Not really, it's pretty obvious they are checking their watch to see if they have a notification. To me it's exactly the same as pulling your phone out since people have been using phones as watches for some time. It interrupts the conversation and it is rude.
I'm pretty sure asking for references from provided references and contacting them without getting permission from the applicant is illegal. Also most people would feel there was a serious invasion of privacy I think.
I got one just for surfing the web in the living room for the most part, doing a little bit of coding sometimes, and taking it to meetup groups. There is an app called Caret which satisfies my editor needs. Anyways, I'm pretty satisfied with it and it wasn't very expensive.
I'm also interested in how this works. I would imagine they would need to use a webservice to get the actual exchange rate at the time of the order processing to give you an exact amount.
I think math can be taught much more effectively to young children through programming. It gives them a direct and useful application of what they learn in math which could motivate them a lot more.