Comment by AdamJacobMuller | Hacker News Reader

Comment by AdamJacobMuller | Hacker News Reader

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AdamJacobMuller

I agree it's unlikely, but, not for technical reasons.

Iridium would work fine for this if you limit it to iMessage/SMS and anything else low-bandwidth (I would imagine they add 911/SOS support too).

I have a Garmin InReach which operates on Iridium, it's a 5+ year-old-device which works fine with Iridium in very challenging conditions and isn't very much larger than an iPhone.

Considering (some of) the commercial side of this, I strongly suspect the Iridium network has more than enough capacity for such a plan and Iridium could easily support it technically and they could work out some reasonable commercial terms with Apple for this. If Iridium doesn't want to work with Apple the company could surely be acquired for effectively pocket change by Apple and if they did release such hardware and charge a monthly subscription for "100% global coverage" it could be pretty quickly profitable.

But, with all of that said, I'm really not sure why Apple would want to do this. Like I said, I have an InReach, I'm commonly in areas with no cell service and so for me this would be a clear win and I would love it, but, I suspect I'm squarely in the minority.

I dunno how much of a minority you're in.

If I could just by an iPhone13 and not have to also have an inreach, that would sell me on it.

That's not a massive market segment for sure, but I know plenty of folks living in vans in southern Utah who likely would do the same; so there is an identifable market even if its small.

Small anecdote, I saw a girl’s life get saved by someone being smart enough to have an in-reach on them. Snowmobiling accident, got a helo to pick her out of the Idaho backcountry. No doubt in my mind she would be dead or severely disabled had it not been used to contact help.

Instant buy if they built iridium into an iPhone for emergency use… also… if they do that, invest in helicopter and life flight medical companies.

This year will be year 3 of me learning to ski. 65 days over the last two years. I really, really want to be in the back country.

Thankfully Utah's avalanche center does post mortem YT videos, cause damn that really tempers my drive to get out there.

Snow is so freekin' dangerous.

There is a long discussion on moutainproject about what folks carry in their first aid kits... TBH, given that "stabilize for definitive care" is pretty much the limit of what I can actually do, anything that decreases that time by any amount is probably the best first aid.

I can easily see how this would be much cheaper and better than inreach and similar, even at the low-end of the capabilities.

It's usually too late by the time help arrives in an avalanche scenario. If something happens you could have about 15 minutes to rescue your partner(s). You must NOT go alone. Get a course in snow rescue, find experienced people and go with them. Be alert. Always carry a basic avalanche rescue kit: a modern beacon, a probe and a shovel.

And, if you must, you could get a Cospas-Sarsat PLB in addition to your avalanche beacon.

If the new phones can deliver near global coverage for SMS/iMesssage texts and findMy services then that is a huge selling point. Tapping into the rescue device market for hikers and backpackers is a huge business opportunity.

> Tapping into the rescue device market for hikers and backpackers is a huge business opportunity.

Would that be even noticeable on Apple's Income statement?

How big is this market?

This is a case where I don’t think it matters how large the market is, but rather the perception of how valuable the bullet point is.

Apple has been reportedly exploring the "extreme sports" market recently.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-03-26/apple-con...

It is not that Apple isn't able to sell crap people don't really need. It is about creating the desire. Some others like the fact their phone cannot be located at will... I fear that is the smaller crowd. Sexy and smart, but small.

But it's still a somewhat larger device dedicated to a single function.

For me, I'm not sure I'd want inReach-type capability in my phone if it was another monthly subscription fee. I'd prefer a separate extremely rugged device given that, when I might really need it, there's a decent chance I'm in really crappy weather, have gloves on, my face covered, etc. Who wants to be fiddling with their phone under those conditions?

The problem with any "second device" is that it needs to be with you and charged up when you need it. My phone fits the bill already, so adding a fallback for ubiquitous basic connectivity would be a win.

The InReach has some advantage here too.

When off, the battery seems to last "effectively forever" and when on it has "several days" of battery life even when doing constant communication with a satellite for location updates.

The most important use cases for the InReach are pretty specific though. I'm not likely to be strolling down the frozen food aisle in the local grocery store and suddenly wish I had my InReach on me. Sure, backup iMessage capability when I'm out of cell phone service range would be nice. But I'm not going to pay the amount that Garmin charges for that capability. (Though some people perhaps would if they routinely go places with no service.)

You might not even need to. If they put it in the Apple One Subscription , they’ve already won.

Well, sure. Apple One is already essentially a no-brainer for me once my "free" Apple TV+ expires. If they add more into that, why not?

I don’t think you have to wait. I had some free time left on Apple TV+ when I subscribed to Apple One and then they started crediting me monthly for the value of the TV+ subscription.

Interesting. I'll have to run the numbers.

I have had my iPhone “too cold to work” while snowboarding and “too hot to work” a few hours later hanging out by a fire.

Something people should consider when they read the words “rugged”, it’s not always about cracking/breaking.

InReach is a monthly subscription anyway.

Right. My point was that, if I'm going to pay a monthly satellite subscription fee one way or the other, I'm probably going to go with the separate device that is designed with wilderness situations in mind.

> I have a Garmin InReach

The photo seems to indicate the InReach is 3-4x as thick as an iPhone. I couldn’t find specs. Would you care to share the actual size?

Given the size of my Garmin 64st, I bet that most of that thickness is down case design. Apple sacrifices a lot of durability in the name of making the “thinnest iPhone ever”, while Garmin often goes in the exact opposite direction for fairly obvious reasons.

2.04” x 3.90” x 1.03” (5.17 x 9.90 x 2.61 cm)

It’s chunky. Hard to say how much of that is radio and antenna. And folks in this discussion seem to forget the antenna, which is multiples of iPhone thickness.

https://buy.garmin.com/en-US/US/p/592606#specs

It's chunky, but, it's older and made of plastic vs glass/metal and designed to be more resistant to drops/falls/damage. It's also a 6 year old design, technology has moved on.

My larger point being that I don't find it implausible that it could be done, since, 6-year-old technology was already close.

Cell service can be spotty outside of urban centers. I could imagine some people benefitting without hiking to remote locations.

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