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Will.i.am links with 7digital, reveals wearable wristphone
By Aly Barchi | Published on Friday 17 October 2014
7digital has entered into a partnership with the most technologically-advanced popstar on the planet – Will.i.am – the first offshoot of which is an involvement in ‘the Puls’, the new ‘wearable wrist device’ that i.am revealed to the world this week as an alternative to the smartphone. Hear that, smartphone-makers? Your time is over. OVER.
Actually, you may remember that Will.i.am first showed off his new gadget earlier this year, when he ‘accidentally’ received a call on it from Cheryl Cole during a live broadcast of ‘The Voice’. Hopefully it now works a bit better and accidental calls have been stopped.
7digital provides the in-built music streaming service on the new(ish) gadget, which is watch-like in appearance (if not in its mechanism, which is waaaaaaaaay more complicated). So it looks like a watch but acts like a smartphone, in that it makes calls and connects to the internet and all that. It also has a ‘mood sensor’, a pedometer, and a Siri-style voice-activated assistant inside it named Aneeda. As in, “Hey, robot slave. Aneeda order a pizza while I’m driving because I’m a lazy, impatient oaf”. Kinda like that.
On 7digital’s part, the collaboration with i.am sees the digital-music-platform-provider move another step away from the white label download stores it is probably best known for, and more into the streaming content space. All part, says 7digital CEO Simon Cole, of the “massive change going on in digital music as new streaming models replace the buy-to-own downloading model”.
Adds Cole: “Many of these, like the service launched last night by Will.i.am, will be designed for ease of use on mobile and wearable devices. These services require the technology platform and expertise in both radio and streamed music that 7digital has at its core”.
But wait, slow down, can I just scroll back to Will.i.am and his Puls for a hot minute? “First off this is not a watch, by any means”, said i.am whilst explaining the “cuff” at this year’s Dreamforce tech convention on Wednesday. “It should be totally different kind of device in how you utilise it, you should still be able to communicate when you’re truly mobile. When I’m at the gym, I don’t want to have to strap something to my arm, I don’t want to worry about cords while I’m jump-roping”.
Yes, putting something on your arm does seem like a great solution to the problem of having to put things on your arm. So it’s a good thing Will’s gone and invented this new device then, isn’t it? A great thing.
The Puls, which doesn’t have any kind of price point attached to it so far, will hit the shops in time for wealthy idiots who don’t mind wearing a giant black shiny blob on their wrists to get one for Christmas. Meanwhile this is a clip in which Will mimes skipping, driving, and sheds light on what it’s like to finally make his digital dreams a reality.
