AppleInsider had a great scoop this morning, finding some patents that Apple was granted that look to possibly be a hint at what is in store for Cupertino’s wearable device. The USPTO posted U.S. Patent No. 8,787,006 for a “Wrist-worn electronic device and methods therefor”.
Interestingly, in one illustration it has “iTime” (below) in the middle of what would presumably be the screen of the device. Whether that is just to throw people off or if Apple is going to pull another iSlate/iPad move again, who knows.
According to the patent, the device would be able to do some things that should be obvious: connect to a peripheral device (iPad, iPhone), computers most likely, as well as sensors found in the band of the device itself that would include miscellaneous things.
Overall it seems that the device would be something separate from the watchband itself, being able to be removed and possibly put into either upgraded straps or different sizes for one that fits a particular wrist size.
One place that AppleInsider points out something that is new is where the patents describes this as a “personal wireless environment.” Information would be able to not only go watch-iPhone, but iPhone-watch, computer-watch, watch-computer, etc, and this could be done by some automatic process such as it sending sleep information to the Health app on iPhone when you wake up, or by a user request such as sending settings to the device.
There are so many rumors surrounding the potential iWatch that as this point, even those these patents are real, we don’t know if this is actually going to be the device we see hopefully come later this year.
We’ve seen patent among patent from Apple that still to this day haven’t been released. Sure, this could mean something along these lines is in the works, but this also means that this may be something that will go into a future iWatch (or “iTime”) iteration, and not the first one we see. Rumors have been talking about the iWatch coming later this year, so who knows if this is what will come this year.
What do you think? Are you looking forward to an iWatch being announced? What features are you hoping for? Let us know in the comments
