I’m not going to disagree with you on the e-waste issue. I think every effort should be made to reduce e-waste, and smart watches are definitely e-waste.

I’m saying the uncomfortable truth is that smart watches currently have the following constraint. User-replaceable battery, acceptable size and water resistance, smart watch features; you can pick two. I’m not saying that’s okay, I’m saying that’s physics.

Proof that quartz watches cannot reasonably do it has no bearing on if smart watches can. Quartz watches don’t have a screen, they don’y have smart watch features (radios, etc). A battery in a quartz watch is a fraction of the power capacity of that in a smart watch. Hell, the entire movement of a quartz watch is smaller than just the battery in a smart watch. You cannot compare the two.

You can make the argument that smart watches should have user replaceable batteries. I agree they should. You can think that we can accomplish all three things I mentioned above now, and while I think that’s a nice goal, I don’t think we are there yet.

Proof that user replaceable is not currently feasible? The batteries in the Apple Watch aren’t even Apple replaceable; if you get a battery “replacement”, they send you a new watch. One would hope Apple recycles the old watches in a responsible manner.