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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.

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Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology? With

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Speaker 1: tech stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hi, everybody,

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Speaker 1: welcome to the podcast. My name is Chris Pollette. I'm

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Speaker 1: an editor here at How Stuff Works, and sitting next

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Speaker 1: to me, as usual, is senior writer Jonathan Strickland. Hey,

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Speaker 1: they're big guy. Hey, you know that's a that's a

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Speaker 1: pretty sensitive spot for a lot of people talking about

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Speaker 1: big Yeah. Of course that's you know, it's the beginning

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Speaker 1: of the year or early in the year, so some

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Speaker 1: people are trying to uh follow through with that new

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Speaker 1: year's resolution and pounds. Yeah, and uh and of course

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Speaker 1: we're we cover text stuff obviously. Um. One of the

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Speaker 1: interesting things about technology isn't supposed to make our lives easier,

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Speaker 1: but one of the drawbacks is that by making our

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Speaker 1: lives easier, we tend to adopt a more sedentary lifestyle.

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Speaker 1: I can't imagine what you would mean. You know, I'm

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Speaker 1: comfortable sitting at my desk for eight hours a day

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Speaker 1: staring at the monitor and then going home and playing

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Speaker 1: four or five hours. If we first unleashed It's funny

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Speaker 1: you had mentioned the Wei. Yeah, yeah, that we actually

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Speaker 1: Nintendo is really good about about tackling this problem. They

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Speaker 1: you know, when they designed the Wei, they came up

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Speaker 1: with an idea that they wanted to, uh, to target

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Speaker 1: this to sort of non traditional gaming communities. When you

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Speaker 1: think about video gamers, you often think about those guys

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Speaker 1: who have the headsets on with the microphone up and

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Speaker 1: they've got the control in their hands. They're leaning forward

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Speaker 1: and they're yelling obscenities into the mic as they gunned

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Speaker 1: down their friends online. And I mean, I know that's

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Speaker 1: how I am. But that would be the Xbox Crew.

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Speaker 1: That would be the Xbox Crew, and I you know

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Speaker 1: what represent But uh, Nintendo decided what they wanted to

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Speaker 1: do was stop competing with those guys and to create

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Speaker 1: a system that appealed to a broader audience. And so

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Speaker 1: that's wherein the we came out. They were like, you

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Speaker 1: know what, we want to concentrate on gameplay. We're not

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Speaker 1: concerned with being the most graphically advanced. We're not concerned

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Speaker 1: with having the best sound. Uh you know, we don't

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Speaker 1: care so much about all of those kind of elements.

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Speaker 1: We want to make a system that's fun for everyone.

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Speaker 1: To play, whether they have been playing video games since

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Speaker 1: they were three or if they're seven years old and

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Speaker 1: had never played a video game before. And they were

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Speaker 1: very successful with the Wii. In fact, it's still hard

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Speaker 1: to find a we sometimes. I mean you go to

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Speaker 1: these sometimes. Yeah, well once in a while you'll run

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Speaker 1: across one, but that's they're pretty rare. Well, they came

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Speaker 1: up with another great idea, which was this wonderful little

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Speaker 1: pad called the we Fit, and it's a it's a

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Speaker 1: combination of this, um, this this pad, what's really kind

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Speaker 1: of a console most uh that hooks up to your

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Speaker 1: we UM that has sensors in it, uh and some

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Speaker 1: exercise software and um and boy did that take off off.

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Speaker 1: As a matter of fact, I own we Fit, so

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Speaker 1: yes it you, Yes, I do. It's tell me that

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Speaker 1: the balance board is pretty cool because, um, when you

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Speaker 1: unwrap it and it requires its own set of batteries

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Speaker 1: and it sinks with the we using Bluetooth. Um and uh,

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Speaker 1: it's really kind of funny because what I didn't realize

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Speaker 1: when I first, you know, pulled it out of the

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Speaker 1: box and set it up, it's got a scale at it,

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Speaker 1: which you know, then one of the very first things

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Speaker 1: you do and we fit is you, you know, basically

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Speaker 1: put yourself in the game. You know, say this is me,

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Speaker 1: and it says, well, you know how tall are you? Well,

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Speaker 1: you know what kind of clothes are you wearing? Um?

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Speaker 1: And then it you know, it takes your weight and

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Speaker 1: uh it says well, and it gives you read out

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Speaker 1: of how heavy you are. And then it gives you

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Speaker 1: an idea of how you know your b m I,

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Speaker 1: which is the body mass index, which is theoretically, uh

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Speaker 1: reasonable facsimile of how healthy you are based on your weight.

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Speaker 1: And it also will make your me pudgy if you

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Speaker 1: happen to be carrying a few extra pounds. And we'll

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Speaker 1: also make your very small children worry about their weight,

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Speaker 1: as I'm finding out from personal experience, because I'm not

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Speaker 1: sure that they took young children into uh consideration, because

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Speaker 1: you know, you know any well, yeah, well let's just

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Speaker 1: say that that Mimi could substitute as a bowling ball. So, um,

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Speaker 1: that's not that violate. You're turning violent violent, It's not

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Speaker 1: that bad. I'm not that out of shape, but I'm

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Speaker 1: carrying around a few extra pounds. Uh, And um, you

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Speaker 1: know I haven't even created one on my we yet

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Speaker 1: because my wife and I are actually in the process

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Speaker 1: of converting our guest room into a digital exercise room.

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Speaker 1: Really yeah, and the we Fit is playing a major

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Speaker 1: role in that, in that uh plan. And so we

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Speaker 1: got we got a new plasma TV and we got

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Speaker 1: a the weef has a small plasma TV. We didn't

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Speaker 1: go out crazy. Actually I'm sorry, it was an l

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Speaker 1: c D. We couldn't afford the plasma. We went with

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Speaker 1: the l c D TV. Yeah yeah, um, so anyways,

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Speaker 1: an HDTV of any comming. It's pretty. And so we

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Speaker 1: got the We've got that. We've got the we Fit,

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Speaker 1: and then we picked up an extra Xbox, the old Xbox,

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Speaker 1: not the three sixty, so that we could hook up

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Speaker 1: and blow people away. No, no, we we have the

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Speaker 1: Dance Dance Revolution game pad as well, so it gets

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Speaker 1: you moving exactly. So you know that the we Fit

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Speaker 1: really is was designed specifically from the ground up as

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Speaker 1: a game and system that would allow you to exercise

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Speaker 1: and practice healthy habits. Um it's really you know, it's

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Speaker 1: just like any kind of exercise regiment. It's just part

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Speaker 1: of what you need to be doing in order to

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Speaker 1: have a healthy lifestyle. No, one should ever expect technology

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Speaker 1: to solve all their problems. It's going to take a

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Speaker 1: lot of work on your end to do it as well.

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Speaker 1: That's true. I mean, we Fit has a pretty decent

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Speaker 1: selection of yoga um in the game UM, which really

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Speaker 1: doesn't require you to you know, do a whole lot.

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Speaker 1: You do the yoga poses, which is very good, you know,

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Speaker 1: but so that's one part of it. And then it's

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Speaker 1: got some other things too where you can work on

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Speaker 1: your balance and posture. UM. All kinds of games like

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Speaker 1: walking on a tight rope or trying to get a

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Speaker 1: marble in a hole sort of like in that the

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Speaker 1: old Marble game where you had yeah or um, the

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Speaker 1: kind that the physical game where you had the two

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Speaker 1: different dimensions and you're trying to, uh to make the

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Speaker 1: ball roll down through the maze and into the hole

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Speaker 1: where you actually part. Yeah, I didn't go an a

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Speaker 1: long sorry um and uh, essentially you have to lean

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Speaker 1: a certain direction and it does help you with your balance.

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Speaker 1: But there there's a long distance running game and uh, okay,

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Speaker 1: let's be honest, you're basically jogging in place, UM and

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Speaker 1: it's not like you are going out and running a

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Speaker 1: ten k in real life or you know, or anything

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Speaker 1: like that. But again, sort of like D d R.

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Speaker 1: You do get up, you do get moving, maybe get

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Speaker 1: the heart rate up a little bit, right, So I

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Speaker 1: mean we're not talking. Yes, you don't get your heart

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Speaker 1: rate up a little bit, it's not bad. And uh

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Speaker 1: and they also have strength training as well. True, that's

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Speaker 1: done a little bit of that as well, not that

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Speaker 1: you could tell, but um so yeah, So going back

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Speaker 1: to the Dance Dance Revolution, now that that was a

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Speaker 1: game that was just sort of designed. It is this

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Speaker 1: fun interface where you know, you you follow the instructions

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Speaker 1: on the screen and try and you know, make sure

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Speaker 1: that you hit the pad in the right spot at

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Speaker 1: the right time the rhythm game. Um, but they also

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Speaker 1: have an exercise mode where it keeps track of how

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Speaker 1: many calories you're theoretically burning, assuming you're doing everything that

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Speaker 1: the screen is telling you to do and not just

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Speaker 1: sitting on the ground and hitting the pad while the

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Speaker 1: arrows come up. But um, the issue there is, you know,

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Speaker 1: do you get your heart rate up high enough and

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Speaker 1: sustain it long enough for it to be considered aerobic

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Speaker 1: exercise And a lot of people say not really, Um,

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Speaker 1: it's better than sitting still. Don't get me wrong. You know,

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Speaker 1: if if you're gonna be sitting still instead, it's better

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Speaker 1: than nothing, But it's it doesn't replace real exercise or

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Speaker 1: you know, or you know, like jogging or something like that. UM.

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Speaker 1: And some people will tell me, hey, you know, the

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Speaker 1: way I play Dance Dance Revolution, my heart rate gets racing,

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Speaker 1: and that that could be true. I'm talking about kind

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Speaker 1: of generalities here, UM, so that those are like, you know,

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Speaker 1: you can actually use video games to help you stay

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Speaker 1: healthy or even get in shape. But that's not the

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Speaker 1: only tech we can talk about, you know. Actually, UM,

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Speaker 1: it's not even the only WE game. Uh. We Fit

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Speaker 1: It's not sorry, not Dance Dance Revolution. We Fit is

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Speaker 1: not even the only WE software that helps you with

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Speaker 1: or attempts to help you with your fitness level. UM

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Speaker 1: would be soft has a whole series of might fill

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Speaker 1: in the blank hare coach um. You know, they have

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Speaker 1: my word code, my Spanish coach UM, but for for

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Speaker 1: the Wei, they have my fitness coach UM and it's

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Speaker 1: got a similar kind of feel to it. UM. It

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Speaker 1: helps you work on weight loss, upper body, lower body strength,

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Speaker 1: your flexibility, cardio fitness, and it offers um, different kinds

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Speaker 1: of activities like yoga, pilates, kickboxing, UM, strength training, and

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Speaker 1: a weight loss routine. And they even have one for

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Speaker 1: the Nintendo DS called My Weight Loss Coach and it

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Speaker 1: even works with It comes with the pedometer to get

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Speaker 1: you walking and uh basic based on your nutrition and

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Speaker 1: your physical activity. It kind of helps you. It kind

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Speaker 1: of gives you some guidance trying to to work on

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Speaker 1: weight loss. Right it becomes a virtual personal trainer. Really

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Speaker 1: yeah yeah, and um, that actually reminds me of another

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Speaker 1: product that you mentioned to me. And Uh, I don't

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Speaker 1: know if you've had a lot of time to to

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Speaker 1: look it up, but the body bug remember that. I

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Speaker 1: do remember that. Yeah, I haven't had chance to look

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Speaker 1: at it at all. I heard what it's supposed to do,

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Speaker 1: and I was immediately curious and a little skeptical. Well

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Speaker 1: I can understand why when I actually went to the

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Speaker 1: site to look at it. Um, it's a it's a

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Speaker 1: an electronic device by Apex Fitness, and it it monitors

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Speaker 1: the calories you burn. Um, it's actually a little thing

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Speaker 1: that you wear in your arm, and electronic device you

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Speaker 1: wear in your arm, and uh, it's got an accelerometer

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Speaker 1: in it. It measures your heat flux and your galvanic

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Speaker 1: skin response and your skin temperature, so it's a biometric

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Speaker 1: device as well. Essentially, yes, it's UM. It's calculating how

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Speaker 1: much you're sweating, how warm you are, and the accelerometer

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Speaker 1: is is judging how much you're moving. UM. So if

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Speaker 1: you can, you know, get your arm wet and warm

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Speaker 1: and then move it around a lot, it will think

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Speaker 1: you're losing weight. So if you were to say, step

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Speaker 1: outside in June in Atlanta, it would think you were

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Speaker 1: losing weight. I'm making jokes because I don't. It's actually

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Speaker 1: gotten some ray of reviews UM, but it's actually more

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Speaker 1: than just that. Really, there's a there's a service, UM,

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Speaker 1: a web program that has UH that where you log

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Speaker 1: your food, what you're eating. UM. You tell it basically

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Speaker 1: your age, your gender, your height, and your weight, and

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Speaker 1: based on the information that you get back from the

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Speaker 1: arm monitor, it can sort of give you an idea

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Speaker 1: of a you know where you are, how much you're

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Speaker 1: actually using as far as you know you're supposed to have,

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Speaker 1: for example, a thousand calories a day and you're taking

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Speaker 1: in twelve calories a day and you're only burning eight hundred.

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Speaker 1: Well you're gaining weight in that situation. Um, so it

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Speaker 1: can kind of give you an idea. It's like, yes,

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Speaker 1: you are burning calories, No, you're not burning calories. Um.

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Speaker 1: And it will also if you sign up for a subscription,

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Speaker 1: a six month subscription, you actually get to talk to somebody.

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Speaker 1: You get a phone session with an expert who can

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Speaker 1: kind of help you through the process. They even have

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Speaker 1: they had three basic levels. You can buy the you

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Speaker 1: can just get the web program without any of the

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Speaker 1: digital stuff. The gear itself for nine dollars. That's the

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Speaker 1: six month subscription, and then um with the arm man

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Speaker 1: it's two forty nine. And then there's even a digital

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Speaker 1: wrist monitor that gives you an idea of what's what's

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Speaker 1: going on at ending given time so that you don't

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Speaker 1: have to you know, I guess download the information. Uh.

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Speaker 1: But that's um almost three fifty so it's uh, it's

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Speaker 1: not inexpensive, but you know, if it works as well

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Speaker 1: as the reviews say, it might be something worth looking into.

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Speaker 1: I mean, especially if you're actually going out and getting

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Speaker 1: some exercise and not as we were joking about, trying

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Speaker 1: to fool the monitor into believing that your exercise. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: what's the point at that point? Yeah, would be like

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Speaker 1: if you spent three on a wristband and I hope

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Speaker 1: you're not trying to cheat it. Well, that would be

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Speaker 1: like the we fit and doing the running long distance

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Speaker 1: running thing. Really all you have to do is shake

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Speaker 1: the remote upside, you know, up and down, and you're

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Speaker 1: fooling it into thinking you're running self. That it really

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Speaker 1: kind of defeats the purpose I made it think I

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Speaker 1: lost weight by putting my checkistile terrier on it and

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Speaker 1: saying it was me. I'm not very healthy. Apparently I've

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Speaker 1: lost everything but my head. But you, but you work

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Speaker 1: like a dog. I do. I do. I like one too.

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Speaker 1: So um we well that that's a pretty expensive way.

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Speaker 1: But let's say that you already have um well, let's

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Speaker 1: say that you were one of those people who bought

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Speaker 1: an iPhone. There are several iPhone apps that are geared

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Speaker 1: geared towards weight loss. Um, I have a few, actually,

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Speaker 1: I can mention there's a several that are more about

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Speaker 1: you know, your nutrition and what in your diet. For instance,

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Speaker 1: Restaurant Nutrition is a free application that you can get.

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Speaker 1: It has information nutritional information for foods, from various restaurant chains,

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Speaker 1: so things like RBS and McDonald's or Chilies or whatever,

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Speaker 1: big nationwide chains. It has information on the basic foods

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Speaker 1: you find there, so you can kind of get an

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Speaker 1: eye idea of you know, should I really get that whopper?

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Speaker 1: UM this will tell you no, No, you shouldn't, but

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Speaker 1: I could come in yeah. But there are other ones.

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Speaker 1: There's the livestrong dot com calorie tracker that that logs

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Speaker 1: calories um and uh it will tell you how many.

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Speaker 1: It's kind of similar to the what you were talking

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Speaker 1: about with the body Bug. Um it lets you log calories,

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Speaker 1: tells you how many calories you would lose through exercise.

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Speaker 1: If you know you you tell it how much you've

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Speaker 1: exercise that day. Um so essentially tracks your caloric intake

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Speaker 1: and tells you whether or not you're taking in more

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Speaker 1: calories or you're burning up more calories. It's a good

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Speaker 1: way to kind of keep track of how you're doing

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Speaker 1: from that perspective. But there are other ones as well.

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Speaker 1: There's um Eye Fitness that lets you create and organize

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Speaker 1: a workout routine so that you can target whatever body

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Speaker 1: parts you specifically want to target when you're working out.

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Speaker 1: Um Jim goal Light, which is another similar UH application.

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Speaker 1: It also lets you create workouts UM. And then there's

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Speaker 1: run Keeper, which some of the people here at our

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Speaker 1: office probably would like. We've got some marathon runners in

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Speaker 1: our office. UM And run Keeper uses the GPS and

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Speaker 1: the iPhone to keep track of your location when you're running,

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Speaker 1: so it can tell you how far you ran. It

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Speaker 1: can kind of give you an estimation of how fast

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Speaker 1: you ran. It can even create a map of your

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Speaker 1: route the route that you ran, including things like elevation

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Speaker 1: like if you went up hills and things like that,

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Speaker 1: and it can tell you kind of all this information

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Speaker 1: give you a complete rundown. Now, that could be very

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Speaker 1: helpful for someone who is training for something like a marathon,

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Speaker 1: you know, especially if you're you know the route of

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Speaker 1: the marathon ahead of time, and you know, hey, you

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Speaker 1: know what, there's a mile and a half long UH

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Speaker 1: stretch where it's a slight upgrade. I need to train

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Speaker 1: so that I hit an upgrade at that time, so

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Speaker 1: I know that my body is ready to go through

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Speaker 1: that kind of torture. So run Keeper can actually help

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Speaker 1: you out with that. Speaking for a personal experience, that's

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Speaker 1: really important to remember whether or not they're hills. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I would imagine, so I don't run unless someone is

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Speaker 1: chasing me. Yeah, every other day. I was gonna say

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Speaker 1: it's probably fairly often. Yeah. UM. You'll notice that that

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Speaker 1: a lot of these have similar themes, basically tracking what

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Speaker 1: you eat and exercise. Really those are those are going

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Speaker 1: to be something that you'll find in virtually all of

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Speaker 1: these products, and UM, you know, I think one of

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Speaker 1: the advantages that some of these things have, UM, is

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Speaker 1: that they make it fun to to work on your way.

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Speaker 1: I mean, we're you guys who are listening to us,

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Speaker 1: UM are tech people. So you're the kind of person

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Speaker 1: or you're the kind of people who like to to

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Speaker 1: mess with gadgets and software and things. UM, if you're

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Speaker 1: the kind of person who wants to lose weight, looking

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Speaker 1: into something like this might be good because if it

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Speaker 1: can make it more enjoyable for you to stick with

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Speaker 1: the program, you're probably more likely to uh to actually

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Speaker 1: lose some weight and get into a healthy routine. And

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Speaker 1: that's that's what virtually all of these is is about. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it really helps your with your motivation. Like we said before,

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Speaker 1: a lot of this actually most of it depends upon you. Um,

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Speaker 1: so if you bring it, they can help you out.

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Speaker 1: But I have one other tech. I'm betting that because

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Speaker 1: I was going to mention it too. Yeah, there's your

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Speaker 1: particularly involved with sitting at your computer, and right, there's

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Speaker 1: one gadget that we would be remiss if we did

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Speaker 1: not mention it when we're talking about getting in touch,

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Speaker 1: and that is of course, go ahead, Chris. The Hula chair. Yes,

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Speaker 1: the Hulu chair, also known as the Hawaiian chair. If

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Speaker 1: you have not seen the videos, go to YouTube, type

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Speaker 1: in Hulu chair and h don't drink anything at all

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Speaker 1: when the video comes up, because you will lose it completely. Um.

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Speaker 1: I'm not really convinced that this does anything other than

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Speaker 1: give your anyone who looks at you full immunition to

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Speaker 1: make fun of you for the foreseeable future. But um,

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Speaker 1: and I mean this as a compliment, even to the manufacturer.

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Speaker 1: It's really funny. Yeah, it's The entertainment value cannot be overstated.

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Speaker 1: There's no way you could go beyond. Is it even

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Speaker 1: better than the the virtual bowl riding thing? C. S

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Speaker 1: two thousand eight Pletni Long day at Ces. We're looking around,

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Speaker 1: we come to this uh booth that's filled with massage chairs,

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Speaker 1: which kinds of massage, and they were very, very enticing

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Speaker 1: at that point of the day. But they also had

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Speaker 1: a saddle, an electronic saddle, yeah, like a mechanical bowl,

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Speaker 1: but without the bowl, just the saddle part. And the

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Speaker 1: idea is that you sat on it and then you

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Speaker 1: would try and stay not not like trying to stay

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Speaker 1: on it, because it wasn't going to try and buck

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Speaker 1: you off, but that you try to keep your you know,

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Speaker 1: artical base, try and stay upright, and that that would

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Speaker 1: work your muscles. Um. Really it was. It depended on

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Speaker 1: who got up there, whether or not it was really

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Speaker 1: funny or you know, you felt uncomfortable watching. I'm just

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Speaker 1: gonna leave it at that. Well, that's a great discussion

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Speaker 1: about tech getting in shape. So I would like to

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Speaker 1: invite our listeners. If you want to us to talk

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Speaker 1: about specific topic or you have comments on something that

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Speaker 1: we've already addressed, please write to us. We have a

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Speaker 1: great email address just for us now. It's called tech

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Speaker 1: Stuff at how stuff works dot com, and we would

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Speaker 1: love to hear from you. We really enjoy when we

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Speaker 1: get to cater these to our listeners. Otherwise it's just

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Speaker 1: me and Chris sitting around saying Hu, why do you

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Speaker 1: think to be fun to talk about? So? Uh? And

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Speaker 1: if you want to learn more about a lot of

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Speaker 1: these items, we have information on many of the things

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Speaker 1: we've talked about already up live right now at how

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Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. And we'll talk to a again soon. Now,

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Speaker 1: let's let's go exercise the hit the track all right,

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Speaker 1: all right. For more on this and thousands of other topics,

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Speaker 1: visit how stuff works dot com, brought to you by

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Speaker 1: the reinvented two thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you