Speaker 1: I'm TT and I'm Zakiah, and this is Dope Labs.
Speaker 1: Welcome to Dope Labs, a weekly podcast that mixes hardcore
Speaker 1: science with pop culture and a healthy dose of friendship. Girl,
Speaker 1: let me tell you about this Apple Watch and how
Speaker 1: it saved my life. Okay, I didn't have a fall
Speaker 1: or anything, but I got a high heart rate notification
Speaker 1: when I was dating this man.
Speaker 2: He was stressing me out, and for the Apple Watch
Speaker 2: to say to me, Hey, you have an elevated heart
Speaker 2: rate even though you're not moving around, it was like, Wow,
Speaker 2: you in danger, I said, this man trying to kill me?
Speaker 2: An Apple Watch knows? Okay, where your fitness devices save yourself?
Speaker 1: Good God, But that just makes me think of about
Speaker 1: all of this wearable tech that a lot of us
Speaker 1: are wearing and the notifications that we get. So I
Speaker 1: think that that is a great topic for us to
Speaker 1: talk about today. Let's jump into the recitation.
Speaker 2: Well, I already told my story, but what do you
Speaker 2: want to know? What else do you want to know?
Speaker 1: I think it's good to start from the beginning, like
Speaker 1: who started all of this and what made it boom
Speaker 1: the way that it has. It feels like everyone has
Speaker 1: some type of device on their body.
Speaker 2: Yes, And when did it become cool? Because I remember
Speaker 2: when people are like, can't believe you're dressed up and
Speaker 2: got on an Apple Watch. It you got on a
Speaker 2: wiz Kid watch or whatever.
Speaker 1: You know. They still saying that. They're like, oh, leave
Speaker 1: that Apple Watch at home when you're going to someplace fancy.
Speaker 1: I'm like, well, how am I supposed to get these
Speaker 1: steps at this work dinner?
Speaker 2: Huh mm? And along with steps, there's also like heart
Speaker 2: rate information, breathing. Some of this wearable technology is letting
Speaker 2: you tell if your stress level is high. I want
Speaker 2: to know how useful all that information is when it
Speaker 2: comes to like healthcare and your PCP or a primary
Speaker 2: care physician looking at it and saying, hey, here's what
Speaker 2: you gotta do next.
Speaker 1: Right, And the engineer and me like, I want to
Speaker 1: know how this stuff works because sometimes I look down
Speaker 1: in my Apple Watch and I see that green light
Speaker 1: glowing and I'm like, okay, what are you doing? So
Speaker 1: I want to know how all this stuff works like
Speaker 1: inside of these devices.
Speaker 2: Yes, And the consumer in me, okay, the gadget.
Speaker 1: Girl and me knows my friend loves a gadget.
Speaker 2: I do Apple watch or ring. I remember the fit
Speaker 2: bit yep, I remember whoop? But like, what are the
Speaker 2: other ones out there? What's new, what's coming? And what
Speaker 2: do I need to buy next? And what's capturing which
Speaker 2: data points? Because that really, I feel like, determines what
Speaker 2: you should have right.
Speaker 1: And my friend she also loves a lot of data
Speaker 1: on herself. She wants everybody to send their numbers in.
Speaker 1: But I feel like there might be a little bit
Speaker 1: too much information, you know, And so I want to know.
Speaker 1: Is there a such thing as too much data? Is
Speaker 1: it overwhelming us? It's overwhelming me?
Speaker 2: Not me, I'm throwing in Google sheets, let's look at it.
Speaker 2: But for the people that are collecting their data like me,
Speaker 2: is somebody else collecting it? Is somebody else possibly selling it?
Speaker 1: Oh?
Speaker 2: That's scary mm hmm. I want to know because we
Speaker 2: saw what happened with twenty three and me companies up
Speaker 2: for sale along with your data.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's a great start of questions.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, let's jump into the dissection.
Speaker 2: Our guest expert today is Christopher Memes. He writes about
Speaker 2: technology for The Wall Street Journal, and he's the author
Speaker 2: of Arriving Today.
Speaker 1: Christopher We are so excited to have you back on
Speaker 1: the show. Me az Akiya are people who wear wearable technology?
Speaker 2: You see?
Speaker 1: She has her ring on where did wearable technology begin?
Speaker 1: How did we get here? Who started this? And was
Speaker 1: there an inflex point when it started to become popular.
Speaker 3: I think it all came from our phones in the
Speaker 3: first place, right, Like we take it for granted that
Speaker 3: there are these sensors in our phones. My favorite way
Speaker 3: to describe it is we all remember the first time
Speaker 3: we picked up an iPhone and or a iPad and
Speaker 3: you know, you do this and you turn it ninety
Speaker 3: degrees and it was like magic because you're like, oh,
Speaker 3: now the YouTube video or whatever is full screen.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So that little attitude sensor in there that was key
Speaker 3: to enabling these fitness devices because it, I mean, that's
Speaker 3: kind of a miracle technology itself. It's a literal form
Speaker 3: of nanotechnology. So the real precedent of that technology is
Speaker 3: this thing that was the size of the basketball which
Speaker 3: flew on the first missions to the Moon, and it
Speaker 3: was attitude sensor so that they could orient the spacecraft
Speaker 3: as it was coming down to land. And you know,
Speaker 3: it was a very early computer. It was built by IBM,
Speaker 3: and that has been so miniaturized now that it is
Speaker 3: the size of a poppy seed on one microchip inside
Speaker 3: your phone, and so then of course it's easy to
Speaker 3: put it into like a fitbit or an Apple Watch,
Speaker 3: and it's super accurate. You know. That's why your watch
Speaker 3: can identify different exercises that you're doing without even telling it.
Speaker 2: That's crazy.
Speaker 1: An attitude censor. The key needs one of those, and
Speaker 1: not just for orientation.
Speaker 3: Well, I think when they came out with the Apple Watch,
Speaker 3: there was a lot of skepticism. Everybody was like, you know,
Speaker 3: the iPhone is enormous. You're never going to build a
Speaker 3: business that's on the same scale, So why are you
Speaker 3: even trying? And then I think maybe five years into
Speaker 3: sales of the Apple Watch, somebody did a calculation and
Speaker 3: they were like, you know, if you broke this business
Speaker 3: out on its own, it would be a fortune one
Speaker 3: hundred company by itself by revenue. But Apple's so big
Speaker 3: that it's like to them, it's like a rounding error
Speaker 3: because it's five to ten percent of their iPhone revenue.
Speaker 3: I mean, Cook famously is extremely focused on health. He
Speaker 3: has said in interviews, I think better health is going
Speaker 3: to be Apple's greatest contribution to humanity, like that he
Speaker 3: wants that to be his legacy.
Speaker 2: And it seems like doctors are buying into that idea.
Speaker 2: In your article, you mentioned that some doctors are recommending
Speaker 2: the Apple Watch to patients to help them manage their
Speaker 2: health conditions. Could you elaborate, aside from the attitude sensor, like,
Speaker 2: what are some of the other specific features that make
Speaker 2: this particularly useful for a medical setting. Yeah.
Speaker 3: So, obviously, as America's population ages, we've overcome the big
Speaker 3: killers of the past. People aren't dying from pneumonia anymore,
Speaker 3: and so, you know, we age, and obviously heart disease
Speaker 3: and cancer become the big killers. So you just have
Speaker 3: tons of especially boomers, now aging into that time of
Speaker 3: life when they might need intermittent or continuous monitoring of
Speaker 3: their heart. And one of the kind of really pivotal
Speaker 3: innovation for the Apple Watch as a medical device was
Speaker 3: giving it the ability to do a live essentially EKG.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Right, you can take a recording and if you're having
Speaker 3: like an abnormal event or your doctor wants to look
Speaker 3: out for, you know, something's wrong with the rhythm of
Speaker 3: your heart, you can just record it. On your watch
Speaker 3: and email it to your doctor. And that's such a
Speaker 3: breakthrough the fact that you can do that on the
Speaker 3: cheapest Apple watch, the Apple Watch. See, doctors are basically
Speaker 3: prescribing it. They're saying, this happened to my own mother. Actually,
Speaker 3: the doctor said, just go get one of these watches
Speaker 3: and then do this monitoring so many times per day
Speaker 3: and send me the results.
Speaker 1: Chris, you and Zakia are ring wearers, and Zee you
Speaker 1: have the or ring, right yep, and Chris you have
Speaker 1: the ultra humans. So let's talk about rings. They feel
Speaker 1: like the next step in the technology. Zeqia is the
Speaker 1: first person that I know personally, so I could see
Speaker 1: the ring on their finger and she was explaining to me.
Speaker 1: She was showing me all this data and I was like, Okay,
Speaker 1: my Apple watch cannot do that. What do you think
Speaker 1: sets this new ring technology that people have sets it
Speaker 1: apart from the Apple watches and the fitbits. What was
Speaker 1: the change in the technology that helped the ring, the
Speaker 1: or ring, or the ultra human ring become what it
Speaker 1: is today.
Speaker 3: Well, I think it's pretty simple actually, So like here's
Speaker 3: my ring and the sensors are on the bottom and
Speaker 3: the sensors go on this bottom part of your finger,
Speaker 3: and you know what do we have right there? Actually
Speaker 3: I'm not an anonymous, so I don't know. I don't
Speaker 3: know if it's a vein or an artery. I think
Speaker 3: it's an artery.
Speaker 2: You're right, it's an artery.
Speaker 3: And that is a really great place for a sensor,
Speaker 3: is right on the bottom of your finger where you
Speaker 3: have an artery, Whereas if you have a smart watch
Speaker 3: and it's sitting on top of your wrist, this is
Speaker 3: actually a terrible place for a sensor because this is
Speaker 3: your veins. There's so much information you can get when
Speaker 3: you put this light sensor right up against the artery
Speaker 3: that is close to the skin. So that's really the
Speaker 3: key thing. Like I think in theory, the best possible
Speaker 3: device would be like a choker and it would be
Speaker 3: like right on your carotid artery right here. I mean,
Speaker 3: you would get so much data be like, oh, your
Speaker 3: brain is low on oxygen right now, like you need
Speaker 3: to stand up or something. It's as simple as that,
Speaker 3: which is why it blows me away that Apple hasn't
Speaker 3: tried to make a ring yet. I mean, again, I
Speaker 3: think the watch is good enough. They're able to gather
Speaker 3: a lot of data. But the other thing you can
Speaker 3: get from putting a sensor right here on your finger
Speaker 3: is this measure of basically how hard your arteries are,
Speaker 3: which predicts, you know, heart disease.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's because what they do is there's.
Speaker 3: A measure of like how fast the blood is flowing
Speaker 3: during a particular period in the cycle of your heart beating,
Speaker 3: and by measuring the velocity of the blood at that moment,
Speaker 3: they can get it's a proxy for her, like how
Speaker 3: hard your arteries are.
Speaker 2: So you tell me they're looking at it, say too
Speaker 2: much cholesterol in there, yeah, or if there's a plaque
Speaker 2: build up.
Speaker 3: But it's really about the elasticity of you or blood vessels,
Speaker 3: because that is a really big factor in terms of
Speaker 3: your health. But Tekia, I really want to hear how
Speaker 3: this ring has changed your life, because I'm like a
Speaker 3: collector of these stories. It always blows me away. How
Speaker 3: wearing one of these rings for tt if you want
Speaker 3: to talk about the watch change your behavior, how did
Speaker 3: it change your behavior? Because this ring has really changed
Speaker 3: my behavior.
Speaker 1: It has changed her.
Speaker 2: The ring has changed me. Okay, this was a gift.
Speaker 1: I've only had it for like three months, and I
Speaker 1: had started working out more and a different kind of
Speaker 1: working out because TT's husband has been my trainer. Anybody
Speaker 1: looking to run, Wow, he's your guy.
Speaker 2: Okay. I was getting, first of all, a rash from
Speaker 2: wearing this Apple Watch. Okay, And you need to charge
Speaker 2: it so often, and so I will put it on
Speaker 2: the charger. I would leave it off for days. It
Speaker 2: just wasn't I'm not consistent with my Apple Watch. It
Speaker 2: dies on my arm. I don't want all of those
Speaker 2: notifications I'm getting, and I feel like I turned them off,
Speaker 2: but I'm still getting notifications. The ring I put it
Speaker 2: on once I got used to it for like two
Speaker 2: or three days. It's like, set it and forget it.
Speaker 2: It's a rotisserie chicken. You know. I put it away.
Speaker 2: I don't think about it.
Speaker 3: And wait a minute, I need to know more about
Speaker 3: how you just leave the rotissary chicken out.
Speaker 2: Oh wait, do you not remember those informations that set
Speaker 2: it in?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 2: And they now, I do believe in food safety. Do
Speaker 2: not set it and forget it with your rotissory chicken.
Speaker 2: But wearing the ring, I felt like I didn't have
Speaker 2: to think about it. It was able to get consistent monitoring,
Speaker 2: and I wasn't on and off, and it gave me
Speaker 2: some really good insights around, like my sleep is never
Speaker 2: it was never right. Okay, it's not she's not sleeping,
Speaker 2: like I haven't been resting. I've had a lot of
Speaker 2: day stress. When I realized those things, I'm like, Okay,
Speaker 2: what was I doing today. I'm starting to put in tags.
Speaker 2: Everything's in one place for the or ring every night.
Speaker 2: I'm putting all that stuff in. I'm looking at the day.
Speaker 2: It's been easy for me and I don't have to
Speaker 2: charge it. And even the prompts didn't feel like I
Speaker 2: don't know if it was the apps I was using.
Speaker 2: It felt like a little condescending some of those prompts.
Speaker 2: I didn't like those notifications I was getting.
Speaker 3: I know what you mean, yeah, Apple Watch. I just
Speaker 3: felt like it was shaming me. Is like, how come
Speaker 3: I stood up in two hours? I'm like, I'm working exactly.
Speaker 1: That's the reason why me and my Apple Watch don't
Speaker 1: get along. Like it's phases. I want all of that
Speaker 1: health stuff off, Like if you take a ten minute walk,
Speaker 1: you can don't tell me to get up and take
Speaker 1: a ten minute walk. I'm barely making it through the day.
Speaker 1: I don't want to hear that. I just want to know,
Speaker 1: did I just get an email? Perfect? I can see
Speaker 1: that a text message. So I'm like the opposite where
Speaker 1: it's like I don't need all that health data. I
Speaker 1: just need I want to be more efficient in everything else.
Speaker 1: But I know I'm an anomaly.
Speaker 2: No, I don't think you are.
Speaker 3: I have heard from the people who make these rings
Speaker 3: that I think like two thirds of their users have
Speaker 3: a watch and a ring.
Speaker 1: The ring is one thing, m hm that it feels
Speaker 1: like an advance. But you've been also trying out the
Speaker 1: continuous blade glucose monitors and I've seen those.
Speaker 2: Yes, what's the scoop?
Speaker 3: So this is wild? Like I was hesitant to try
Speaker 3: this because it is in your body. It's a tiny,
Speaker 3: tiny bit. Okay, So there's a very fine little metal lead.
Speaker 3: This is gonna sound terrible.
Speaker 2: It sounds like just like.
Speaker 3: Demolition man stuff. There's an applicator and you put it
Speaker 3: on and you go like and it goes junk and
Speaker 3: it makes this loud noise and this tiny, tiny little
Speaker 3: metal wire. It does not penetrate the skin. It goes
Speaker 3: just below the epidermis. Into I guess, like the interstitial fluid.
Speaker 3: It's just below your skin and there, I guess glucose
Speaker 3: is circulating even though it's not penetrating any blood vessels.
Speaker 3: And the wild thing about it is the more sophisticated
Speaker 3: ones have this little like it's almost like when you
Speaker 3: go to the store and you just pay with touch lists,
Speaker 3: like with your watch or your phone, and you just
Speaker 3: tap your phone to the sensor and it goes like
Speaker 3: beep boop, and then immediately download your glucose data and
Speaker 3: so you get this continuous monitoring you can check out
Speaker 3: anytime you want, and the way it gets sold. You know,
Speaker 3: I'm sure you've seen these ads. There's tons of influencers
Speaker 3: on Instagram love this. It is a lot of data
Speaker 3: and like, I feel like it can be misused, but
Speaker 3: when I did it, it just was helpful because it
Speaker 3: kind of helped me realize I need to be taking
Speaker 3: seriously all of the advice about slow carbs and when
Speaker 3: do you eat, and because it will show you how
Speaker 3: you respond to various foods, how you respond to exercise,
Speaker 3: does your blood sugar change, you know, if you're tired,
Speaker 3: and it kind of just I mean, these are things
Speaker 3: that I think we could all probably figure out on
Speaker 3: our own if we had a skilled nutritionist kind of
Speaker 3: in our ear all the time. But it's just like
Speaker 3: the watch of the ring. It's very convenient, and you
Speaker 3: know how humans are, We need reinforcement. We have to
Speaker 3: be told over and over and get day in and
Speaker 3: day out to like break down our mental barriers to
Speaker 3: learning these things.
Speaker 1: Do you feel like there's a such thing as too
Speaker 1: much information? Where do you think we should draw the
Speaker 1: line between beneficial health checking and potential over reliance on technology?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I do think there's a such a thing as
Speaker 3: too much information. I mean, this is why I use
Speaker 3: a ring and not a watch, because I actually only
Speaker 3: want to check my sleep in activity maybe a couple
Speaker 3: times a day, and I don't want anything sending me
Speaker 3: alerts and reminding me. I'm like, yeah, I know I
Speaker 3: haven't exercised this morning, Like that's going to happen this afternoon,
Speaker 3: Like stop hassling me. The blood Guckost monitor also, I
Speaker 3: felt like it was valuable, But the more I investigated it,
Speaker 3: the more I found that a lot of the sort
Speaker 3: of chatter around it on social is people observing what
Speaker 3: are normal variations in blood glucose throughout the day, and
Speaker 3: they were pathologizing them and saying like, oh, you know
Speaker 3: this just happened. I saw this, so I shouldn't eat
Speaker 3: this food ever. And it's like, no, this is your
Speaker 3: blood sugar does go up and down if it is
Speaker 3: out of control, and then yes, you need to see
Speaker 3: a medical doctor. So I think that there is this
Speaker 3: potential for people to really just over focus on certain measures.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, the data is only as good as
Speaker 1: the people who are reading it, Like, you have to
Speaker 1: know what the data means. You have to understand those things. So,
Speaker 1: like you were saying in the beginning, doing this in
Speaker 1: conjunction with your doctor so that they can explain these
Speaker 1: things and give you context. I feel like makes the
Speaker 1: data that much better and over.
Speaker 2: A long period of time, Like don't go checking the
Speaker 2: exhale sheet between your epidermis and drmis every twenty minutes,
Speaker 2: like it's just going to alarm you, you know.
Speaker 1: Right, hyperfixation on getting your data just right seems very
Speaker 1: excessive because how much will it really extend your life to.
Speaker 2: Never mineccounts teaching.
Speaker 1: Listen, in the world we live in in I need
Speaker 1: less minutes, okay, which I.
Speaker 3: Feel like, now we have to talk about Brian Johnson.
Speaker 2: Let's get to let's get to it. Let's get to it.
Speaker 3: Okay, So Brian Johnson he made his money on a
Speaker 3: company called Braintree, which is a you know, payments platform,
Speaker 3: so it's like Square or one of these. His net
Speaker 3: from the sale of that company was probably north of
Speaker 3: three hundred million, So he's set for life. And then
Speaker 3: he's like, you know, does the like typical Silicon Valley
Speaker 3: divorced guy thing, has some drama, and then decides, I'm
Speaker 3: going to commit myself to not dying. That's his motto,
Speaker 3: don't die. And now he is famous for having these
Speaker 3: special dinners with other celebrities like the Kardashians or whoever,
Speaker 3: where he's like, here's my extremely strict diet. He doesn't
Speaker 3: eat after eleven am. I think it's vegan, and he
Speaker 3: has He spends more than a million dollars a year
Speaker 3: on tests and this kind of full time longevity doctor
Speaker 3: who is helping him figure out ways that he sees
Speaker 3: himself as a pioneer, ways that we can all live longer.
Speaker 3: So primarily for him, that's caloric restriction, you know, it's
Speaker 3: eating and taking all these supplements that he thinks are
Speaker 3: going to help him into accidents whatever. And avoiding the sun.
Speaker 3: He's definitely not seen the sun in at least two years.
Speaker 3: And then his latest thing, I don't know if he saw,
Speaker 3: is he's getting really into the hyperbaric oxygen chamber. He
Speaker 3: said that's the next breakthrough for him. And he has
Speaker 3: created a movement called Don't Die and it's amazing to
Speaker 3: me how it has become this big Silicon Valley subculture
Speaker 3: that has broken out of that and now like they're
Speaker 3: kind of accolytes everywhere. And he jokes like, yeah, I'm
Speaker 3: starting a cult, and it's a cult to make you
Speaker 3: go to bed on time.
Speaker 1: I have never heard of Brian Johnson, and so I
Speaker 1: had to look him up and I found his diet
Speaker 1: and I've just got to step through some things with
Speaker 1: all of you. So his daily routine and diet, he
Speaker 1: has a calorie intake of about two thousand calories a
Speaker 1: day that is precisely measured, and he eats all his
Speaker 1: food in the morning, like Chris was saying, and completes
Speaker 1: them all before noon. And he usually has three main
Speaker 1: items for his three main meals, and it's a green
Speaker 1: or a super veggie meal, a nutty pudding, and the
Speaker 1: third meal is based on the data that he has
Speaker 1: evidence bay fired to figure out what he needs for
Speaker 1: that last meal. And so the core components are one
Speaker 1: hundred percent vegan, and he's focused on whole foods that
Speaker 1: have high nutrient density and low glycemic index so to
Speaker 1: avoid blood sugar spikes, and no processed foods, so no sugar,
Speaker 1: no refined grains, and no seed oils. And he takes
Speaker 1: over one hundred pills a day of vitamins and supplements.
Speaker 1: And that hyperbaric therapy, Christopher, that you were talking about,
Speaker 1: that's when you increase the delivery of oxygen to the
Speaker 1: body by providing pure oxygen in an enclosed space. So
Speaker 1: he gets into these chambers, it's pumped full of oxygen
Speaker 1: and it's meant to increase the amount of oxygen into
Speaker 1: your body.
Speaker 2: That's crazy, because my multi items are looking at me like, girl,
Speaker 2: when are you returning? When will you have another one to.
Speaker 1: Blow off the top of my before I screwed the top.
Speaker 2: Don't tell my mama. I'm embarrassed a little bit because
Speaker 2: I know Brian Johnson already across Brian Johnson on Twitter
Speaker 2: years ago, and I was like, what's this man doing now?
Speaker 2: The open access officionado in me was like, download his data.
Speaker 2: Take a look, right, Okay, I was looking, and so
Speaker 2: I was looking at all the like readouts because he
Speaker 2: was sharing all this stuff publicly, and he was talking
Speaker 2: about what type of tests he was doing. I said, hey,
Speaker 2: a little weird. This is before I think he was
Speaker 2: taking his son's blood or whatever was going on there.
Speaker 2: What Yeah, I know, it sounds crazy, it sounds like
Speaker 2: a joke, but he was getting these plasma transfusions as
Speaker 2: part of his whole anti aging thing, and he was
Speaker 2: replacing his blood with his sons. Now, it didn't really help,
Speaker 2: and it just proved to be controversial because I was like,
Speaker 2: now you're taking it too far, okay. But he was like, hey,
Speaker 2: my nutritionis has worked with me. And at the time
Speaker 2: I didn't have a nutritionist. I still don't, okay. Mine
Speaker 2: is my explore page on Instagram. And so I was like,
Speaker 2: all right, if the nutritionist is working with him and
Speaker 2: this is working, let me try some of these things.
Speaker 2: So Blueprint is Brian Justin's like outfit where he does
Speaker 2: all this stuff, and so I've made some of those recipes.
Speaker 2: Now he was saying, just blend it all up, you know,
Speaker 2: and just eat this, you know, slurry. I don't go
Speaker 2: that route. I like to chew and so but I've
Speaker 2: tried some of the things. Not so bad once you
Speaker 2: get used to it.
Speaker 1: I can't eat that many lentils.
Speaker 2: No lentils are good for you. I know they're good
Speaker 2: for you.
Speaker 1: I don't like them.
Speaker 3: I feel like what he is doing, though, in some ways,
Speaker 3: is the future, because we're talking about tracking right now
Speaker 3: and glucose monitoring being the cutting edge. But this reminds
Speaker 3: me that this ring that I'm testing ultra human, which
Speaker 3: is like a more fitness focused version of AURA, Like
Speaker 3: they are moving into new types of tracking that they
Speaker 3: want to pair with the insights and the data you
Speaker 3: gather from the ring. So like obviously like everybody's doing now,
Speaker 3: they'll do like cycle and ovulation stuff, but they actually
Speaker 3: are contracting with like outside labs and they're like, go
Speaker 3: get your vitamin D tested, yeah, or go get these
Speaker 3: other common blood markers tested and then we'll integrate that
Speaker 3: into the app. And so I find it fascinating that
Speaker 3: like what used to be tests that would be ordered
Speaker 3: by doctors. Now we are being encouraged to go get
Speaker 3: on our own, yeah, to go examine our biomarkers, like
Speaker 3: we're all Brian Johnson.
Speaker 2: But also what I've seen lately that was taking it
Speaker 2: too far is Brian Johnson having all those folks that
Speaker 2: work with him sign of NDA's. Did you see that?
Speaker 2: I did see that.
Speaker 1: You sent me the link, so I read it because
Speaker 1: I didn't know who he was. I was like my
Speaker 1: first introduction into him, and I was like, this seems incorrect.
Speaker 1: You put an NDA's in place and trying to live
Speaker 1: longer to harass folks. Sounds like you should be not
Speaker 1: living so long. Oh that sounds hard. If it ain't right,
Speaker 1: it ain't right, though, it ain't right.
Speaker 2: Like so I'm up to minds when it comes to
Speaker 2: that because I live in Atlanta where people are on
Speaker 2: a lot of things that should be done by doctors. Okay,
Speaker 2: and you can get a V twelve shop with your lashes, Okay,
Speaker 2: you can get both of those done at the same time.
Speaker 2: But I feel like that's really interesting, Like I would
Speaker 2: be interested in my vitamin D levels and all of
Speaker 2: those things. But when we share all of this stuff,
Speaker 2: it's different when I share it with my doctor versus
Speaker 2: sharing it with the app. So for me, I'm like,
Speaker 2: what about data privacy? So we had a Dope Labs
Speaker 2: listener reach out months ago, Hey Vio, and she said
Speaker 2: she was using the iOS health app, a mindfulness app,
Speaker 2: a sleep tracker, and a cycle tracker like you mentioned,
Speaker 2: and she said she started getting like she noticed that
Speaker 2: she was getting targeted ads and emails and socials and
Speaker 2: even women's health and it was stuff that she wasn't
Speaker 2: thinking about it first, but she felt like the ads
Speaker 2: correlated with what some of the apps were eventually telling
Speaker 2: her or calculating. And so I don't know how much
Speaker 2: of this is the strides in effect, like once you
Speaker 2: look at a thing, you start to recognize it more
Speaker 2: and more you bring more attention to it. But she
Speaker 2: said she didn't feel safe for secure, so she stopped
Speaker 2: using them. And you know, TT and I were talking
Speaker 2: about data breaches we saw with twenty three and meter
Speaker 2: and that's your genetic information YEA United Healthcare. Yeah, so
Speaker 2: when we think about this, what is the potential When
Speaker 2: we start thinking about I mean, I don't know what
Speaker 2: anybody would do with my vitamin D levels, but with
Speaker 2: all of this information. Do you know anything about what
Speaker 2: companies are saying they're going to do to protect our
Speaker 2: data once they have it.
Speaker 3: I don't, but I have covered data privacy for a
Speaker 3: long time, and I do know based on my previous reporting,
Speaker 3: that the default here is companies will gather and share
Speaker 3: data if it is profitable until they are prevented from
Speaker 3: doing so. That's just the bottom line. I mean, we
Speaker 3: went through this with location data, Like it's easy to
Speaker 3: forget that not that long ago, advertisers could know everywhere
Speaker 3: you'd been almost and target things based on your location
Speaker 3: until Apple shut that down with a whole whole change
Speaker 3: to their policies, and that made Mark Zuckerberg super mad.
Speaker 3: He's still mad about it, talks about it all the time.
Speaker 3: And health data, it's probably like the next frontier. I mean,
Speaker 3: you're right. What's really scary for me is like the
Speaker 3: cycle tracking stuff. We've actually done some reporting on that.
Speaker 3: This is a very real scenario. That's gonna sound like dystopian,
Speaker 3: but this is real. When companies gather this data, if
Speaker 3: they're not encrypting it, let's say law enforcement can go
Speaker 3: subpoena that data. So a lot of times the way
Speaker 3: they solve crimes. Nowadays is our phones are tracking us
Speaker 3: all the time, and even if Apple is preventing Facebook
Speaker 3: from getting that data, every one of our cell phone
Speaker 3: providers has that data at and T Verizon, and when
Speaker 3: they get a subpoena from local law enforcement or the
Speaker 3: FBI or whoever, they turn that data over. And most
Speaker 3: people don't object to that because it's generally it happens
Speaker 3: with a warrant and it's like somebody had to be
Speaker 3: involved in a serious crime. But we now live in
Speaker 3: a time where a serious crime might be, you know,
Speaker 3: missing a cycle, and then the Age of Louisiana thinks
Speaker 3: that you've broken state law and, according to their law,
Speaker 3: committed murders, so they're going to go subpoena that data.
Speaker 3: That's very frightening to me.
Speaker 1: No states currently have laws that say that they could
Speaker 1: use your phone data to track you and figure out
Speaker 1: if you've obtained an abortion, but there have been instances
Speaker 1: where law enforcement agencies have used data in investigation. So
Speaker 1: in Idaho, law enforcement used cell phone data to charge
Speaker 1: a mother and son with kidnapping for aiding an abortion
Speaker 1: seeker who traveled across state lines to receive care and
Speaker 1: So in response to these concerns, there have been a
Speaker 1: bunch of states that have enacted laws to protect reproductive
Speaker 1: health data from being exploited.
Speaker 2: I like it, and I like the geo fencing around
Speaker 2: healthcare facilities.
Speaker 3: Apple tries really hard to make sure that that data
Speaker 3: they either don't ever get it or it's encrypted in
Speaker 3: a way that nobody else can get it. Like, they're
Speaker 3: quite good at that, to the point that law enforcement
Speaker 3: gets real mad at them. That's why, Like, if you
Speaker 3: ever want to have a conversation that law enforcement can access,
Speaker 3: use imassage.
Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, for real, all of my criminal activity is
Speaker 1: about to start. My Villain Richard story starts today.
Speaker 2: You and your Apple Watch.
Speaker 1: So I saw a stat that said that in twenty
Speaker 1: twenty three, fifty percent of adults between thirty five and
Speaker 1: forty four reported that they own a wearable fitness or
Speaker 1: wellness device. And then we also saw that the higher
Speaker 1: your education level I'm in, the higher your income, the
Speaker 1: more likely you are to use these devices. In your opinion,
Speaker 1: how can wearable technology be made more accessible, especially when
Speaker 1: we're thinking about how this could help improve your health
Speaker 1: outcomes when you become more aware of what's going on.
Speaker 3: That's a good question. I think that some of it
Speaker 3: could be awareness. I often forget that I pretty much
Speaker 3: have my phone on me all the time anyway. It
Speaker 3: has a health app on it that is tracking every
Speaker 3: one of my steps, whether or not I have aware.
Speaker 3: Every phone is wearable effectively if you are carrying it,
Speaker 3: and it's quite accurate. Another thing is I think that
Speaker 3: there's a normal cycle and technology where it starts out
Speaker 3: as an expensive toy for the rich, and then it
Speaker 3: just becomes cheaper and more accessible. I mean, I think
Speaker 3: the maybe the underlying question is how do we make
Speaker 3: it not just accessible, but how do we make it
Speaker 3: useful to people? Because it's telling you, well, you didn't
Speaker 3: get a lot of activity because you're a long haul
Speaker 3: truck driver and you're stuck in the cab twelve hours
Speaker 3: a day. Does that even have any utility?
Speaker 1: You know, it's true.
Speaker 2: But if you're a member of a population that historically
Speaker 2: has had less access to healthcare or has had medical
Speaker 2: mistrusts over years because of you know, actual events, I
Speaker 2: think something that tells you about heart incidents is important,
Speaker 2: right if you're able to track or catch those things early.
Speaker 2: And so I'm like, once we remove that economic layer
Speaker 2: or the act like just the barrier to entry into
Speaker 2: some of these things. How do we say, like, hey,
Speaker 2: I know you feel like this is tracking, and it
Speaker 2: might be, but it could also save your life or
Speaker 2: save you hundreds of dollars or thousands in the long run.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I hope that one way that it becomes more
Speaker 3: accessible is more insurance companies subsidize it. Right now, Medicare
Speaker 3: advantage plans will pay for an Apple Watch, and why
Speaker 3: because of exactly what you just said, Like, if they
Speaker 3: can prevent you having to go to the er, that's
Speaker 3: going to save them tens of thousands of dollars. Better
Speaker 3: that you get an early alert through your watch, you
Speaker 3: go to your doctor, you get the care you need
Speaker 3: when you need it. I mean, it could be a
Speaker 3: win win, and sometimes the driver is economic right with insurance.
Speaker 2: I'm curious about what advice you would give to consumers
Speaker 2: that are looking to integrate these devices into their lives
Speaker 2: without feeling overwhelmed, you know, and without riding the highs
Speaker 2: and lows of blood glucose monitoring notifications that shame you
Speaker 2: for not moving and also like and just not becoming
Speaker 2: a hypochondriac because all these things happen without your awareness
Speaker 2: before and just knowing that your body does have some
Speaker 2: resilience to manage these types of things.
Speaker 3: That's a great question, because it's definitely I think, as
Speaker 3: this conversation is illustrated, it is not one size fits all.
Speaker 3: Every single one of us has had a different experience,
Speaker 3: and I feel very privileged that I have been able
Speaker 3: to try all these different devices, you know, and part
Speaker 3: of it is my job. I just call people up.
Speaker 3: I'm like, hey, I want to try your device and
Speaker 3: maybe I'll write about it. I would say, just start
Speaker 3: somewhere a used Apple Watch, see if you want to
Speaker 3: get into it is a great way to start and
Speaker 3: not too expensive.
Speaker 1: Because you're so immersed in all of this, what future
Speaker 1: developments are you excited about? Like what do you see
Speaker 1: coming down the pike that you're like, Okay, this is
Speaker 1: going to be very very cool.
Speaker 3: I think that almost hesitate to say because it sounds
Speaker 3: so nuts. I think brain monitoring is going to be next.
Speaker 3: And I don't mean the Elon musk sticking an electrode
Speaker 3: into your head.
Speaker 2: No one should do that.
Speaker 3: I just mean, like, you know, the EEG headbands, which
Speaker 3: now you can use for biofeedback and such. I think
Speaker 3: that people are going to start playing with those two
Speaker 3: I don't know, you know, help them. First it'll be
Speaker 3: to help them meditate, and later it'll be to help
Speaker 3: them identify, you know, different states of mind. I don't know, I.
Speaker 2: Didn't even think about that.
Speaker 1: Wow, the future is now.
Speaker 2: I think, even when I look at all of this,
Speaker 2: all our data, feels like we need to get a
Speaker 2: cybersecurity people on the line because all of our data
Speaker 2: is up in the air. It feels like up there
Speaker 2: in the clouds, everybody in the clouds, and everybody's pulling
Speaker 2: down different things. I'm seeing your favorite rappers getting caught
Speaker 2: up with screenshots from their text messages, war plans for
Speaker 2: the United States being shared in a messaging app with
Speaker 2: reporters in the app, all the credit bureaus sharing everything.
Speaker 2: All that stuff is just loose on the Internet. I
Speaker 2: feel like.
Speaker 1: All of it's just loose information high fighting up Internet.
Speaker 2: Yes, and so Apple Hell feels like the safest place.
Speaker 2: Maybe that's where I should store my pens, you know, like,
Speaker 2: maybe that's where I should put my passwords. You can
Speaker 2: find Christopher on Instagram and threads at Technically MEMS, and
Speaker 2: if you want to find him on Blue Sky and
Speaker 2: all the other budding platforms, go to MEM's dot club,
Speaker 2: mi MS, dot c l ub.
Speaker 1: You can find us on X and Instagram at Dope
Speaker 1: Labs podcast, tt.
Speaker 2: Is on X and Instagram at d R Underscore.
Speaker 1: T s h O, and you can find Takiya at
Speaker 1: z said So.
Speaker 2: Dope Labs is a production of Lamanada Media.
Speaker 1: Our senior supervising producer is Kristin Lapour and our associate
Speaker 1: producer is Issara Sives.
Speaker 2: Dope Labs is sound design, edited and mixed by James Farber.
Speaker 2: Lamanada Media's Vice President of Partnerships and Production is Jackie Danziger.
Speaker 2: Executive producer from iHeart Podcast is Katrina Norvil. Marketing lead
Speaker 2: is Alison Kanter.
Speaker 1: Original music composed and produced by Taka Yasuzawa and Alex
Speaker 1: sudi Ura, with additional music by Elijah Harvey. Dope Lab
Speaker 1: is executive produced by us T T show Dia and
Speaker 1: Zakiya Wattley.