At Least This Heartbeat-Sensing Smartwatch Is Trying Something Different

The smartwatch era will supposedly begin in earnest on Wednesday with the introduction of Samsung’s Galaxy Gear, its version of the much-ballyhooed concept of a wrist computer. A range of bracelet computers are already being sold, of course, but Slate technology columnist Farhad Manjoo recently compared the current offerings to the MP3 players that existed before the iPod. There’s a revolutionary idea in there, but its potential has yet to be realized.

That doesn’t mean people aren’t trying. The buzziest project was Pebble, which inspired the biggest crowdfunding campaign in history (unless you count the strange story of the Ubuntu Edge). A number of other smartwatch projects have attracted hundreds of thousands of dollars or more in Kickstarter campaigns. The Omate TrueSmart claims to be more independent of smartphones than its competitors, plus it’s waterproof. The Agent is aiming for really long battery life. The Vachen wants to be simpler than other smartwatches, with plans for a new version every 45 days. And the ideas keep coming: Kapture, a project that launched Tuesday, is a watch-like device that constantly records audio—whenever you tap it, it will save the previous 60 seconds of sound.