If you don't have an Apple Watch and you are wondering what folks use it for, or if you do own one and you want to see how your own usage compares to others, then you should check out the results of iMore's first survey of Apple Watch users. Over 8,000 folks responded (including me), making this the largest survey of its kind so far. Respondents said that the best features of the Apple Watch are notifications, timekeeping, health and communications — which are also the four functions that are most useful to me. The most popular faces are the Utility and the Modular. (I myself use the Modular face because it has space for lots of complications, such as an indication of my next appointment, the date, and my activity circles.) And the most used apps are Dark Sky, Overcast, 1Password, Fantastical and Twitter. (I use the first four quite a bit; I use Twitterific instead of Twitter.) When watchOS 2.0 comes out — and it will be out soon, probably this month — the Apple Watch will be even more useful, with native apps and third-party complication support. I hope that iMore does a similar survey next year because it will be interesting to see what changes over time. There are not many apps that I'm still using today that I used with my first iPhone, although there are a few as I noted in this post last year, so I'm sure that Apple Watch usage will also change in future years. And now, the news of note from the past week:
- Florida attorney Katie Floyd reviews the Ring doorbell, an Internet-connected doorbell that lets you use your iPhone to see who is at the front door.
- Katie Floyd also checked out the Spigen Apple Watch Night Stand that I reviewed a few weeks ago. She likes it too, and she was able to test the pad that makes the stand work with the 38mm version of the Apple Watch, which works well for her.
- New York attorney Neil Squillante of TechnoLawyer reviews Adobe Acrobat DC, a service that stores your PDFs in the cloud so that you can access them on both your computer and iPad.
- California attorney David Sparks talks about the rumors of a new Apple TV next week.
- Bellefield makes iTimeKeep, an app that you can use to track your billable hours. This week, Bellefield announced that you will soon be able to enter your time using an Apple Watch, which could be useful when you are on-the-go and want to quickly dictate time to your Apple Watch before you forget it. Here is a YouTube video showing how it will work.
- The Expert Institute nominated iPhone J.D. for its list of best legal blogs, and is now running a contest to see which blogs get the most votes. If you want to vote for iPhone J.D., click here and then click the Vote button. It only takes about a second to do so; there is no registration required.
- Glenn Fleishmann of Macworld shows you how you can print a single page from a multi-page document on an iPhone or iPad by using an app from your printer's manufacturer.
- Mike Murphy reports, in an article for Quartz, on the most-downloaded apps of all time, according to App Annie. The top app is Facebook; the top game is Candy Crush Saga.
- As noted above, one of the products that Apple is expected to update next week is the Apple TV. Luke Dormehl of Cult of Mac takes a walk down memory land to look at Apple's prior TV-related devices. He actually left out one that I would have put on that list: the Apple Pippin, sold in the mid-1990s.
- Apple is also expected to introduce a new iPhone next week. Should you change your carrier when you get a new phone? Brian Chen of the New York Times has advice on choosing the best smartphone plan.
- Christina Warren of Mashable explains why the Maps app will be better in iOS 9, which I expect Apple to release this month.
- Jason Snell of Six Colors reports that you can now use the Amazon Instant Video app to download certain movies and TV shows, which means that you can watching streaming video even when you cannot stream — such as when you are on a plane. I wish that Netflix would offer this feature.
- Caitlin McGarry of Macworld reviews products that you can use with an iPhone while you run: the Griffin LightRunner armband, the Sensoria Smart Bra, and the MilestonePod.
- Geoffery Fowler of the Wall Street Journal reviews the DxO, an external camera for the iPhone that has amazing quality, but is expensive.
- If you want a link bracelet for the Apple Watch but don't want to spend $449 to get the Apple version, you might be interested in third party link bracelets. Abdel Ibrahim of WatchAware reviews the HappyCell link bracelet which you can buy on Amazon for only $80. At this point, however, I encourage you to wait on buying third-party bands. Apple will soon be certifying third-party bands, giving the manufacturers Apple-made parts to connect those bands to the watch, so I would wait a little longer to see what the Apple-approved third party market looks like before spending money on another band.
- Steve Sande of Apple World Today explains why Shazam is his favorite Apple Watch app.
- Tony Romm of Politco discusses Apple's lobbying efforts in Washington, DC.
- Ben Patterson of PCWorld discusses useful gestures on the iPad.
- This is not related to the iPhone or iPad, but it is tech-related and something fun to do with your kids this Labor day weekend. Next year, the InSight lander will be sent to Mars, and if you sign up by September 8, your name can be etched on a silicon chip that will be affixed to the lander. Click here to sign up.
- And finally, starting today, you can pre-order from Sphero (the manufacturer) and places like Amazon a $150 iPhone/iPad accessory that just may be the hottest toy this holiday season: the BB-8 Droid. It is a miniature version of the droid that will star in the next Star Wars movie this December, and it looks really fun. It's like a remote control car with personality. Select members of the press were given review units, and the embargo lifted on their reviews yesterday, so there are lots of great videos showing the BB-8 in action, including this one from Geoffrey Fowler of the Wall Street Journal, this one from Daniel Howley of Yahoo Tech, and even this one from Tina Nguyen who put the cute BB-8 in a room full of even cuter puppies. But my favorite video is the one from Sphero itself: