Publish at December 16 2019 Updated March 02 2023
"Playing sports": the resolution we make every year and that few of us keep. How can we motivate ourselves and continuously enjoy the fruits of our efforts? Connected objects provide us with answers. They track our pulses, calculate our bone or fat mass, appreciate the evolution of our weight, count our steps, display the calories burned and provide advice and encouragement...
But all these promises have their downside, as the hero of our story testifies!
Connected watches are a hotly contested market, with competitive marketing strategies at play. Apple is the market leader, with 50% of sales in 2018, but Fitbit is a close second and growing rapidly, followed by Samsung and Garmin.
Catastrophe, my connected scale, sorry, my impedance meter is turning red... Nothing escapes it, neither my weight, nor my balance on my two feet, nor my body fat. And since she knows the evolution of these different parameters, she warns me. I have to get my act together! The holidays are coming up, and among the gift ideas that pour into my mailbox every day, connected watches are a big hit. Could this be the solution? I'll give it a try!
Connected to an application, my new watch is a real sports coach. It knows everything about my progress, my tone, my evolution. It can give me the best advice. It even monitors the quality of my sleep and gives me a report when I wake up. And yet, many watches end up in drawers next to pedometers, tamagochis and
and other gadgets that made us want to use them so much... and seem useless
after a few weeks of use.
Will I last more than a few weeks?
We look at the time dozens of times during the day, we consult our cell phone hundreds of times... So the manufacturers of connected watches are getting impatient, how to make the owners of these objects check their pulse thirty times a day and the kilometers they have traveled as soon as they take ten steps? The hope lies in gamification techniques, which is pronounced "gamification" if you're marketing.
My watch tells me about my achievements, but it also lets me know when I'm slightly underperforming. It encourages me to go the extra hundred yards or so to be within the averages I've set for myself. Sometimes I'd like to protest as I would with a real coach: it's raining, I've had a hard day, my pack is heavy. But my watch is deaf to all justifications.
I gradually develop a sense of mastery, of knowing myself, but also the diffuse feeling of being continuously monitored and, gradually, the pleasure of walking gives way to the duty of burning calories. The motivation fades. Walking represents a moment with myself, suitable for a mental stroll or even meditation. If a concern for performance is superimposed and extrinsic motivations take over, the pedestrian I have been for years is tempted to give up!"
The market for connected watches is worth more than 20 billion dollars. There's no way consumers are going to give up these new selfie reflexes. Engagement can be boosted by a home group. The app has located several people who use the same system and are in my more or less distant networks.
The data and results are partly shared. We find out who are the best performers and who is progressing the fastest. A slackening is quickly known and we congratulate each other on our progress. Some of my friends no longer ask me "how are you doing?" when they see me. They already know. They comment on my momentum as if they've become an expert on my health!
As we've said before, there are big appetites in the connected watch market. Fitbit was acquired in November 2019 for $2.1 billion by Google, with all the concerns this may raise about data privacy. Facebook was also in the ranks to buy this company.
The reason for this concern is that these watches collect sensitive information about our dynamism and health status. The information, which we freely agree to share with companies and their partners, is a real asset; even more so than the money we have to pay to buy these pretty goods!"
Illustrations : Frédéric Duriez
Resources
Marine Protais - DNA - Google buys Fitbit - Why do GAFA want to treat us at all costs? - published November 4, 2019 - accessed December 14, 2019
https://www.ladn.eu/tech-a-suivre/data-big-et-smart/google-rachete-fitbit-pourquoi-gafa-nous-soignent/
Wired - Robbie Gonzales - Science says fitness trackers don't work - wear one anyway - published December 25, 2017, accessed December 14, 2019
https://www.wired.com/story/science-says-fitness-trackers-dont-work-wear-one-anyway
Matt.O on Towardsdatascience.com The Gamification of Fitbit - November 10, 2018, accessed December 14, 2019
https://towardsdatascience.com/the-gamification-of-fitbit-how-an-api-provided-the-next-level-of-training-eaf7b267af00
Vikram Biyani (NetApp Inc.)Gregory Corrado (Google Inc.)Stacie Hibino (Samsung)Damian Tompkin (Yahoo Inc.)Chris Wayne (Yahoo Inc.)
The Coming Gamification of Fitness published April 12, 2015, accessed December 14, 2019
https://ikhlaqsidhu.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/fitness-gamification-paper.pdf
The sites of the major players:
Apple: https://www.apple.com/fr/watch/
Garmin: https://www.garmin.com/fr-FR/
Fitbit: https://www.fitbit.com/fr/home
Fitbit Apps: https://www.fitbit.com/fr/app
Samsung : https://www.samsung.com/fr/wearables/
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