Apple Watches and Electric Cars

The Mechanical Parallel

Apple’s marvel of miniature electronics, the Apple Watch, has become an indispensable part of my day and points the way to a future when smartphones offload various functions to satellite devices. But to watch purists, this vision of the future is a cold one. In a piece for Business Insider, Dennis Green writes about how Swiss watch maker H. Moser & Cie has crafted a mechanical watch that mimics Apple’s watch.

More than anything I’ve heard, listening to mechanical watch fans talk about smart watches describes how driving enthusiasts feel about electric cars.

Inside, there's no gadgets or gizmos, just a HMC 324 fully mechanical movement. It's visible from the rear, where instead of a heart rate monitor there is a beautiful window into the movement (known in watch enthusiast circles as a "city").

Moser built this watch as a response to the "cold electronics of connected watches" and says it "presents the soul of mechanical watchmaking." – Dennis Green, Business Insider

There seems to be an odd parallel between watches and automobiles. Both have mechanical origins and a die-hard fan base that clings to the moving harmony of intricately assembled machinery. Granted, cars have become rolling platforms of electronics these days, but you can’t deny the long love affair that enthusiasts have had with the gasoline engine.