Here’s the TL/DR version: Don’t buy this piece of shit. It doesn’t work, it will fail, and the software is terrible. Jawbone is still selling them even though they know they’re all future bricks. Don’t buy one. Feel free to read on if you’d like the nitty-gritty details.
Update: Jawbone recently sent out a letter from their CEO offering a rebate policy for all Jawbone users, and admitted they’ve “temporarily” ceased production of the UP until they can solve the problems. This is a good step in the right direction. I genuinely hope Jawbone can resolve the hardware and software issues and release a much better product, because there is a lot of promise here. Perhaps one day in the future I’ll have a positive review of a better UP.
I bought the Jawbone UP with high hopes. I’m obsessed with data tracking. I use Nike+ for running, I have a Withings Scale for tracking my weight and BMI (which I use in combination with Weightbot), I log most TV episodes I watch using IntoNow, I check in everywhere I go with Foursquare—the list goes on and on. So, obviously, products like the FitBit and the new Jawbone UP are right up my alley. I owned a first-generation FitBit and I really liked it, but long-term it became a pain to use. The device needs to be clipped onto your pants, meaning you can forget it easily when you leave your house (and, of course, it’s clipped on your pants which is not an awesome look), and at night you have to put it into this ridiculous wrist band. It just screams extra step and that lead to me leaving it behind. The beauty of the Jawbone UP is that you wear it 24/7. When you go to sleep, you simply press the single button to switch it to sleep mode. You wear it in the shower. You never have to worry about forgetting it because you never take it off.
Design-wise, the UP is relatively pretty. It’s understated, with a simple rubber-coated band that crosses itself at the tips. I liked wearing it, it was mostly comfortable, and it didn’t look particularly strange. I did have to wear it upside down, however, because if you work at a desk and wear the UP the way they suggest, you’ll be instantly annoyed about the thing smacking around on your desk. I also found it less comfortable the default way. Jawbone claims you can wear the band in either orientation without issue.
My favorite features of the UP were its ability to remind you to be active on an interval (I had mine set to remind me every hour from 10AM-7PM to get up and stretch my legs and drink some water), and to wake you up during a 30-minute window when it was most ideal for your body based on your sleep patterns. In theory, these are terrific features.
That’s it for the positive things about the UP. Now let’s talk about why it’s a piece of shit:
The software is terrible. Poorly designed, buggy, and lacking in all but extremely basic features. You sync the band with your iPhone using the headphone port, which is fine, except 75% of the time I would get repeated “Sync error” messages until I unplugged/plugged-in the device over and over. Once successfully synced, the app tracks steps and sleep patterns, and pretends to track food intake. I say pretends, because here’s how UP tracks this data: You take a picture of a meal and submit it in the app, along with a title. An hour or so later, UP asks you how that meal made you feel, with a few emoticon options. That’s it. No calorie counting, no detailed entry, just a cruddy picture of a plate of enchiladas and a “:( Full” message. This is so pointless it might as well not be in the application at all.
The activity reminder seemed hit or miss. One day, it reminded me twice in total, even though I sat at my desk all day long. Another day, it never reminded me even though I was still mostly sitting around. I think this has something to do with the UP using any motion as an indication it doesn’t need to alert you. The problem, of course, is that moving your arm between a mouse and a keyboard rapidly for four hours straight is not what I’d consider activity.
But hey, it tracks steps, that’s something, right? Not quite. Turns out the UP is terrible at tracking motion because it considers any motion to be a step. Sit at your desk all day using a computer and mouse? 1,250 steps. Sure, why not. Brush your teeth? 78 steps. Walk down the street? 11 steps. Wait—what? I control-tested my two of my UPs and they were all over the place. I took exactly 100 regular steps and the results were different every time. The first time, the result was 72 tracked steps. The second time, it was 290 (WTF?), third, it was 112. After replacing my first band, the results were similarly awful: 81, 124, 56. I expected it to be a little off, but this is basically garbage data. To be sure this wasn’t caused by wearing the band upside down, I did these tests in both orientations and had similar results. (Comparatively, I remember the FitBit being very accurate, but it does not have the ability to remind you via vibration or wake you up.)
This problem partially extends to sleep as well. The UP uses movement to determine your light versus deep sleep patterns. The problem is that its alarm utilizes this movement to decide when to wake you up in a 30-minute window. For a single person or someone who does not have pets, this might work fine. But when you share a bed with another person and have cats that like to crawl around on you all morning, what this leads to is being woken up within two minutes of that window’s start time. I tried four nights in total to be “smart” alarmed from 9-9:30AM and every time I was buzzed at around 9:02AM. Was it truly a coincidence that I happened to be in light sleep at the start of that window every morning? Based on how insanely tired I felt when it woke me up, I doubt it. A further problem is there is no way to snooze the UP, so if you don’t get up right away, you’d better have a backup alarm.
Now let’s talk about the most serious problem: The failure rate. I purchased the UP in an Apple Store in Los Angeles. I used it for two days and then it failed. I put it in sleep mode one night, and it didn’t wake me up the next morning (fun!). When I tried to switch it back into activity mode, it was dead. Although the light came on, charging it did nothing. I exchanged it at a different Apple Store for another unit. I used it for two days, and again, it failed to wake me up on the third day. I contacted Jawbone to complain and after nearly three weeks, I received my third UP directly from the company. I used it for a day and half, and then it died mid-day. I went to sync it and noticed it was dead. It didn’t respond to being charged at all. That’s three dead Ups in a tiny amount of time. And it turns out I’m not alone. The discussion forums at Jawbone are packed with complaints from other users, some of whom are on their fourth or fifth UP. One user was burned in the middle of the night wearing it. I’ve yet to hear from anyone who has had an UP for more than a few weeks that works. I’m willing to bet the failure rate is close to 90%. Jawbone is willfully selling defective products to customers.
So where does this leave us? Bad software, defective hardware, and relatively useless motion tracking. Lots of missed opportunities and shameful corporate strategy. Jawbone completely missed with the UP, and they need to cease sales immediately. Don’t buy this product.
New personal policy: If you think this movie looks good, we’re no longer friends.
The Getty Center in LA is amazing. So amazing, in fact, we didn’t really even go inside because the view and the architecture is so much fun to look at and take photos of.
Terrific post by Matt Gemmell regarding supporting latest-only versions of iOS. He makes some solid arguments for why you should, including this one about “better customers”:
I think that there’s a correlation between the kind of people who keep their OS updated, and those who are willing to actually pay for software. I don’t have any data to back that up, but it makes sense that someone who’s interested and invested enough in their device to know there’s an update and have applied that update, would be more amenable to investing in a new app or two along the way.
I’ll definitely +1 one this. Again, I can’t prove this with data either, but it sure feels true. People who keep their software up-to-date tend to be savvier, more willing to spend appropriate amounts of money for software, and tend to be invested in the quality of their OS and application experience.
Matt also counters some of the common complaints used as an excuse to support ancient versions, including an excellent point about entitlement:
Bullshit. Customers are entitled to some updates, based on a mostly subjective combination of factors […]. If your app costs $500, your customers probably have a right to expect a year or more of updates, and certainly through to the next major release version (with an upgrade discount). If your app costs $2, anything you provide after purchase (other than fixes for particular egregious bugs) is essentially a courtesy. How mercenary and awful of me to say, but there you have it: Customers are not entitled to updates unconditionally.
And dealing with existing customers who refuse to upgrade but demand your application’s new version still support them:
To hell with those guys. It’s disproportionately burdensome to support them, they’re a shrinking market, they’re technological luddites, they want new stuff for free, and they’re vocal complainers. Seriously, you want to do nice things for these people? What’s wrong with you?
The whole post is gold and completely inline with how I feel about iOS version support. Be sure to read the updates near the end where Matt also responds to a ridiculous Twitter reply he received.
Anonymous asked:
I currently do a small bit of iOS and Android contract work on the side. I really enjoy it since what I'm working on changes somewhat frequently and I have more control over how I work. I'll be graduating from college in the spring and would like to do contract work full time. Any tips other then simply meeting people and creating great work for clients?
Starting your career going freelance is tricky—you need contacts to get jobs and without having had jobs in the industry, you’re unlikely to have contacts. Because you’re just starting out, you probably have a smaller body of work, which means it will be harder to convince potential clients to work with you. My suggestion would be to take a full-time job at a small studio, if possible. It will give you loads of useful, real-world experience in all the areas that matter for later going freelance: Client and project management, the sales process, billing, and, of course, the actual work. Be sure you find a place where you can really get involved in a lot of aspects of the business and learn as much as you can.
While you’re working, become a part of the community. Write a weblog about your work, talk to other designers, attend conferences (preferably smaller, intimate conferences where you’re not just one of 20,000 people), and build up a network of contacts and friends. They’re going to be priceless when you eventually go out on your own.
It all takes time. It took me nearly 10 years to get where I am today with Karbon, and all of the connections and experience I gained along the way have made it possible for me to continue to do fun projects for awesome clients and work with amazing people. Good luck!
Our friends at Crush + Lovely have just launched Duet, a brand-new iPhone app that brings romance back to one-on-one sharing.
Karbon had the pleasure of helping develop the app alongside a fine team of folks. We’re thrilled to see Duet hit the store—you should check it out.
At some point over the past week, our short film passed the 500,000 plays mark at Vimeo. That’s absolutely amazing. We were blown away by the initial reaction to the film (awards, hundreds of amazing comments and emails), but the fact that we still receive messages from viewers every day is just plain fantastic. We can’t thank you all enough for the support and for telling your friends about Forever’s Not So Long.
