Man, what am
I doin'? Another Fuelband entry? I don't even do
two entries on legitimately cool things that happen in
my life, and I'm RE-pimping a product? Well,
truthfully, I'm not. I'm kinda callin' out the makers
of the product to realize what they have and take over
the world already.
Does that make
sense? Nike is blowin' it on their promotion of this
product. They're relegating it to all the other
athletic gear that no one but athletes care about when
for all intents and purposes this is just a 21st
century watch that tracks time and activity. And it
does it so simply, so well and so subtlely that within
a week of owning it you will start thinking of life
like this:
625 points -
15 mins jogging
475 points -
15 mins shooting hoops
425 points -
15 mins rollerblading
375 points -
15 mins of Dance Central Kinect
250 points -
15 mins walking
200 points -
10 mins sweeping the house
100 points -
100 jumping jacks
075 points -
5 minute shower
075 points -
making the bed
050 points -
game of Fruit Ninja Kinect
050 points -
brushing your teeth
Now, name me an
athlete that gives a shit about that. And the reason
you come up with all of those numbers? You're trying
to fit activity into your life in whatever free time
you have. Often it's at the end of the day trying to
hit your goal before midnight. Which is probably THE
most eye-opening thing about the product:
Who walks at
11:30? Who powerwalks in circles around their house
with their dogs minutes before midnight? When would
you ever be doing jumping jacks at 11:45? Whether you
mean to or not, at some point you will inevitably be
just below your goal with 45 minutes left in the day
and find yourself doing all sorts of active things to
achieve your goal and keep your streak going. This, is
not, for athletes. This is for everyone else. They
need to market this thing in different colors, styles
- they need to license the technology to OTHER watch
companies so people have a fuelpoint metric in their
jewelry. Make it as commonplace as having the
date on your watch along with the time. This is
revolutionary, this is life changing, and even Nike
doesn't seem to grasp that. Remarkably it's just
another athletic gadget along with all their other
gadgets.
So Nike,
I beg you. Think outside your own box. You've
set-up the infrastructure with the fuelband site and
all the geeky fun with graphs and achievements and
motivators...
...now you just
need to get a spokesperson that
ISN'T AN ATHLETE (like the guy typing) and
turn this into a gadget for "everyone".
Do that? And you
will have invented an everyday metric for the human
race. This is a big deal.
