Report of Chapter 6

  Not long before I came here for my master degree, I was trying my best to lose my weight for almost one month though I was failed eventually because of idleness. I ate less food than before, kept walking and running at least one hour every day and did something wacked in my roommates’ view. They were all confused about what I was doing till they noticed a smart fitness tracker on my wrist.

  The smart fitness tracker could record how many steps I had taken, how much calories I had burnt off, how long I had walked and show the real-time data from the touched rectangle screen on it if I touched and lighten it up. Absolutely, the accurate time would be inevitably told when I was walking or running as well by touching the screen.

  The tracker could collect sports data like steps and transmit it to the corresponding app in my smartphone by blue-tooth. It also provided a function that monitored my heart rate all the time and noticed me by vibrating if my heart beat out of the normal range.

  I could set the target in advance and check out what I had done by looking at the presented blanks provided by the app before I went to bed. The blanks were generated automatically according to the analysis of collected date from fitness tracker and there was a mentioned message if I had not accomplished the target. This function helped me a lot by motivating myself to keep moving to accomplish the target, but it didn’t work so well after I lost the curiosity on it. So how to keep the novelty of customer when they are using the smart fitness tracker is the biggest issue for its manufacturer I think.

  Someone said the smart fitness tracker would be replaced by the smartwatch, especially the looming of Apple watch. I don’t agree with them about this item as the author, we just use the fitness tracker for our health.

  Although people become more wealthy than before around the world who can afford the cost of smartwatch like Apple watch or Galaxy gear, it not means that they want to get a partial functional alternative of smartphone. After all, whipping out the smartphone and dealing with phone calls or messages from face-book isn’t difficult and the screen of smartwatch is conspicuous for most people. It’s a little wacky to make a phone call by putting our wrist in mouth or ears. In China, people who use smartwatch would be regarded as a flaunted man and I haven’t seen anyone who wore a smartwatch around me. But I think if the smartwatch had the whole functions of a smartphone or it could make a projection on our hand to touch instead of liquid crystal display screen, it would be popular.

  The smart glass made by Google isn’t a useful wearable appliance like smartwatch as well in my opinion. Let’ not talk about privacy issues first, the high price of smart glass will be prohibitive for common people. Although it will be convenient and interesting for us to record our normal lives by using smart glass, it would make the distance between people more and more distant than the smartphone did.

  I really appreciate the combination of smartwatch and smart shirt by the author. “Your smartwatch detects a variation in your heart rate and, simultaneously, your smart shirt indicates that you’re sweating and having trouble breathing. Combine the data points and a smart service might rightly determine that you’re about ready to have a heart attack and then alert paramedics or your doctor of your situation.” (Putting the data to use, chapter 6) I think if Dr. Templar had these smart wearable appliances, we won’t be nervous about her oversleeping anymore. It’s pretty good for old people who live alone.

  It’s the truth that companies like Apple, Google, Amazon or Samsung will utilize our personal data to make profits. After all, we have to use their appliances or other online service. It is legitimate that they collect consumers’ personal data about usage habits or body condition for promoting their products or service, but it is illegal to sell our data to other profit-making institutions like insurance companies for profits. Unfortunately, it’s difficult to define these behaviors in law and issue relevant laws to limit and prohibit it.

  In China, reselling personal information is really a grievous issue for government as well. I always receive lots of trash messages or phone calls for advertising. Though there is a law to limit this illegal behavior, it still exists because of the high profit.