Square-eyes

Juniper Foo | Apr 20, 2006

The Brunel Design awards are here again with great invention ideas that push the envelope. So whatever happened to the class of 2005? At least one held great promise last year when British undergrad Gillian Swan presented a devious concept to combat growing obesity among kids. Called Square-eyes, it's a reward scheme where the more steps one takes, the more TV time one earns. The insoles are embedded with sensors and record the number of steps taken daily. These are then beamed back to a base station via radio signals, and the tally displayed on an LCD screen. Here's what's even more sneaky. Once tube time runs out, the TV automatically switches off until more steps are tallied up. It pays to be a gal here since Swan targeted 12,000 steps for girls and 15,000 for boys. For the record, every 100 steps recorded by the Square-eyes shoes equals precisely 1 minute of TV time.

See the insole upclose | base station

Price: N.A.
Availability: Prototype displayed at the Brunel Design
Device: Shoe insoles
Basic specs: N.A.

Filed under: Future Tech
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