If Facebook is building an Apple Watch killer, the only thing that’ll die is privacy

Facebook and Apple are at loggerheads these days which is great for two reason: 1) “loggerheads” is just a delightful word and 2) Facebook is just awful. Absolutely terrible.

Just perennially wrong and gross.

The Macalope hopes he’s being clear about his feeling about Facebook. Please DM him if you require further clarification.

(DISCLAIMER: do not DM the Macalope.)

Anyway, guess what Facebook’s working on now!

“Facebook plans first smartwatch for next summer with two cameras, heart rate monitor.”

What could go wrong?

Other than everything, the Macalope means.

Remember the magic moment when we all stood together and said “NO!” to Google Glass? We’re gonna need another one of those moments in about a year.

Facebook is taking a novel approach to its first smartwatch, which the company hasn’t confirmed publicly but currently plans to debut next summer.

So, hang on a second. If the Macalope were to look at the calendar on the wall, he’d see that it’s 1999 because he hasn’t had a wall calendar for at least 20 years. But in reality, it’s 2021. Way back in 2014, if you recall, people were running around saying (Wall Street analysts are technically people and not fish as previously believed by zoologists) that Apple would “disappear” within 60 days if it didn’t produce a smartwatch forthwith. And now eight years later Facebook can just roll in with a smartwatch and people are like “Yep, good timing.”?

Okay, cool.

IDG

Well, welcome to the party, Facebook. Next year. Certainly there’s no problem with strapping on a constant monitoring device sold by a famously anti-privacy company. No, none at all. Wouldn’t worry about it.

It’s part of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s plan to build more consumer devices that circumvent Apple and Google…

Wonder why he’d want to do that!

Employees have recently discussed pricing the device at roughly $400, but the price point could change.

Wow, you mean people can pay just as much as they’d pay for an Apple Watch and the privacy intrusion is thrown in for free?! Where do we sign up?! What a fantastic deal!

The fact that some people will actually end up buying this crime against personal privacy is already making the Macalope angry and it’s not even out for another 12 months at least. He’d better pace himself.

While plotting to take pictures of everything it possibly can from your wrist, Facebook is simultaneously trotting out Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri to whine and complain about how bad Apple is.

In an interview with CNBC, Mosseri highlighted the fact that Instagram would charge less than the 30% cut that competitors like Apple take on digital transactions.

Sure, you can just make up the difference by selling everyone’s information. The end user, the developer, the guy who lives next to the developer, the woman who met the end user once at a conference, some monkeys the developer saw at the zoo… everyone!

The Macalope is no fan of the App Store rules but Facebook can absolutely pound sand on criticizing Apple over… well, anything, really. Of just even talking in general. The company’s “Look over there!” shenanigans after getting repeatedly caught shoveling peoples’ personal information to anyone willing to pay for it and misinformation back into everyone’s feeds are comically, tragically and nauseatingly ham-fisted.

from Macworld.com https://ift.tt/3xkyh16