By Sree Sreenivasan
DNAinfo contributing editor
There are, broadly speaking, two kinds of new technology. There are new tech products you understand right away because they improve things you've used for years. Digital music players and electronic readers are examples of this.
Then there are new products that you don't understand because you're convinced there's no need for them right now (or that your life is complicated enough without them). At the moment, 3D television sets fit into this category for me and my family. We have enough trouble keeping track of the remote control, how in the world are we going to keep track of the\ expensive glasses you need to view 3D TV?
So when I heard of a WiFi scale, I figured here's another product I don't need. After all, my wife and I had what we considered to be a sophisticated weighing machine, the kind that remembers each of your most recent recordings via a big "1" button for her and "2" button for me. As long as we pressed, with our big toe, the right button before we stood on the scale, we were able to vaguely track our weight.
But now that we've been using the Withings Connected Body Scale ($159) for some months now, it has changed our routines and shown us a glimpse of how technology is going to continue to evolve.
The machine is, above all, gorgeous. Looking like something Steve Jobs might have designed, it's basically a piece of black glass 12.6 inches x 12.6 inches that's less than 1 inch off the ground. It automatically comes to life when you step on it and shows you your weight (in pounds or kilos), your fat mass and your body mass index. Using your home's WiFi signal, the scale sends these numbers to a secure website where you can track them in multiple ways - as raw numbers, in graphs, comparing them to your goals, etc.
Among the features that beat our old scale: it can track up to eight users automatically - it knows you by your weight; you can provide others, including doctors or personal trainers or nutritionists, access to your data so they can track your progress directly; you can add your data to your online medical records, such as Microsoft HealthVault or Google Health; you can also track your data on your iPhone. It does all this without subscription fees or other costs.
For the truly adventurous (or if you are motivated by public affirmation or humiliation), you can choose to publish your measurements on a public website or send them to Twitter, having your data tweeted each time you step on the scale. Yes, there are people who do this - see examples here.
By now you might also be wondering why it's showing up in a column about the changing media landscape. The reason is that it is a sign of things to come. More and more products in our lives are going to be connected to the Internet, sharing data and information. While a lot of this will be shared in private, secured ways, a lot of it will be open and will help journalists find stories, trends and leads they might not otherwise. Also, aggregate statistics (ie, without being attached to specific people) of all kinds are going to be widely available, providing insights we wouldn't have had before.
You can learn more about the scale at Withings.com and here are some videos from the company's site that show you the scale in action.
What do you think? Would you use such a product? Let me know in the comments or via Twitter @sreenet.
Every week, DNAinfo contributing editor Sree Sreenivasan, a Columbia Journalism School professor, shares his observations about the changing media landscape.
