I'm not a huge fan of inPulse - not because of what they do, which I think is awesome, but because of their size - if I could get the watch of my preference (random example, but here's the kind of watch I personally like http://s7ondemand4.scene7.com/is/image/Signet/8349614?$detai... ) with a few of these features, such as vibration in patterns to show the difference between a call, an SMS, an email... then I'd jump all over it.
As to the screen, I can see many people in the near future being sold on this - hell, it's a cool thing in principle, as a kid my two favourite watches (one of which I had), were one that was a calculator (http://retrothing.typepad.com/.a/6a00d83452989a69e201156f357...) and one that was a TV remote (http://www.calculatorwatch.net/wp-content/uploads/Digital-ca...), and many of my friends thought they were awesome too. Personally I'm quite happy taking my phone out to actually read stuff - though on a small watch a display for calls would be great if/when using a wireless headset.
".. vibration in patterns to show the difference between a call, an SMS, an email"
This is genius. Why doesn't my phone do this now? Sure, I have different audible tones for reminders/sms/email/calls but most of the time my phone is in vibrate-only.
I think we will end up with watches similar to those you describe. I imagine they'll have more functions than alerting you though. A device in constant contact with the skin could likely do a whole bunch of health monitoring.
By default, iPhones vibrate once for emails, twice for texts.
Through the accessibility settings, you can set completely custom vibrations for each of the contacts in your address book (e.g. you could make morse code of each of their names)
Maybe better for people with clothes that hold phones tighter against their skin (?) or for owners of other phones (I'm a blackberry man), but personally I often don't notice vibrations in my pocket, I definitely wouldn't notice patterns. Whereas on the wrist it can be quieter (no more BZZZZZ "oh look, my phone's on silent haha") and gentler, yet more noticeable.
I wrote a Python script for my Nokia N900 that vibrated the text of a SMS in Morse code. It was an interesting idea but only lasted a day as I don't know More code well at all.
Ye olde BlackBerry would let you set custom vibration patterns per-app. It's technically possible on Android too, but most apps don't take advantage of it (including the built-in apps, negating the usefulness of such a thing)
As to the screen, I can see many people in the near future being sold on this - hell, it's a cool thing in principle, as a kid my two favourite watches (one of which I had), were one that was a calculator (http://retrothing.typepad.com/.a/6a00d83452989a69e201156f357...) and one that was a TV remote (http://www.calculatorwatch.net/wp-content/uploads/Digital-ca...), and many of my friends thought they were awesome too. Personally I'm quite happy taking my phone out to actually read stuff - though on a small watch a display for calls would be great if/when using a wireless headset.