[Cyclopath]

[JimmyBob]

[Cyclopath]

The Garmin version of this feature is disabled by default and people complain about that. "I bought it because it had the help me in an emergency feature and it doesn't work unless I learn where to find everything in their menu system?"

[neek]

[jinx'sboy]

I got an Apple Watch for Christmas. (and I sometimes have the tech savvy of an Archie Bunker…) Mine went off and began calling 911, a couple weeks after I got it. I was vigorously pounding - up and down - on a piece of ice with a shovel. I figured out how to disable that feature. After calling 911 myself and telling them to disregard…..

[Cyclopath]

My 71 year old mom woke up in the middle of the night to pee. She turned the sink on and gave it a moment for the water to warm up to wash her hands. And then she fell and hit her head, and passed out. Her home flooded. I wish she had had an Apple Watch. Lives have been saved by this feature, last week I heard about a lady having a heart attack who was incapacitated and unable to call for help, but still alive because this feature isn't disabled by default. The genie doesn't usually go back in the bottle. This exists, society needs to come to terms and figure out how to use it.

[neek]

Don't let a few anecdotes mask what this really is: yet another attempt to exploit public resources for private profit. 911 operators are claiming to be flooded with these calls, unable to do their jobs, in some cases delaying responses to actual emergencies. Apple has claimed the feature has "already contributed to saving several lives," which is about as wishy-washy of a statement as you could make. They made the decision in a vacuum, without consulting the agencies that would be affected. They did lab testing, but any responsible company would have set up their own call center to do real-world testing without unintended impact. Apple markets their watch as a gadget that anyone concerned with personal health or safety can't live without, and any success story, regardless of significance or externalities, is marketing material. It's up to the people (i.e. government) to decide what we need to thrive, and there are so many ways we could easily save thousands of lives per year: improve access to healthcare, decrease vehicle size and speeds, reduce pollution. Notice one thing in common with all of these: industry (e.g. pharma, auto, energy) creating artificial demand, consuming public resources, and getting in the way of solutions. Big Tech, including Apple, is no different. If you like their stuff and are lucky enough to be able to afford it, great, go ahead and buy it, but don't step on everyone else. Worried about Grandma falling? Program in family members as emergency contacts and have them make the call. People should be the ones making critical life-or-death decisions, technology should assist. For sure, the ways in which technology can assist have exploded in recent decades/centuries, and I think it's wonderful. But we're starting to get ahead of ourselves, offloading nuanced human reasoning to machines, and it's not going to lead to the utopia some imagine.

[Cyclopath]

[Seventy2002]

The dispatch center supervisor quoted in the NYT article offers a rational solution: “Apple needs to put in their own call center if this is a feature they want.”

[Chief Joseph]

I figured out the solution...don't buy Apple products.

[Cyclopath]

[Cyclopath]