Jawbone takes on Misfit with the $50 Up Move

Jawbone’s first budget-friendly wearable may look a tad familiar to anyone who’s seen Misfit’s stylish gadgets. Just like the recently announced Misfit Flash, the Up Move is a tiny $50 hockey-puck-looking device targeted at people who haven’t yet jumped aboard wearable bandwagon. But while it’s not necessarily revolutionary, this could be Jawbone’s ticket to getting even more people on its health tracking platform.

Jawbone also announced the Up3 today, its latest high-end wristband which is better-suited to experienced wearable users than this smaller device. The Up Move offers most of the features from Jawbone’s Up health bands — including step, activity, and sleep tracking — but it lacks the Up’s vibrating notifications and smart alarm clock. That’s to be expected, though, as it relies on a watch battery for power (again, similar to Misfit’s devices). Jawbone claims the Move will get around six months worth of battery life — a decent tradeoff for not having to worry about charging it every few days.

While it’s built out of anodized aluminum, the Up Move actually feels more like plastic in your hand. It’s a bit pudgier than Misfit’s gadgets, but it’s still small enough to drop into your pocket and forget about it. It also features wireless Bluetooth low-energy synchronization, just like last year’s Up 24.

The Up Move’s “watch” face serves as its only button: Press it once to show your step progress; twice to show the time (displayed analog-style with two LEDS); and three times to show your sleep progress. You can wear the Up Move in a variety of ways: In your pocket; clasped onto your clothing with the included clip; or on your wrist with a $15 wrist strap (which will be available in slim and standard-width variants).

Andrew Rosenthal, Jawbone’s group manager for wellness and platform, noted that the Move is all “about people who are starting their tracking journey.” The company has found that customers who have friends on the Up platform tend to be more engaged, so it makes sense for Jawbone to have a low-priced device to bolster its platform.

Indeed, Jawbone’s health tracking platform is what we should really be paying attention to these days. The company recently opened up its platform to work with other devices, including Fitbit’s lineup and anything running Android Wear and Apple’s HealthKit. Ultimately, it won’t matter if you’re wearing a Jawbone device or not — more data will inevitably make Jawbone’s platform stronger.

Jawbone is also rebranding its platform’s insight engine, which offers personalized health tips, as “Smart Coach.” Expect to see the company touting this particular feature much more in the future, as it’s one of the biggest differentiators Jawbone has up its sleeves. It doesn’t take much to track steps these days — what matters more is what that data can do for consumers. “For us, it’s not just the hardware,” Rosenthal said. “The hardware is an entry point — it’s a beautifully designed, highly-engaging, covetable entry point to a behavior change system.”

Rosenthal didn’t have much to say when I brought up the very obvious similarities between the Up Move and Misfit’s lineup, but he noted that Misfit hasn’t yet enabled its devices to work with Jawbone’s platform. Given that even Fitbit’s devices work with the Up platform, that makes me wonder what role the Up Move will serve if Misfit, whose devices are far sleeker, ever decides to cooperate.

The Up Move is available for pre-order today on Jawbone’s site, and it’s also heading to Amazon, Apple stores, Best Buy, and Target later this month. Jawbone will eventually sell the device in batch packages for families and groups, though it’s unclear how those will be priced.

Filed under: Wearables

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Jawbone unveils the Up3, its most sophisticated health band yet

Nope, Jawbone still doesn’t have a smartwatch of its own. But with the $180 Up3, its latest health-tracking wristband, the company is making a clear case for why it doesn’t need a smart watch (yet). With sensor technology from last year’s BodyMedia purchase, Jawbone has crafted an all-day activity tracker that appears more refined than most of its competitors. Slimmer than Microsoft’s recently announced Band and the Up24 , its sensors go deeper than Jawbone has ever gone before. Perhaps most significantly, it features heart-rate monitoring that may actually work consistently, unlike what we’ve seen from many competitors. In short, the Up3 is a health tracker built for people obsessed with health tracking. If you’re looking for something a bit more entry-level, consider the new Up Move, which the company also announced today.

Naturally, the Up3 features all of the usual activity and sleep tracking features from the Up24. But thanks to a whole bunch of new gear — including a tri-axis accelerometer, bioimpedance sensor, skin sensors, and ambient temperature sensor — it also goes much further. The Up3 can automatically detect new activities — for example, if you went for a bike ride — without any prompting, and its sleep tracking can now give you a detailed look at your light, deep, and REM sleep.

As with all of Jawbone’s health trackers, the company once again tapped Yves Behar, its chief creative officer and a renowned industrial designer, to craft the Up3. It’s a considerable upgrade over the past two Up bands — and that’s a big deal, since they’re among my favorite wearable designs so far. Rather than a single, continuous bracelet design, the Up3 features a central housing for most of its gadgetry surrounded by two extremely flexible arms. The design is thinner and doesn’t stand out as much as past Up models, making it ideal for wearing alongside other arm accessories.

Best of all, the Up3’s new design makes it a one-size-fits-all device. Previously, you had to choose between small, medium, or large-sized Up models. Jawbone developed a new type of clasp for the Up3 — which, honestly, resembles a fancy bra clasp — to make it easily adjustable for all sorts of body types. It’s a big step up from awkward and clunky clasps I’ve seen from other companies (hello, Fitbit and Samsung).

The Up3 still doesn’t feature any sort of screen — you’ll still be looking at blinking LEDs — but its central unit is now touch sensitive, so you won’t have to go fishing for any buttons. Jawbone says it will get around seven days worth of battery life, and it’s also water resistant up to 10 meters.

The Up3’s combination of design and functionality is best shown by how it handles heart-rate monitoring. Most other wearables on the market rely on green LED sensors that have to be held close to the skin very carefully to detect your heart rate. The Up3, on the other hand, gets your heart rate by measuring galvanic skin response using the skin and temperature sensors in its arm bands. At launch, the Up3 will be able to measure your heart rate when you’re at rest, but an update will eventually enable on-demand heart rate monitoring.

When it comes to wearables, we’ve seen plenty of sensor-laden devices that would be tough to wear all day, and plenty of pretty-yet-functionally-light gadgets that may not be robust enough for health tracking addicts. With its slick design and bevy of sensors, the Up3 could finally end up being the unicorn device to bridge that gap. (Though I’m sad there’s still no independent GPS functionality.)

And what of the Jawbone smartwatch? The company has opened up its platform to competing health platforms, including Apple’s HealthKit, and it has apps available on Android Wear and Pebble watches. With such widespread support across the disparate smartwatch market, it actually makes more sense for Jawbone to avoid releasing its own smartwatch.

“The good smartwatches have become good platforms, and we’ve taken full advantage of that,” Andrew Rosenthal, Jawbone’s group manager for wellness and platforms, told us in an interview. “We believe in platforms — we’re going to show up where the smartwatch is, where people want to put a big display on their wrist, but not everybody wants to do that.”

The black version of the Up3 will be available for $180 by the end of the year, with additional colors coming next year. (Judging from the mockups I’ve seen, it may be worth waiting for the more colorful variants.)

Filed under: Wearables

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MMS messages through Google Voice finally working on Verizon

About a month ago, many Google Voice users were ecstatic when Google announced that Google Voice users on 100 North American carriers can finally receive MMS messages. However, one very notable carrier was missing from that list. Yup, you guess it….Verizon Wireless.

Well Verizon customers shouldn’t feel left out in the cold any longer. It appears that Verizon and Google quietly resolved the situation since a few users are reporting that things appear to be working fine now.

If you’re a Verizon customer, does this news inspire you to switch to Google Voice?

source: Droid-Life

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TalkAndroid Daily Dose for November 4, 2014

With hectic schedules, it can be hard to keep track of everything in your news feed. That’s why we created the TalkAndroid Daily Dose. This is where we recap the day’s hottest stories so you can get yourself up to speed in quick fashion. Happy reading!!

Android TV

YouTube for Android TV listed in Google Play Store

Apps

Disney Movies Anywhere is your one stop cross-platform shop for Disney, Pixar, and Marvel movies

Microsoft and Dropbox team up to provide seamless integration across services

Amazon offering free unlimited cloud photo storage for Prime members

Pocket for Android gets Material Design update and Google Now integration

Google expands Play Movies and TV app to eight new countries

MMS messages through Google Voice finally working on Verizon

Carriers

Go long with new AT&T Next 24 program

MMS messages through Google Voice finally working on Verizon

Gaming

Xperia Z2 and Z2 Tablet getting update for PS4 Remote Play

Home Automation

Nest Thermostats getting software update this week

Phones

HTC Desire 820s is now official

LG announces the G Prime and G2 Lite for Brazil

Nexus 6 will be back in stock tomorrow and every Wednesday thereafter

Galaxy Grand 3 specs leaked in benchmarks

Xperia Z2 and Z2 Tablet getting update for PS4 Remote Play

Tablets

Nexus 9 teardown reveals that it won’t be easy to repair

LTE version of Nexus 9 shows up in FCC filing

[Deal] Staples has the Nexus 7 (2012) WiFi and 4G for $129

NVIDIA Shield Tablet set to receive Lollipop update before the end of November

Xperia Z2 and Z2 Tablet getting update for PS4 Remote Play

Updates

KitKat to Lollipop full changelog posted

NVIDIA Shield Tablet set to receive Lollipop update before the end of November

Nexus 9 factory image is now available with LRX21L build

Come comment on this article: TalkAndroid Daily Dose for November 4, 2014

KitKat to Lollipop full changelog posted

If you have some time on your hands, you might want to check out Funky Android’s KitKat to Lollipop full changelog. To say that Lollipop is a major upgrade would be a huge understatement. There are 128,680 commits, and I dare you to find another version of Android that comes close.

There is obviously way to many to post here, but if you hit the source link below, you can see each and every one of them. Enjoy!

source: AOSP Changelog

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Science says Spice Girls own the UK’s catchiest song ever

In addition to being married to one of the most popular (albeit retired) footballers in recent years, Victoria Beckham also lays claim to the catchiest song ever in the UK. Posh and her bandmates in the Spice Girls have the most recognizable tune with “Wannabe,” according to a study from Manchester’s Museum of Science and Industry (MOSI). Using an interactive game, researchers gathered details on what cements songs in the mind of the listener long-term, tallying stats from over 12,000 folks. The game played clips of tracks randomly selected from the best-selling tunes spanning the 1940s to today. Based on the amount of time it took to identify the song, researchers compiled the list of the 20 catchiest of all time, with the aforementioned selection taking an average of 2.29 to recognize. Number 2? Why that’s Lou Bega’s “Mambo No. 5,” and the most recent song is Lady Gaga’s “Just Dance,” coming in fourth. Don’t worry, we’ve posted the full list on the other side of the break.

1. Spice Girls: Wannabe
2. Lou Bega: Mambo No 5
3. Survivor: Eye of the Tiger
4. Lady Gaga: Just Dance
5. ABBA: SOS
6. Roy Orbison: Pretty Woman
7. Michael Jackson: Beat It
8. Whitney Houston: I Will Always Love You
9. The Human League: Don’t You Want Me
10. Aerosmith: I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing
11. Lady Gaga: Poker Face
12. Hanson: MMMbop
13. Elvis Presley: It’s Now Or Never
14. Bachman-Turner Overdrive: You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet
15. Michael Jackson: Billie Jean
16. Culture Club: Karma Chameleon
17. Britney Spears: Baby One More Time
18. Elvis Presley: Devil in Disguise
19. Boney M: Rivers of Babylon
20. Elton John: Candle in the Wind

[Photo credit: AP Photo/Charlie Riedel]

Filed under: Misc, Internet

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Via: CNET, BBC

Source: Hooked on Music