It requires pairing with a phone via Bluetooth(Low Energy). I don't think at this time it is economically feasible to have a phone with data service, touch screen and a juicy battery all in such a small foam factor.
Why does a watch need a touchscreen? What are you touching on your watch?
Digital watches already have a wonderful UI: they're called "buttons", and they're located on the sides of the screen, so you can still see what you're doing while using the thing.
It reminds me of DeusEx2. Before release all the PC gamers lamented the dumbed down circular menu interface developed to accommodate console gamers. Turns out it was just a flat out better/simpler interface in general though.
So while I could see buttons working OK (well, not really, watch buttons have always been real imprecise and difficult for me, but still), simple swipes, taps, and maybe radial or quadrant based options seems like a solid interface to me.
Say someone texts me while I'm using the walking directions. Swipe that stuff away with a flick of the finger similar to WebOS. Much better UI than hitting a button IMO.
I constantly want to touch my Pebble's screen. It's plenty big enough (and could easily be bigger). The buttons are workable but not ideal. With, say, 3-4 menu items on the screen, there's plenty of area for touching them, and it would be a lot faster than hitting the up/down buttons a couple times followed by the select button.
I don't get this "can't see what you're doing" thing at all. Do you not use touchscreen phones? What's your finger doing in front of the thing you're going to touch before you go to touch it?
I recognize I'm in a minority here, but I'd love to see Graffiti [0], the old Palm OS glyph-based input method, come back on smart watches. I could write short text messages in-place on a watchface in Graffiti, or write two-letter shortcuts for different watch displays I want to switch to.
The classic interface for watches is a rotating crown or bezel. The closest modern equivalent would be the circular touch pad on an old style ipod. Why not have a touch sensitive bezel around the outside? Even better would be to make the skin of your arm a touch sensitive surface so that you do not have to cover the screen with your finger.
