thoughts on nikeplus.com (Nike + iPod Sports Kit)

What's the site I keep hitting the refresh button all day long? Ironically, it's the one place that's helped me spend more time off-line.

Nikeplus.com (and the hardware you need to enjoy it, Nike + iPod Sports Kit) is - in a nutshell - a pedometer that tracks your running speed and distance and a site to upload that data. But the site is so much more. It's shining feature is the part that uses your running data and lets you compete virtually with others who also own the sports kit. It's become a great motivational tool for my runs and upped my mileage over the last few months. Here's their site to explain how it works (link).

These virtual races you have with others are really addictive. It's a quickly growing community and I've managed to organize a few monthly challenges myself. With each challenge, you get instant updates on how you're doing against others (here I am in the first few days of a new race and already no. 6!)

Click on the link to see all the growing features nike and apple are adding (google maps to share your running routes, running events, discussion boards) After some runs I can rise a few notches up, then if I can't run for a few days, I'll find myself falling behind to the bottom. It becomes a good motivational tool to tell myself on the run "just 1/2 a mile more and I can be in the top 5!) Running has always been a solitary affair for me as I've never quite found friends who would run at the same pace or at the same time. With the virtual race with runners all around the country it doesn't matter where and what time you run. And they're a good bunch of folks on the site, too (you can write quick text messages where the site tells us to "talk trash" but it's been nothing but nice words in my running group). And the biggest motivation of all? The sense that the running steps I am taking are part of the grand new direction in melding sports and virtual social networking (!!)... well, maybe not (one small step for me, one giant step for internet history!) Anyway, as you might be able to tell, running has taken on a whole new level of excitement for me.

I sure hope other products will follow the lead of Nike and Apple's success and come up with socially networkable bikes, tennis rackets, basketballs and even dance shoes (with of course, social networking sites of equal elegance and simplicity). I understand there's a closed networked driving range with RIFD tagged golf balls and scoring systems near Washington DC. It's a great step but being able to compete with anyone in the world will be its true potential.

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nike, iPod, nike+, running, pedometer, social networking, sports technology