Google, Fitbit, whatever.

A lot of talk recently of Google buying Fitbit and what this means for users' data, how Wear OS will fare, the collaboration between the two companies, the buying price, the market share etc. etc. For me (being an ex-Fitbit user) there is really one focus that matters - please make the damn products better.

Replacing units for free seemed to be a (I'd guess 'necessary' rather than 'chosen' ) strategy for Fitbit. I had mine replaced 3 times: twice when the unit simply stopped working and once when the strap came away (which you couldn't replace separately on my model, surely not a design choice?). The fourth time it went I didn't bother going through the customer-service-explain-problem-get-photo-evidence-get-a-reference-number-wait-for-package-have-a-nice-day cycle again. That all has to have cost Fitbit some serious money if I'm not alone.

Judging by the Trustpilot reviews (72% 'Bad' at time of writing) I'm guessing I'm not and others may feel the same way.

It got to the point where I couldn't hand on heart recommend Fitbit any more. When asked, I pointed friends and family towards cheaper, better devices that had:

a) Vastly superior battery life
b) Faster charging times
c) The option to easily customise
d) reliability i.e. not break down for no apparent reason

The apps to link these to your phone / other devices were not quite as developed as Fitbit (they've improved immensely since) but in terms of priorities, getting the unit functionality right seemed to be higher on the list - a good thing.

The fact that some of these products originated in the far east caused some comments about data and ownership (in light of the Huawei scandal/propaganda/concern/non-event depending on your individual opinion). Valid I guess - now Google will have your Fitbit data to add to their gigantic pool instead. Read into that what you will.
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Whatever Wear OS ends up looking like, whoever owns the data, however the 'transition' takes place, please Google - just make the products better. It may be too late for me but others I'm sure, will thank you for it.