SPOT Watch So, for the first time in over a decade I'm wearing a digital watch today. It feels a little strange not having the hands and needing to work out the time... and that extra thrill of knowing that this watch is accurate and the day is right!

This is no ordinary watch that just tells the time, oh no... that would never be enough to get me to put my real watch on the shelf even for a day!

This is an MSNDirect powered watch feeding news, weather and traffic reports to my wrist (as well as syncing to my calendar and letting people send me alerts from Windows Live Messenger).

Now this watch isn't exactly cutting edge but it got some nice reviews when it was new - there are some much nicer models available now.

It's fairly comfortable (though my wrist is probably as thin as you'd want to use this with) and it's fun having the data on your wrist. Downside is that it's got a fairly unusual charger connection so it's one more hunk of junk to lug around when traveling (apparently there is a USB charger but I can't find anything about it)

I'm not totally convinced of the value of a one-way device... you'd end up needing to carry a PDA or smartphone to push information back (new appointments etc) and it would be nice to be able to sync contact info to the device as well (though I guess there's a limit to the internal memory!)

I'm going to have a hunt around and see what third party apps exist beyond the MSNDirect services (PopLogix have a couple, I wonder if there are more). SpotStop looks like a good place to hang out for some info.