard time thinking of any
features they've added this entire time (in fact it's terrible as a watch
since you can't set the time/time zone except via the web and after a full
data sync, making it often useless if you travel much).

I finally got the Amiigo a couple months ago - I didn't see SpO2 stats
detailed. It was actually pretty underwhelming - the Amiigo doesn't have the
promised API/SDK either. The MS Band's sensor suite is better (GSR, skin
temp), it's just too bad it's not waterproof.

------
akimc
I'm not a big Microsoft fan, but I think this device isn't that bad especially
for the fact that it is working on Android, iPhone & Windows Phone.

I'm a bit thrilled to see it live in action !

It is fun to see wearable becoming more and more present with big tech firm
too.

------
Encosia
It's sold out online now:
[http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/en_US/pdp/productI...](http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/en_US/pdp/productID.308308800#buy-
product)

I wonder how many that was.

~~~
lhl
I ordered online but canceled and just swung by my local (West LA) store in
the morning to pick one up. I called late last night to ask about stock and
was told they couldn't tell me anything about future products (even though the
website/online orders were up and a couple hours later they were advertising a
"fitness launch event" in the store the next). When I dropped by the store, it
was predictably empty (and it took some time to flag down someone to help me,
which never happens at the Apple Store), but I got a chance to make sure on my
sizing and picked up the device. I set my Band up in front of the store (took
about 10 minutes) and have been wearing it all day. Everything seems to work
pretty well so far, although I haven't stressed tested it...

~~~
Encosia
I'm planning to do the same soon. There are three Microsoft stores here in the
Atlanta area. I'd just rather do just about anything other than fight traffic
to get to one.

------
wiradikusuma
I don't want to sound skeptical (I like the device and consider buying it),
but how likely is it they gradually introduce "Windows (Phone) only" features
for this device, up to the point it's not so useful in other platforms?

EDIT: clarification

~~~
wfjackson
It also depends on how much the other platforms support deep integration. For
example Apple tends to lock down things like Siri(perhaps this can connect as
a bluetooth mic) and Google had scuffles over Youtube on Windows Phone so is
likely to do everything in it's power to undermine this.

------
DavidWanjiru
Can it (or could it be made to in future iterations) record the sort of data
used to produce the output of an ECG (echocardiogram)? That would be quite the
application for people with actual or high risk for hear disease, I think?

~~~
lloeki
ECG (electro- — not echo- — cardiogram) records electric potential changes
between various points on the torso, of which pulse rate is really only a very
averaged metric, obtained via blood flow and pressure changes.

No chance you'll detect a QT interval change with this.

------
k_bx
I wonder if some day someone would release a watch (or bracelet) that is able
to have a sim-card and receive SMS. In a world of pin-code based
authorizations and fast-dying-battery smartphones this looks like a thing I
would own.

~~~
akst
I think will.i.am actually released something this...

> Puls will require its own SIM card and mobile connection, but can completely
> replace a phone...

[http://www.dezeen.com/2014/10/20/will-i-am-zaha-hadid-
puls-s...](http://www.dezeen.com/2014/10/20/will-i-am-zaha-hadid-puls-
smartwatch-cuff/)

------
jimmcslim
I wonder if integration with Xbox One is on the cards? It would seem to be
natural given the fitness side of Kinect; if this has a HRM integrated perhaps
that could be sent while you are doing your P90X workout or some such...

------
arjie
Would have bought this if it were fully functional with non-MS devices. It has
all the sensors I want and looks unobtrusive. Even the Apple Watch looks like
a Casio, so it's not like we're in top style here.

------
antjanus
I'd love to see someone compare this to the new Fitbit Charge HR! :)

~~~
ddrmaxgt37
The MS Band has more sensors and his bound to have much better software. I'm
guessing that it's not going to be a very fair fight.

~~~
antjanus
yeah but Fitbit has the whole "light-weight band" going for it plus 5 days of
charge.

I do like the GPS feature though, that's fucking killer

------
nullz
As a comparison, worth noting that the watch does _not_ have GPS without the
paired phone. So if you wanted to go out for a run and track the course, you
would need to bring the phone.

------
dataminded
Any word on silent alarm and convenient wake-up like the fitbit?

~~~
jbigelow76
That's a feature I like about my fitbit, but with the Band requiring a charge
every two days could result in sporadic sleep data since most people will
charge it as they sleep along with their cell phones. Granted, I charge my
phone at work at my desk but taking off and putting on something that is
supposed to track your activity could get annoying.

~~~
dataminded
That does sound kinda messy. I think that I'll wait until the Fitbit Surge or
Charge HR. Wish they'd gotten their act together well enough to get them out
before holidays.

------
resu
Galvanic skin response is listed as one of the sensors, but there's no mention
of it in the marketing material.

Anyone know if it'll be able to measure exertion via sweat?

------
72deluxe
It looks great; the only problem is that I'd have to be active and fit to use
it so looks like I won't be getting one; I type this from my armchair.

------
tkorri
Oh the title got me thinking that this is music related, like a new version of
Songsmith. I'm glad I was wrong, the device looks very nice!

------
perfunctory
"Life is made up of moments. How many do we miss? Tied to our desks." Yeah,
Microsoft band will rescue you from your desk.

------
BasDirks
The pictures promoting the product only feature very healthy, attractive
30-somethings. Is this intentional or simply and oversight?

------
chenzhekl
It' with Bluetooth 4.0. So my HTC 8X which is loaded with Bluetooth 3.0 may
not be able to work with it. Such a pity.

------
mahyarm
Two things that I'm missing:

\- How do you charge the thing?

\- Is the sleep tracking automatic or do you have to press a button to start
it?

~~~
nfmangano
I have one on my wrist right now, and from the limited amount that I've played
with it:

\- There's a magnetic connector (like mac boks) that hooks up to USB. It
doesn't come with a wall connector, just USB, which is a bit weird.

\- It does indeed look like you need to press a button to start tracking
sleep.

~~~
mahyarm
A big thing about sleep tracking for me is it being automatic. When I'm about
to fall asleep, I'm often too sleepy to remember to press that button. It why
I ditched my fitbit.

Other fitness trackers have automatic sleep tracking, even it's only heuristic
based. For example misfit just has the formula of 'if not moving much for a
large chunk of time in between these user configurable hours, mark that as
sleep time'. That is a huge improvement.

The basis band seems to have a more advanced automatic sleep tracking algo.
You guys would be probably interested looking into it.

------
nulterm
I wonder if it would be usable for navigation. I guess it would be impractical
because it lacks a compass?

~~~
maxerickson
I think most handheld navigation aids infer direction of travel from position
information. An electronic compass gives the orientation of the device, who
knows how it is being held.

I guess they use a compass when it's available, like for trying to display a
map oriented to compass north, but I don't think it is dependable as
algorithmic input.

Something mounted in a vehicle can directly factor the compass data into
directions though (just saying that to emphasize that I'm talking about
handheld stuff above).

------
outside1234
This is the first thing I have excited enough to buy from Microsoft on launch
day since Windows 95.

------
Shad0w59
How do I buy it (international)?

------
girmad
That's very Yahoo purple.

------
MrDosu
The watch is dead, long live the watch...

This money grabbing gadgetarianism is getting silly.

------
ha292
Prediction: no one will be talking about it past June 2015.

------
brettkc
Looks like this is what Nike Fuelband should have become.

------
aercolino
Nice, it could work as a wrist band lie detector too.

------
kmfrk
I see a lot of stories about people in retirement homes running away without
anyone being able to find them. This looks like a decent tool for the job.

Decent GPS trackers are hard to find and recommend.

------
lziz
friends with the engineer behind the sensor tech inside it. if you have any
questions i'd be happy to forward them to him

~~~
nnd
more like a product question, but... UV sensor looks more like a gimmick,
rather than something which could be somewhat useful. What's the reason for
having this?

------
mrmondo
Bit late to the game aren't they?

------
rubython
finally a microsoft product that works well with other players in the
ecosystem

------
peterclary
It makes me think of a high-tech hospital wrist tag, so not particularly
appealing on first glance.

------
hxw
How is an integrated GPS cutting edge? Polar has had watches with GPS for a
while now..

~~~
cujo
Take out the windows phone specific stuff and I'm fairly certain there isn't a
device on the market with this feature set anywhere near this price point.

------
jezfromfuture
where fit bit and apple tread microsoft will eventually follow.

~~~
sumedh
That is pretty much MS's strategy for all these years. Someone else does the
innovation and then they follow.

------
lafar6502
Hey, this makes sense!

------
enthdegree
Microsoft Band Wagon

------
eridal
man, their site took ages to load!!

------
cnp
can someone explain this?

~~~
o0-0o
MS is rumored to be working on a wearable. This is obviously it. Looks like
Apple outed them through their submitted app.

~~~
eslaught
> "Apple outed them"

More likely someone at Microsoft hit the wrong button, or failed to set
something to private, or whatever. This even happened to Apple with some iPad
Air 2 documentation not so long ago, so obviously this stuff happens.

------
znowi
This will be perfect for PRISM

------
satheeshKR
nice

------
mmcconnell1618
I guess someone selected "Release when approved" instead of "Release
manually."

~~~
drawkbox
Or a sneaky market test for reactions.

~~~
kolev
It seems that it's available to order.

------
dang
Url changed from [https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/microsoft-band-
sync/id926162...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/microsoft-band-
sync/id926162815) via
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8531131](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8531131).

------
rrobbins04
Sad. Even from just the website and the logo, you can tell that microsoft
never understood the internet.

------
zenbane
LoL

------
lectrick
microsoft is always the "me too" company

~~~
jongalloway2
[http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-09-04/microsoft-
ma...](http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-09-04/microsoft-made-a-
pretty-good-smartwatch-back-in-2004)

~~~
lectrick
ok, good point. :) I VAGUELY remember that watch...

------
acd
The funny thing is that Microsoft has always been good at creating good
hardware but never at masking great software except Office.

------
bluthru
I'm surprised so many are drawn to the industrial design of this. It seems
quite clunky with the electronics distributed throughout the band. The flat
portion is also too long.

Microsoft wants to sell you a gadget while Apple wants to sell you a watch.

~~~
jader201
I belong to a certain group of people that I'm guessing many smartwatch makers
are targeting.

That is, I've not worn a watch for years, mostly because a) I've never needed
time to be any more convenient than checking my phone, and b) watches tend to
be more about style than function, and I care almost zero about the former and
almost everything about the latter.

Now that the "watch" is becoming functional, it really is more of a gadget,
and that's the only thing drawing me back to considering having something
attached to my wrist again.

Of course, I also realize there is a group that does care more about style,
and maybe these people aren't the target for the more "gadgety" type
smartwatches.

One of the reasons I think the Apple Watch Edition is a joke is that it's
trying to target both groups (the other reason being the ridiculous name). And
I don't think there is that large of an audience that is willing to spend that
much for style + functionality -- if they want to spend that much, they likely
care more about style, and will stick to a traditional watch.

So if gadget = functionality, then I say "Finally. Sign me up."

~~~
threeseed
"I also realize there is a group that does care more about style"

Amusing that you call the majority of the population a "group". People buy
clothes, shoes, cars etc based on style not specs. And you only have to look
at the LV, Prada etc of the world to know they are willing to spend huge
amounts of money on it.

Gadget on your wrist ? Nice. But it's a niche market.

~~~
wfjackson
68% of people in the US are obese or overweight. The numbers in other
countries aren't much better and are rising. The iWatch is a luxury watch that
does fitness tracking and also allows you to view images. This is a fitness
band that allows you to see the time.

------
blhack
How many mentions of the apple watch in this thread?

The moto 360 is already out, it's completely awesome, I use it every day, and
as far as I can tell is _already_ ahead of the apple watch in terms of
functionality.

Apple are seriously gods at marketing. Wow.

~~~
threeseed
It has nothing to do with marketing. Apple simply has a record of disrupting
industries e.g. music player, music store, smart phone.

So of course people are going to compare it to the iWatch.

------
fortuitous
Crashed for me browsing that website with win 8.1. Thanks, microsoft. It
actually rebooted my computer. Only microsoft can reboot your computer from
their own website.

------
bigtunacan
When I saw the app name I instantly thought of the D12 song.

"These chicks don't even know the name of my band...my band...my band..."

------
yohanatan
I am sure the Microsoft employees which will make up about 95% of the market
share of this thing will be happy (until it goes the way of the Kin, Zune,
etc).