Take a look at the above watch I bought last week for £50. It’s a 1972 Avia Swissonic which is an electric watch and which was arguably right at the cutting edge of technology at the time. Electric watches were pre-quartz and they were designed to offer an alternative to mechanical timepieces. A battery and a tuning fork were used to keep time, and there are many available today in a variety of impressive 1970’s styling.

I say again, take a look at it and if you think hard you may notice a ‘huge’ design flaw in the dial.

The new Twelve South HiRise 3 looks impressive as well. It has the ability to charge an iPhone via MagSafe, an Apple Watch and a set of AirPods. It is $99.99 and can only charge an iPhone up to 10 watts, the Apple Watch cannot work in Nightstand mode and if you have a case on your iPhone it won’t connect properly. Jeez! That is so poor from a company that has historically made excellent products. A review highlighting the issues is here.

Oh yes, the watch. Look at the number of markers between the 5 minute markers. There are 3.

How on earth can you set the time accurately and, even worse, how can you tell the time accurately on this watch which was marketed as being a much more accurate timepiece for the modern generation? That’s appalling design for the sake of design while forgetting the actual functionality, and something that thankfully Apple rarely does.

Have you any examples of terrible design on products you own?

UPDATE: Neil may have solved the Watch conundrum- ‘Am I being dense? On the electric watch, I wonder if one is supposed to use the gaps between the markings, rather than the markings, to count the minutes?’