**Apple Watch Edition: A Luxury Timepiece with a High Price Tag**

The Apple Watch Edition is one of the most expensive smartwatches on the market, with prices ranging from $10,000 to over $40,000. The watch's high-end design and materials, including stainless steel and titanium, make it a luxury item that appeals to those who value style and craftsmanship. However, as Tim Cook mentioned during the Apple event, the watch's high price point may be a barrier for some customers.

**Upgrades and Future-Proofing**

One of the concerns about buying an expensive smartwatch is whether the device will become outdated quickly due to advancements in technology. The Apple Watch Edition seems designed more for experience than technological updates, with features that are focused on providing a seamless user experience rather than cutting-edge hardware. As such, it's unclear how much room there will be for upgrades and future-proofing.

Apple did not discuss any plans for upgrading the watch's internals or incorporating new technologies, which may be a concern for some customers who want to stay up-to-date with the latest advancements in smartwatch technology. However, the company has made efforts to make the watch more flexible and adaptable to changing user needs, such as introducing a new band system that allows users to easily switch between different bands.

**Design and Materials**

One of the standout features of the Apple Watch Edition is its design and materials. The watch's stainless steel and titanium construction gives it a premium feel and look that is unmatched by many other smartwatches on the market. The use of high-quality materials also lends an air of sophistication and luxury to the device.

The watch's band system, which allows users to easily switch between different bands, is another feature that sets it apart from other smartwatches. This feature may help reduce the need for customers to upgrade their watches as frequently, making it a more affordable option in the long run. However, this benefit is largely offset by the high price point of the watch.

**Interview with Christy Bush**

During the Apple event, Apple invited model and athlete Christy Bush onto the stage to showcase her experiences with the Apple Watch Edition. Bush was enthusiastic about the watch's features, particularly its ability to track her runs and provide detailed performance metrics. She also highlighted the watch's water resistance and durability, which made it suitable for outdoor activities.

Bush's presence on the stage served as a testament to the watch's appeal beyond just its high-end design and materials. The device is designed to be used in a variety of settings, from casual wear to athletic pursuits, making it an attractive option for those who value versatility and performance.

**Hands-On Experience**

In our hands-on experience with the Apple Watch Edition, we were able to explore many of its features firsthand. One of the standout features was the watch's crown mechanism, which allows users to navigate different apps and functions with ease. The device also boasts a high-resolution display that provides clear and vibrant visuals.

The use of gestures and haptic feedback added a tactile element to the user experience, making it feel more intuitive and engaging. We were particularly impressed by the watch's ability to respond quickly and accurately to user input, making it easy to navigate and control.

**Apple Pay Integration**

During our hands-on experience, we also discovered that the Apple Watch Edition integrates seamlessly with other Apple devices, including iPhones and Macs. One of the notable features is its integration with Apple Pay, which allows users to make contactless payments on the go.

When we double-clicked the watch's button, it brought up Apple Pay and allowed us to select a card or send a payment directly from the device. This feature added convenience and flexibility to our experience, making it easier to manage our finances on-the-go.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enyou're listening to the Apple Insider podcast Welcome to our show this is a special episode of the Apple Insider podcast and we're talking with apple Insider editor Daniel Aaron who's actually on the ground in San Francisco and was at the Apple watch keynote event today March 9th 2015 Dan thanks for taking a couple minutes to join us yeah sure it's a beautiful day here yeah I saw winter other places but yeah yeah it looked very nice uh so you were in the keynote looks like you had a pretty good seat up at the front um what was the General Vibe of the people there were people genuinely excited kind of going into it anticipatory uh I think it was a typical keynote um it was a pretty packed Auditorium uh I was right behind the there's guest seating I think a lot of the people in front of me were actual uh Apple developers on the watch Project they stood up as part of the part of that um and like I said it was a it was a packed situation uh Tim Cook got up and introduced as they always do they introduced the kind of a recap of everything that they're doing and it was kind of funny every time he he address something new there'd be sort of a like this gasp of like where when's when you do the watch but the things that he introduced before the watch were actually pretty cool um of course the new MacBooks and um one of the more interesting things that nobody realized was coming was the the health related research kit project that allows medical researchers to connect with a large number of volunteers to share their data and they were discussing some of the ways that you can use that data to do incredible things on a scale that just hasn't been possible before right and when when tip started talking about it it seemed not not to say boring but it didn't like research kit doesn't sound very exciting but once I actually started describing the kind of diseases that they'll be able to track and what they'll be able to do uh with the iPhone I thought it was pretty astounding did people seem pretty excited about that yeah I mean there was a there was a big there was a lot of um Applause for that afterward um I I've worked in research a little bit um not as a researcher but supporting people who do research and so I have a little bit of you know I kind of saw um what's involved in setting up research I've also I've also participated in research groups where you're um taking an experimental drug or something like that um and it's it's a lot of work and researchers have to go through a lot of paperwork there's a lot of security involved because you don't want to be sharing people's information um in ways that they don't expect and typically that's involved a lot of paperwork and a lot of phone calling and dealing with so it's just diff it's difficult to scale to an extent where you're working with a lot of different kinds of people and so what they're doing with the phone is not only getting more people involved uh potentially but also um being able to collect more valuable data more more accurate data and more representative instead of asking somebody on a scale to 110 how much does it hurt when you do this you're able to set up um all kinds of sophisticated tests using all the sensors on the phone to have everybody kind of do similar things and collect on a stronger Baseline of of of what that what their responses actually mean and then be able to use data across thousands of people to come up with uh find a lot of insights that you wouldn't normally be able to do yeah I thought it was pretty amazing and obviously it's you know it's good for Apple because it will sell iPhones but the research itself and research kit I mean not a huge uh profit maker right off the bat so I thought that was pretty admirable to put that much work and effort into something that's U really just to seems to help people really more than anything I think it was an offshoot of work with the health app which part of Health was was um creating a system so that people could the doctors could have uh their patients put in certain kinds of data and collect information on themselves and they started realizing that there's a lot of research groups that have needs for working with lots of people together and um so yeah it's not going to sell a lot of phones but it's going to do a lot of things that are even more important important than that and I one of the things that I was impressed by was well two things one is they one of the doctors in the video was in China and he's talking about how many people have smartphones in China and having just been there I mean the scale of population is incredible so to have all those people I mean have have just a huge population of people contributing data uh could solve a lot of problems or or develop more effective ways of dealing with um some of the uh diseases affect everybody on the planet and kind of in connect in connection with that they also mentioned that it's going to be an open source product so it will be something that that doesn't just sell iPhones but it actually is something that uh researchers could develop apps that work on um other platforms even right so I want to talk about the MacBook real quick again brand newly designed a 12-in MacBook Retina screen U this was something a lot of people were hoping for we weren't sure it was going to come out but they announced it it looks like an amazing device and you got some Hands-On time with it what were your initial Impressions super thin super light it's um somebody was saying it's the same weight as two uh airs iPad Air 2os you know they're already pretty light so it's kind of like hinging two of those together um it has a thinner keyboard so the keys don't depress as much but the key caps are bigger and they have a nicer feel to them you found it pretty easy to type on yeah I was typ a little bit on it um there also has the force touch keyboard that allows you to basically touch anything trackpad trackpad right um when you instead of selecting with the tap you push touch and it essentially basically does the default thing you do if you were doing a um textual menu so in the finder if you force touch a icon you get a preview of it whether it's a video or document or whatever it opens up in quick look and in a variety of apps uh information like a a contact or a a address would open up maps documents email attachments would open up a quick look so it's kind of a handy idea a new type of gesture did you find it intuitive like to use like were we able to pick up on the specific gesture right away um yeah I think I I was kind of like used to two finger tapping right so it requires a little bit of thinking you have to think about it um at first but um it is kind of another way of interacting that feels natural and seems like it would be useful now did you see in like the system preferences is the for tarch going to be something you'll be able to customize kind of like a three finger two finger gesture you can you can set how much uh whether it's I think kind of a small medium large kind of amount of force to uh invoke it you can also turn it off if you don't like it and again that's on the the new Macbook the the 12-in reer display and also the 13-inch MacBook Pro right models haven't Incorporated yet okay and now the Apple watch it was what everyone was waiting for the hardware is not not really anything changed there since the uh earlier event uh they showed off some apps which uh look nice like the Uber app uh opening your hotel hotel room door for like a w hotels and things like that but obviously the pricing is what everyone was interested in uh do you think there was any shock in the pricing especially with the Apple watch Edition models well I think um a number of people were kind of guessing prices and they were kind of in the right ballpark the the sport watch starts at 349 right right um and the we we're discussing whether the larger screen would cost more the larger model cost about $50 more across the board right um the stainless uh costs it's 5.49 and 5.99 for the two sizes and it goes up to around a thousand depending on what Loop because like the millanes loop band itself is like 450 right well actually the the the millanes loop I think is 150 and then the steel link bracelet is 450 um I think I was looking on the Apple store Page yeah there's there's article up on on the site now you can look at all the prices but the the bands definitely vary in price pretty widely um so you can really kind of jack up the price on those steel models anywhere from 549 to over a th000 now when he said the Apple watch Edition model was going to cost 10,000 was there any audible gasps in the room um I don't know how many people were shocked by that there were some people that didn't think it was going to be that much I think yeah um but there's such a range in the middle that clearly the gold is kind of a tip off that because gold itself cost money costs quite a lot of money right um and it's very much a status thing I mean it's what you when you know be fancy and actually for you know the rest of us $10,000 is a lot of money for a watch but there's a lot of people that buy very expensive watches to we $10,000 is not it's not a shocking price no now there was there's no work on any kind of upgradeability or trade in when the new models come in so you know from right now if you get something like an Apple Watch Edition model and then in version two comes out with different technology or different sensors I mean it seems like you kind of just have to purchase a new one and try to sell it yourself it doesn't I I I suppose it'll be more details later but I don't think that the um the people who are dropping $10,000 for watch are really real sensitive to price I I guess not yeah I guess not but upgrades or whatever yeah but even you know you buy a $40,000 fancy watch you don't true expect it to yeah and I mean I guess you know you buy an iPad that's $5 to $700 you may get a new one every three years or something like that I guess they assume people just do that with the watches though I will say since the bands some of the bands are the larger part of the cost especially with the steel models you could just reuse your band year to year if the Apple watch you know the face doesn't change so that might help cut that cut down a little bit on the upgrade costs and they didn't spend a lot of time talking about anything like upgrades I'm sure because a they haven't started selling it yet and B um you know there there's a PO potential for that I think we talked about on the podcast before about the likelihood of being able to swap out the internals um but again it's it's not as much of a technology product as a lot of the other things that we've seen from Apple from computer Meers in general where everything changes every year I think this could be a thing that um I mean it's really designed for an experience right it's not designed to have a certain amount of RAM and yeah and I think it was a little telling you know they didn't bring any third-party app developers on stage to actually show off their apps but the one person they did bring on in the watch segment aside from Kevin Lynch who worked for Apple obviously was the the model the Christy Bush uh who she was showing off as she ran a half marathon in Africa with the Apple watch Sport and that she's very excited about it it's going to be a big part of her life so of all the people they could choose outside of the Apple employee family it was a model so that might be kind of telling yeah kind of a fashion angle she's not just a model she's also um you know and accomplished oh many things many things many things yeah yes she has the the the motherhood a nonprofit that she developed and she's also you know times top 100 and most influential people so she definitely has a lot of stuff going on did did it seem awkward that interview between her and Tim Cook though on stage no I don't really think so I mean she just got back on a plane I I'm aware of what that feels like coming back that's true I've been sleeping most of the last week so yeah I was surprised she was still awake but so what was your so lastly what was your experience using the watch and the Hands-On area I mean was there anything that stood out to you did you find yourself using that crown on the side to navigate certain apps yeah so the the crown you push the crown you get to the home screen and you dial the crown in and out it does kind of um things you'd expect zooming in and out photos things like that um and navigating the watch with glances where you flick up you go side to side it's very intuitive just being able to navigate around and then also the button if you click it once it brings up your contacts you spin the crown and you pick somebody and you can message them or you know voice text or sketch message or send them your heartbeat or whatever and then if you double click on it you get I think that's Apple P right you get something if you double click I think I think that activates Apple pay yeah that's Apple pay so pops up Apple pay and you can slide between your cards pick one and then you hold it up and it pays right right so you can do that from the watch all right well Dan thanks for just taking a few minutes and um we'll look forward to everything you're writing and taking pictures of in the next couple days all right all right and again follow Apple Insider Apple Insider on Twitter go to Apple ins .c and see all the news and articles about the Apple watch event thanks for joining us don't forget to rate US on the iTunes Store leave a comment there and of course you can always email us find us on Twitter and uh we'd love to interact with you there thanks for tuning in and stay tuned for later this week the full podcast episode with the whole gang look out for that later this week all right Dan thanks a lot\n"