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Comment by reaperducer | Hacker News Reader

I do hope that Apple's watch strap system becomes more ubiquitous in the watch world. Oftentimes watches are over-engineered for their 99% use case of casual wear in order to fulfill some fantasy of diving in the Caribbean or scaling Mt. Kilimanjaro, and so therefore many are screwed or fastened in some way that makes adjusting them a pain without tiny little tools and a clean surface.

I agree, but for different reasons. I have several very nice dress watches that I keep for sentimental reasons that I'm not able to wear because the manufacturer used one-off straps for them. The mechanisms still work fine, but I can't wear them because the exact strap for that exact watch is no longer available.

Hey, EU — While you're forcing USB-C on everyone, how about picking a watch band standard, too?

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So, I'm a huge fan of regulation but the problem with over-regulation is that it will stop really fun products from being released in those markets.

Like, imagine a watch that has an inflatable cuff that can take your blood pressure. It may be unsightly, bulky, and very dorky. So maybe it wouldn't fit this new "EU Watch Band Standard" that was imagined for Apple Watch. So a very large company like Apple could lobby the EU to change the law and might even do that with enough lead time so it doesn't delay the product launch. But a small company, kickstarter, etc would be screwed because there's no way they could expect to get the legislators' attention for something like this.

And yes, the legislation could be written with sensible carveouts, but we all know it won't, or they'll either not be comprehensive enough, or they'll be a leaky sieve that lets every shady corporation say "oh yeah there's a standard watchband but our special watch falls under exemption 312(c)." Or you can have a government agency handle "exemption requests" without legislative action, but then the small kickstarter will go through 6 rounds and 18 months of records and documentation requests, if they even bother looking into the process at all and not just saying "oh fuck that."

> imagine

Yes, so imaginative innovations for niche usecases can easily be exempted. The goal would be to enable mainstream mass-market devices to follow the standard. It’s not as complicated as you suggest, and works in almost every industry.

I mean, straight up no. If there is any sort of legislation, regardless of exemptions, time will have to be spent to figure out if the exemption applies, and generally will require some work to either apply for or defend the exemption as part of the development and release process.

This would stifle innovation in the long run. Why bother with this extra work when there are a other variations on the idea that would be quicker to launch?

I rarely see this mentioned, but why don’t people just support laws that expire? You can’t stifle innovation in the long run if the law doesn’t exist in the long run.

I’ve often espoused a law that requires USB-C to charge phones- that expires after 3-5 years. Just enough time to get everyone on the same standard and lock in a little, but not enough to kill innovation when the next big thing happens.

Worst case scenario, wait 3 years… but if it was really bad, the law would get repealed anyways.

This strategy would be great for many fields. Imagine if the world decided to make a law that expires in 3-5 years to require one specific electric car charging port. Or made an expiring law that required ebook sellers to use epub format in 2010 (I’m looking at you, Amazon, with your .mobi format). Or made an expiring law that unified every display cable under HDMI (ignoring patent issues).

I’m not saying that stuff like this should be enshrined in law forever, but a lot of stuff would be a lot easier if it was more socially/politically accepted to pass laws that expire.

Because then laws that people rely on become bargaining chips held hostage when the expiration date comes. And this creates horrible perverse incentives where the more obviously good and uncontroversial the law is, the more valuable it is as a hostage, so the more likely it is to disappear, which is a complete inversion of democracy. Like clean air? Well, give $MY_FACTION a billion billion dollars or it goes away.

This isn't a hypothetical either, you see this in American politics all the damn time with temporary laws and allocations.

Every innovation is niche, until it gets adopted by the mainstream. Many large companies have attempted to create mainstream products which have failed.

You might not be able to get the exact strap, but there are certainly numerous aftermarket straps (from low to high end) you can easily get. The strap is more than likely held in by a spring bar, and the while there are various widths, they are standard widths, ie 20 or 22mm etc… especially any older mechanical watch, will absolutely have the ability to interchange the band. And if it’s not a spring bar but a solid fixed piece of metal, you can use a nato style strap or something similar.

You might not be able to get the exact strap, but there are certainly numerous aftermarket straps (from low to high end) you can easily get.

I've tried, and even brought them to several watch stores and jewelers in Seattle, Houston, and New York with no luck.

The problem isn't the spring bar, it's the shape of the watch where connection is made.

I'm curious, which very nice dress watch manufacturer won't replace the band for you? They went out of business?

> the exact strap for that exact watch is no longer available.

Also too many reaper* nicknames in the thread

You want at a standard watch band? Don't look at the EU, look at... NATO

Really

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