Co. Design is a great site for people who love good design. Some of the stuff they cover would be called “high design” which is sort of like, well, stuff that may be really cool, but also really expensive, and chances are, you probably don’t need it.
This Jasper Morrison Alarm Clock is a clock that looks cool, and probably even has some cool features, and the article suggests that using an iPhone for your alarm clock is silly. I disagree.
I’ve got a pretty nice alarm clock, an old Sony Dream Machine from the mid-1990s, with dual alarms, a nice, big display, and a radio built in. The problem is, it’s on my wife’s side of the bed, and I get up earlier than she does. If I use it as an alarm clock, it will wake her up (not good) and it also requires me to either lean way over her to turn it off (not good) or get out of bed to turn it off (also not good.)
So I actually do have a clock on my side of the bed, but it’s a simple X10 controller and it tells me what time it is. As for an alarm, the iPhone is the best solution for me so far. I don’t use any 3rd party alarm app, as the built-in alarm works fine. I set the volume all the way down at night, and put the phone in silent mode. The phone vibrating is just enough to wake me up and not wake up the wife. The iPhone alarm is also easy to set, and I get up at different times depending on the day of the week, so that’s all preset. Since I also plug my iPhone in to charge it each night, it’s a win-win situation. Any notification apps I use tend to have the concept of “quiet time” and I almost never get messages/interruptions in the middle of the night. It works quite well for me, and I’m typically not the sort of person who uses my phone for everything, as I’ve still got a GPS I prefer to use, as well as an iPod I prefer to use.
I’m interested in what other people do… Do you have an alarm clock, or has your phone taken over that task?