The development of "life recorders" to log personal activity, biodata, etc, is under way. While R&D is still in the early stages, these systems may dramatically change the way we live our lives.
In February 2008 Hitachi Ltd of Japan released a "wristwatch" for Yen500,000. It was not decorated with expensive jewels, and it did not mark Hitachi's entry into the watch business. True, it does have a function to display the time, but that's not what it was made for. In actuality, this wristwatch-type terminal measures user vitals such as pulse, skin temperature and motion around-the-clock, 24 hours a day.
It is exceedingly simple to use: you just slip it over your wrist, just like a watch. Onboard sensors measure pulse, skin temperature, motion and other items, and log the data to internal memory. The data can be transferred to a personal computer (PC) via a wireless link, and then used by a special application to estimate things like number of paces walked, activity (calories consumed) and sleep time. Data is graphed, making it easy to see changes over time. For example, the graph function can be used to review activity for the day.
Terminals like these should actually be called life recorders: data recorders that log daily activity, biometric data and other data for a single user over the course of a day. Life recorders automatically log data without the need for any operator interaction, and the data they yield can be mined for a variety of information we have formerly overlooked.
In 2008, research and development (R&D) of life recorders took off as a diverse array of private enterprises, research institutes and other groups began shifting their focus to the development of such equipment.
Health equipment
manufacturers such as Omron Healthcare Co Ltd, Nipro Corp, and
Matsushita Electric Works Ltd, all of Japan, have been announcing
terminals to measure physical activity, or plan to do so in the near
future (Table 1). All of the manufacturers with the exception of
Suzuken Co Ltd of Japan are releasing a product for the first time in
this category. Industry sources say that companies including Tanita
Corp and Toshiba Consumer Marketing Corp, both of Japan, are also
considering releasing similar products. Activity monitors log the
user's physical activity for each day, and while they are indeed "life
recorders", they are specifically designed to make it possible to
accurately measure the amount of physical activity for that day. Data
logged to the terminal is uploaded to the PC via a Universal Serial Bus
(USB) link. Prices are from about Yen10,000 to about Yen40,000.
The Hitachi wristwatch-type terminal mentioned above, on the other hand, is a multi-function model providing much more data than merely activity.
These terminals, which are just beginning to appear in the market, are merely the first step toward making real life recorders available at reasonable prices. According to Taizo Kinoshita, president & CEO, WirelessInfo Venture Co of Hitachi, the product is an experimental terminal also designed to research market potential, and in fact many firms appear to be trying to figure out where they want to go next. Life recorders in the future will be aiming at significant market expansion, and will undergo a gradual evolution in application, appearance and other characteristics.
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