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Comment by drcode | Hacker News Reader

IT'S A F@#&ING KNOB! Just because you're Apple doesn't give you the right to call it a "digital crown".

As your comment rightfully deserves due to language and general non-contribution, you've been down-voted into oblivion. Nevertheless, educating the uninformed is a public service, so here goes: amongst professionals and connoisseurs in the watch industry, the "knob" is called a "crown", so they have every right to call it that; they didn't just make it up.

To defend my position: They're not calling it a "crown", they're calling it a "digital crown", and digital knobs are common place objects that already have a name.

If I build a car with a joystick instead of a steering wheel and call it a "digital steering wheel" everyone would say, "No, somebody invented that already, it's called a 'joystick'"... they would not say "I am going to educate the uninformed and tell them that among car connoisseurs, a joystick is called a steering wheel."

And they would be right. Why? Because the joystick doesn't look the same as a steering wheel, so it's a stretch to call it a digital steering wheel (though you wouldn't exactly be wrong)

The crown on watches and the crown on Apple Watch look the same. It's a crown with digital functionality. Thus, the digital crown.

FWIW, I am surprised to discover that I am having this argument with someone whose work I've read and admire.

Haha it does amaze me that a single sentence criticism on the nomenclature of a detail on an Apple accessory has gotten any attention at all... I guess I shouldn't be surprised in the case of Apple.

Crown is watch nomenclature. Apple would have been ridiculed by the fashion/watch world if they didn't refer to it as a crown.

"Crown" is a watch term. The terminology wasn't invented by Apple.

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