I still use a pebble 2 se, and notably the pairing of music controls and shortcuts is amazing. Without having to look at the screen, sleeves still covering the device, you can:

- Hit the back button a couple times to make sure I'm back on the watchface/home screen

- Hold down a button to shortcut into an app (e.g. music controls, music boss)

- Play/pause, control volume, go forwards/backwards (or 30sec skip in some podcast apps).

Hoping I can continue to use the device. Have any competitors come close in matching pebble's button UX?

Yeah I had press and hold on the lower button to launch music app, then IIRC the same button was skip track (or hold to fast forward).

I like my Apple Watch too, but I miss the hardware buttons and being able to do stuff without looking at it.

Apple's take is that I should talk to Siri instead of using buttons, but the 8 year wait for them to support 3rd party audio apps kept me from building any habits with that. I'll probably get used to it.

Such a loss.

I wonder how technology development would be different if the people designing it lived somewhere with weather