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// HAPPENING TODAY
- Internet Slowdown Day.
- Silicon Valley vanity searches of Vanity Fair’s New Establishment list — congrats, bosses.
- IFA, TechCrunch Disrupt SF, CTIA and Intel Developer Forum.
- Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker is pondering a letter from Cisco, IBM and others warning her against reclassifying the Internet as a public utility.
One More Thing … You Have to Charge It Every Day
“Bono really should ask Tim Cook about the Apple Watch’s battery life.” I tweeted that yesterday during the U2 frontman’s awkward vaudeville routine with Cook onstage Tuesday at Apple’s biggest event in years. We were clearly moments away from its end and we hadn’t been told how long the company’s first wearable will run on a single charge. Expected battery life was a glaring omission in an otherwise impressive parade of features and specs. And after ignoring it completely during the Apple Watch’s onstage debut, the company stalwartly refused comment on it during the device demos that followed.
There’s a good reason for that. Sources tell me that Apple isn’t yet happy with the watch’s battery life, which isn’t going to break any industry standards. “It’s about a day right now,” said one, adding that Apple is working on various modifications ahead of the device’s 2015 launch to improve it. Reached for comment, Apple spokeswoman Nat Kerris declined to provide an estimate on expected battery life, but said the company expects users will charge their Apple Watches once daily. “There’s a lot of new technology packed into Apple Watch and we think people will love using it throughout the day,” Kerris said. “We anticipate that people will charge nightly which is why we designed an innovative charging solution that combines our MagSafe technology and inductive charging.”
And Soil Shorts at Fitbit, Jawbone, Samsung and Motorola
Apple CEO Tim Cook on Apple Watch in an all-hands memo to employees: “This is a product which will change what people expect from wearable technology.”
BABA Booey
Alibaba kicked off the road show for its initial public offering on Monday, and its IPO order book is already full up. Reuters says the Chinese internet giant has collected enough orders to cover the entire deal, though it’s not clear where they fall in its $60-$66 per share price range. Regardless, Alibaba’s IPO is expected to be among the largest tech offerings ever, topping out at up to $21.1 billion, topping Facebook’s $16 billion listing in 2012 as the largest-ever technology IPO.
Apple Comms Breathing Easier Today
And not just because it pulled off the company’s biggest event in years yesterday. Looks like former White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, who was being considered for the top communications job at Apple, will not be moving to Cupertino anytime soon. He’s joining CNN as a political commentator.
Correction: Making a Mockery of Money and Privacy
Leonid Bershidsky, Bloomberg View: “I know what Facebook is about: Making a mockery of money.”
So the Mixed English/Chinese Soundtrack Wasn’t a Feature?
Dan Rayburn, Streaming Media Blog: “Apple’s live stream of the unveiling of the iPhone 6 and Watch was a disaster … right from the start, with many users like myself having problems trying to watch the event. Apple simply didn’t provision and plan for the event properly.”
That 8-Digit Calculator Is a Godsend Come Budget Time
Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.) on the Apple Watch: “I’ve gotten pretty good life out of my Casio watch, to be honest. It tells me the time and even beeps on the hour. What more could you need?”
“Maybe” Here Being a Euphemism for “Obviously”
Path founder Dave Morin on Path: “Did the experiment fail? Maybe.”
Off Topic
Mutant giant spider dog and shitty New Yorker cartoon captions.
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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.
