Over at Google I/O last week, one of the interesting but under-reported items on the event floor was the Meta Watch from FOSSIL. The folks over at This Is My Next managed to play with it a bit, and in an age where people are generally shedding wristwatches entirely in favor of phones (which all have clocks on them anyway,) the Meta Watch wants to do something a little differently.

What if, for example, you could check your SMS messages, read them, see how many e-mails you had unread, and more, as well as the time, date, and weather? If your watch were more of a companion device, paired with your smartphone, would a watch be a more attractive device?

That’s FOSSIL’s goal. The two models of Meta Watch pair with your Android phone to deliver relevant information to the watch face, while your watch stays on your wrist and your phone stays in your pocket, away from prying eyes or thieving hands.

Here’s a video of the watch in action, thanks to This Is My Next:

[ Meta Watch Hands-On: The Wristwatch Gets A Second Wind as a Smartphone Companion ]