FitBit is a small, wearable device that monitors and tracks your activity and wirelessly syncs to a computer so that you can see how active you have been throughout the day or even when sleeping. According to their website, FitBit lets you ask, and answer, questions such as:

• Did I get enough exercise today?
  
• How many calories did I burn?
  
• Am I getting good quality sleep?
  
• How many steps and miles did I walk today?
  

An image of it is shown below.

FitBit was one of the companies that presented at the TechCrunch 50 conference held in Sepotember '08. The following is the conference blurb about FitBit:

Fitbit inspires people to exercise more, eat better and live a healthier lifestyle. The company is developing an ultra-compact wireless wearable sensor, called the Fitbit Tracker, that automatically tracks data about a person's activities, such as calories burned, sleep quality, steps and distance.

The Fitbit Tracker collects activity data automatically while it is worn by the user all day. The collected data is wirelessly uploaded to a website where the wearer can see their data and track their progress toward personal goals. The website provides a motivational interface where users can share their progress, compare themselves against similar people and compete against their friends, family and co-workers. At the website, users can also manually log nutrition, weight and other health information in order to gain a complete picture of their health.

Fitbit makes it easy to achieve a healthy lifestyle by automating the collection of health data and providing a motivating and entertaining user interface.

Technology Effects

Some of the possible technology effects of this system are:

• Presence - when is the device present on a person and active
  
• Location - where is the device active? how mobile is it?
  
• Sensitivity - what can/does the device record as activity
• Selectivity - can the device distinguish between different types of activity?
  
• Universality - does the device cover all activity situations? what is the 'level' of the data
  
• Continuity - does the device cover all time spans? what is the time granularity?
  
• Data Access - how can the data be accessed? when, where?
  
• Visibility - what does the data show you? how visible and clear are the various activities?
  
• Connection - who can the data be shared with? what connections can be created and maintained?
  
• Integration - how difficult is it to switch between and/or manage the different 'modes' of device and data activity?
  

This preliminary set of effects are what people respond to with regards to personal activity. It is interesting to consider whether each one of us has our own personal 'activity meter' and what may be the nature of that meter. Many, if not most, people, if asked, could give an account of their daily or weekly activity level. Knowing what we do about human nature, the accuracy of such accounts would be suspect.

Community Personas

What are the different personas that are relevant to personal activity, health and wellness. The first thing to note is that by expanding the context from 'exercise' to 'activity' the universe of 'relevance' goes up by at least an order of magnitude. Exercise is an episodic (and for most people a problematic) event whereas activity is universal. Here are some possible activity personas:

• Fitness Conscious - focused on exercise and overall fitness
  
• Slacker - not interested in fitness, minimally motivated by health and wellness issues
  
• Health Concerned - knows there are issues related to activity and health but exercise and diet are too difficult
  
• Health Guardian - oversees someone elses activity and how it relates to health (e.g. parent)
  
• Casual Participant - activity and health not a top concern. has an interest if it's not too much work
  
• Active Ignorer - doesn't want to be bothered with any health or wellness issues. actively seeks non-healthy activities
  
• Health Confident - few activity or health concerns. feels confident in own fitness and health levels
  

These postulated activity personas represent the various motivations, both positive and negative, people have with regards to knowing and understanding personal activity and its relevance to health and/or other aspects of peoples lives.

URU Assessment

The uniqueness, relevance and ubiquity levels of the FitBit can be speculated for each of the hypothetical personas listed above.

• For the Fitness Conscious who already has and uses a number of hi-tech monitoring devices, the uniqueness would be relatively low. The relevance is high (this is a top concern)and the ubiquity would also be high since these personas would be motivated to use the device on a regular and continuous basis
• For the Slacker, the uniqueness could be relatively high (hey, no effort) whereas the relevance and ubiquity would be low
• The Health Concerned would find the FitBit to have high uniqueness, medium relevance (it only covers one aspect of health) and relatively high ubiquity.
• The Health Guardian will see high uniqueness (can now see the activity of your children) high relevance, and high ubiquity
• The Casual Participant will see Fitbit as having moderate uniqueness (alternatives require to omuch effort)), moderate relevance (casual curiosity) and moderate ubiquity.
• The Active Ignorer will be low in all three of Uniqueness, Relevance and Ubiquity
• Health Confident personas will have high uniqueness, high relevance and high ubiquity due to their desire to confirm their health belief

As can be seen from this brief analysis, the Fitbit satisfies many of the unmet needs and desires people have with respect to their health, but even more, with respect to their activitly levels. Many people believe, rightly or wrongly, that even if they do not specifically exercise, their daily (and nightly) activity does count and the FitBit gives them an opportunity to see where they are.

Opinion and Outlook

The FitBit will be a highly successful product. Its key innovation is to change health attention from exercise to activity. With the capability of 24/7 monitoring, even during sleep, the FitBit provides a capability that has previously not been available - being able to see what and when you are active and, potentially, changing your behavior in the small, incremental ways that are easier to implement and maintain. With the additionally capability to easily see and share this information, plus the social aspects of sharing and competing with freinds, the FitBit presents the possibility of really changing people's behaviors in the ways that has been shown to be effective - incremental, continuous and cognitively committed.

Overall prognosis