Agree on every point except sunsetting in 12 months. What are you referencing there? They just this year sunset new OS versions for the Apple Watch 3, which was released in 2017 (the 4 came out in 2018).
This was such a confusing decision. The s3 has been pretty much unusable with how low power it is for a while now. How they kept selling it beyond its useful life is a mystery.
It will still get security updates, but the hardware is a the point of no new support. If you don’t need those features in newer watches it makes a perfect device keep track of kids/elderly who don’t need all the bells and whistles
The devices continue to work the exact same way… apple just does not choose to spend the money adding new features to it (or in more likelihood, testing that new features that require newer hardware do not screw the old device up). The watches still appear in the Watch app etc. If there is a bug to fix (like security), the device/versions will often end up getting out of band updates for even longer.
I have an Apple Watch 3. I will probably buy an Ultra. And I plan to continue using the Apple Watch 3 for a lot of routine wear indefinitely. Probably won't use a lot of apps beyond a watchface and random local walks though.
Do you remember when Garmin made phones? Maybe not, because it was only for a year. They released their flagship Nuvifone with much fanfare (to T-Mobile customers, anyway) in June of 2010. They announced that they were withdrawing from the phone market that October. To be fair, they did release one update after that.