Gesture Watch from Georgia Tech

Here is another aspiring wannabee HCI star at the gesture firmament: the gesture watch.

Activate! The Gesture Watch has five infrared sensors, four of which sense any hand motion that occurs above the watch. If the user is wearing the watch on his left hand, he can move his right hand over the watch in an up or down, left or right, or circular motion. Different combinations of these movements communicate an action to the watch. (source)

Why do such applications receive so much credit in the various tech news sites and magazines? The only thing happening is that a couple of engineers have put together a neat device that can do a trick. It's not commercially available, there are no real users yet, there is no positive market feedback. There is only a vague promise of solving a vague problem. Discovery Channel: It won’t be long now before all electronic devices go "nano," and shrink to the size of frosted mini wheat square. You won’t know whether to turn it on or eat it. But the real question is: How do you press those teeny buttons? I know that writing an opening line can be hard, but this one has fallen straight from the sky on the willing imagination of Tracy Staedter (the reporter in question). Did she not notice the big display on the iPhone? People may not want tiny devices at all, because they need displays. And yes, they may also require decent buttons from their devices. In other words, the premises of the promises are promiscuous (sorry, couldn't resist); reporters are trading in their objective reflection for a nice soundbite.