Surprising facts on the state of technology: are wearables really all that?

Let’s talk about that wearable bandwagon

Wearable technology seems to be the latest buzz, but how many people have actually jumped on the bandwagon? Apple’s recently launched smartwatch was the latest addition to wearable tech gadgets. While it drew significant interest, recent research by GlobalWebIndex suggests that most adults are not partaking in the wearable technology trend.

GlobalWebIndex surveyed 170,000 adults, across 32 markets and only 9 percent report owning a smartwatch and a mere 7 percent own smart wristbands. This is in heavy contrast to the 80 percent of adult who own a smartphone.

While smartphone ownership has reached an all-time high, according to the survey, it has yet to overtake the 91 percent of people who current use PCs to access the Internet. A surprising fact of the research: only 47 percent of those surveyed use a tablet. Personally, I would have though tablet use would be more heavy than this figure.

One particularly interesting point in the GWI survey is in regards to VPNs. Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) are increasing in popularity. The rise of restrictive firewalls in some markets has led to their necessity. VPNs allow you to appear on the Internet as if you were somewhere else than your actual location.

Most users are not searching for apps…

According to GWI, 27 percent of survey takers said they had used a VPN at some point. While using a VPN, the most highly accessed service is Google Play. It seems a bit surprising, perhaps, but most of these users are not searching for apps, but rather audio and video gaming content. A close second to Google Play, is the iTunes store.

Mobile Internet use is also on the rise. GWI states that 75 percent of smartphone users are accessing mobile Internet services on their smartphones with the average amount of time spent browsing coming in around 1.85 hours. This is quite an increase from the 40 minutes spend in 2012. Some markets are seeing PCs being replaced by phones, so it makes sense that their mobile devices are seeing more usage.

So what does this mean for you?

This may change the way you develop your content. Pages that display beautifully on a PC, may not do so on mobile devices. With more and more people using Internet on-the-go, it may change the way content is displayed as well as consumed.

Additionally, while wearable technology may be trendy, it doesn’t seem as though everyone is on board (yet), so it may be prudent for developers to wait a bit before taking the plunge into that particular marketplace.

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