http://www.gamebike.com en-us Nucleus CMS v3.32 � Weblog http://backend.userland.com/rss http://www.gamebike.com/nucleus/nucleus2.gif http://www.gamebike.com http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=1
Well, I’m that guy.

At least I used to be. Now, I’m fabulous. It all has to do with Dance, Dance Revolution.

One of the side benefits of writing this blog is that I get to work with the GameBike and GamePad crew and they let me tag along on as many special events as I want. We go to huge fitness trade shows in nice places like San Francisco and we also go to lots small, neighborhood and civic events in nice places like Memphis and Corpus Christi. Whatever the venue…we bring a couple of GamePads and a few GameBikes and the crowd goes nuts.

Our job at these events is to make sure everyone who wants to, gets to try out the bikes and pads. There is never a problem getting willing participants. In fact, there is always long line of kids and adults ready to test their eye-to-foot coordination. Doing these events over the past five years, I have finally learned HOW to play Dance, Dance Revolution (DDR) and those 10 year old girls who used to laugh at me are now giving me the reluctant respect that I have earned.

The DDR game software was developed by Konami, a Japanese technology company. The GamePad is the platform on which the actual movements take place and are tabulated on the game monitor. Basically, the GamePad has little buttons that are sensitive to pressure from you feet and as you move your feet to the directions on the DDR images, this pressure determines whether you are following the “dance” directions or if you are a doofus like I was before I found rhythm religion.

One of the great things about GamePad and the DDR program is that participants get a rigorous workout while playing the game. In fact, the aerobic benefits of the DDR program were the subject of a recent scientific study which was commissioned by the American Council on Exercise.
The research was conducted by John Porcari, PH.D., FACSM and Anna Norlin, M.S. at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse. It focused on quantifying DDR’s potential physical benefits by looking at the caloric expenditures data of 24 volunteers. The subjects were male and female and they were ages 12 to 25 years old. Half of the volunteers were under the age of 18 and came from the La Crosse Boys & Girls Club.

The study noted that “based on the physiological responses to three levels of DDR, all subjects showed a marked increase in exercise intensity as they participated. Adult participants burned more calories, which can be attributed to differences in body weight since adults averaged about 25 pounds heavier than teenage subjects. Over average, teens burned 5.9 kcal/min on light mode, 6.7 kcal/min on standard mode and 8.1 kcal/min on difficult mode.”

The testing included continuous monitoring of all participants of the oxygen uptake, heart rate and ratings of perceived exertion. Just hop on a GamePad and go to “difficult” mode and you will learn new meanings for the terms “oxygen uptake” and “perceived exertion!”

This research validates one of the things that we have been saying in our Active Gaming quest. Exercise is effective when it’s fun. Kids and adults have the low attention spans that come from our wired world. You can’t “make” them get physical exercise if it is boring. It has to be fun to work. This leads to another interesting corollary to this research.

The DDR software and GamePads are equally effective in a physical education environment, especially if there is a curriculum for the students and teachers to follow.
Scott Bodnar of Youth InterACTIVE designs curriculum for the children who participate in the organization’s after school and in school programs and had this to say:

“These games and Gamepads are outstanding tools for supplementing physical education and after school classes. They bring a fresh face to physical activity using the video games kids know and love. There are myriad ways to use this technology along with supplemental curriculum materials to create an extraordinarily fun, active and educational experience. Anything that makes activity something kids WANT to do rather than HAVE to do is a great ally in the fight against childhood obesity. Fun is the key to this, and DDR and GamePads flat out bring it. With effective lesson plans in place that optimize the use of these high tech tools, the biggest problem is getting the kids to leave the gym when the class is over.”

So, are you ready to trip the light fantastic with some digital booty shakers? You can get your very own GamePad from one of our authorized dealers. Just click on Contact Us. If you’re worried about learning the steps, just ask the nearest 9 or 10 year old. Trust me. They’ll know.]]> General http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=1 Fri, 14 Mar 2008 22:33:49 -0300 http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=2
The report noted that people who do not smoke and people who are not obese tend to live longer. And because these people have the temerity to live longer, this study proved that they cost the healthcare system more than those fat smokers. Health care cost more with infants and old people. Since fat smokers die earlier…voila’...big savings.

As my friend Jeff, who wouldn’t know a BMI from a BMW, would say…Duh!

First, let’s look at the research.

Pieter van Baal led the team that proved the obvious. As you might have deduced from Pieter’s name, he’s not from Kansas. He is an economist at the “Netherlands’ National Institute for Public Health and the Environment.”

Most of us don’t know much about the Netherlands. I like tulips as much as the next guy. My grandmother used “Dutch Cleanser” but this was probably made by Procter and Gamble somewhere in Ohio. On busy days, I identify with little Dutch Boy trying to keep his fingers in the leaky dikes. And I’ve been IN Dutch many times. That’s about the extent of my knowledge of Holland and all things Dutch.

This study noted that, on average, non-obese healthy people lived 84 years. Smokers lived about 77 years and obese people lived about 80 years. Here’s a shock…smokers and obese people had more heart disease than “healthy” people. Further, it stated that the thin and healthy group cost the most from age 20 years on. The total for this group was about $417,000. The cost (in the Netherlands) for caring for obese people from 20 years on was $371,000. For smokers, the number was $326,000.

So far so good. Fat smokers die earlier, probably of a very painful heart attack. But this saves the Dutch some cash because they’re not around to clog up the hospitals. We’re all enjoying a group nod.

The logic of this “unhealthy people cost less in the long run” research starts to show some cracks when the results are applied to the public health policy of the good old US of A.
That Google search revealed that if you are living in the Netherlands, you are required to buy a basic health insurance package and children under the age of 18 are automatically covered by the national health care system for no charge. So, the Dutch enjoy one of the most enlightened, market-driven health care systems in the world. Everyone has insurance coverage at a reasonable, market-driven rate and kids under age 18 don’t pay anything for their coverage.

Note to the U.S. Congress: Call Pieter van Baal and see if he can give you the phone numbers of the folks in the Netherlands who figured this out.

The healthcare system in the Netherlands would be apples. And the system that we have…definitely oranges.

The fact is that in the U.S, an enormous number of families and particularly lower-income families with children don’t have ANY health insurance and can only access the health care system via emergency rooms. Have you been to an emergency room lately? Take some large bills with you.

I will leave it to some of my friends who are legitimate public health experts to argue whether the health outcomes from a system in our country can be accurately compared with the system in the Netherlands. However, it is a fact that Dutch kids get more comprehensive health care and probably avoid some of the chronic diseases such as diabetes, heart disease or liver disease all of which result from childhood obesity.

On a more basic level, the reason why this Dutch study is not applicable to our situation in the U.S. involves the demographics of obesity. This study was historical. It’s all about what happened over the past. The problem with drawing conclusions based on this historical data is that childhood obesity has only become an epidemic in the past 5-7 years and is growing exponentially every year. We don’t know how extensive the diseases and health care costs will be when a 10 year old child becomes diabetic today because the situation on this scale has never occurred before. With proper medication and health care, a chronically ill child can probably live many years. But that health care is going to cost you and me a lot of money in the form of taxes. See “Emergency room” above.

This situation is made worse by the fact that lower income and minority children are more likely to become obese and less likely to have health insurance to cover this lifetime of expense. If they lived in the Netherlands, these obesity related expenses would be ameliorated by the universal insurance. Not so here.

So, will the kids who are obese now die at an earlier age than their parents? Unless childhood obesity is dealt with on a more comprehensive basis, the sad answer is yes. Will these shorter lifetimes save us as much money as these researchers say they will? Probably not. Is it problematic to draw conclusions from research that may or may not be valid in a different country and situation? Yes.

It makes more sense to invest some cash on the “front end” in measurable programs that help families out of the obesity related cycle of chronic illness. If we want to save some real bucks, don’t count on people dying sooner. Move the needle just a little on childhood obesity and we will see a big ROI.]]> Archive http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=2 Tue, 4 Mar 2008 23:55:00 -0400 http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=3
The problem with physical therapy is that it usually hurts like heck. Some patients say that “PT” really stands for “Pain & Torture.” I know a few physical therapists and they hate to be a part of anything that makes a patient uncomfortable or experience pain. Especially if this pain screams: STOP RIGHT NOW!! YOU’RE KILLIN’ ME! Unfortunately, this pain is a part of their job.

Coming back from a stroke, or broken bone or any kind of surgery through a physical therapy regime can be agonizingly painful. However, here’s the worst part…It’s Booooooring!

Well, admirers of Marquis de Sade, the pain and suffering have ended in some physical therapy offices. And to what do we attribute this great medical advancement?

Active Gaming. What else?

Yep. Products such as the GameBike and Nintendo’s fabulous product Wii, now have a role in the PT world. In a recent Associated Press story about this change, Mr. James Osburn, who manages the rehabilitation services at Herrin Hospital in Southern Illinois, noted, “In the Wii system, because it’s kind of a game format, creates this inner competitiveness. Even though you may be boxing or playing tennis against some figure on the screen, it’s amazing how many of our patients want to beat their opponent.”

“When people can refocus their attention from the tediousness of the physical (therapy) task, oftentimes they do much better,” Osburn said.

In the case of GameBike, this “refocus” is due to the patented steering mechanism, the plug-and-play connector that allows for play on any video game console and the fact that the pedal speed is directly tied to the speed of the computer characters. This allows the rider to literally become a part of the game. The better the eye-to-hand coordination…the more likely the 55 year old stoke survivor or 10 year old videogame junkie are to get more points and enjoy more success in the game. Meanwhile, the therapy occurs with no tedium.

Not being a physician, (and those of you who might be sick sometime when I’m on the scene can thank your lucky stars for this!) I can’t propose a cogent medical argument for this. I theorize that when the adrenaline starts flowing as the result of the actually participating in the chase game, some part of the brain says…”Hey, I’m behind those little binary guys and I need to pick up the pace to WIN! Forget about my leg…or other damaged appendage…let’s kick some butte’!”

It’s probably evolutionary. A billion years ago, the organisms that moved faster lived and they passed that trait on to their offspring. Now we want to WIN and don’t really have any control over this. In the meantime, if we are rehabbing from a torn ligament and we jump on a GameBike, the competitiveness that probably got us the torn ligament in the first place, kicks in.

If you have read some of the previous CLUEs, or you have clicked on the University of British Columbia research from Dr. Darren Warburten found on this web site, you know that he and his colleagues proved that many more positive health benefits result from subjects riding a GameBike rather than a standard (and boring) exercise cycle. It would seem to be possible that the brain can be fooled into thinking that playing a Wii game or playing a chase game on the GameBike is FUN…not the torture of physical therapy. Talk about your positive effects of neuroplasticity!

If active gaming products like Wii and GameBike can make physical therapy bearable, just imagine what they can do for helping you get a better workout with less tedium.

So, have you gone through physical therapy and found a way to get around the pain and torture?]]> Archive http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=3 Thu, 14 Feb 2008 22:22:00 -0400 http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=8
Plus, did I mention that they get to ride on the coolest bikes on the market?

Putting aside the fact that I could never pass the psychological or the physical exam to become a police officer, the reason for my rhapsodizing about the bike cops comes from my reading a recent review of GameBike found on the International Police Mountain Bike Association web site found at www.ipmba.org. The product review was written by Denver police officer, John Medford.

To quote officer Medford:

“GAMEBIKE picks up the speed at which you pedal and translates it into acceleration on the screen. You can make the ride as hard or as easy as you want. The first time I used the GAMEBIKE, I had only planned on a 30-minute ride. I was pedaling along to “Gran Turismo” and began to notice that I was drenched in sweat. A quick glance at the clock revealed the reason. I had been riding hard for 40 minutes. The time just flew by. I had become so involved with the game I completely lost track of time. GAMEBIKE has made my trainer fun and when I teach that early-spring bike school, I will have many more miles under my belt than what our Colorado weather would normally allow.”

“If your trainer doesn’t see much action, the GAMEBIKE will cause you to dust it off. It is fun to use, but if you have kids, watch out – you may never get a chance to use it!”

You can read the entire review at http://www.ipmba.org/reviews-gamebike.htm.

After I read officer Medford’s review, I decided to spend a little more time on the site and came across some very interesting and quirky stuff about the International Police Mountain Bike Association. For example, since it’s founding in 1991 the IPMBA has trained over 20,000 police and EMS personnel. They offer a training curriculum that is nationally and internationally respected. This IPMBA course is POST approved for police and EMS personnel and this course can be reviewed on the IPMBA web site at www.ipmba.org.

More than 3,000 active bike patrol officers and EMS personnel belong to the IPMBA. This represents more than 2,200 agencies in 43 states and 4 countries. That’s a lot of police officers, talking to a lot of neighborhood people and most likely stopping a LOT of crime before it comes to yours and my doorsteps.

The current Board of Directors for the IPMBA supplies some of the most interesting and funny facts about the day-to-day life of a bike cop. For example, the current president, Jim Bowell, an EMS with the Troy, Ohio fire department who as been on bike patrol for 13 years says that his most memorable moment on bike came when lightning struck a tree and three people standing underneath it. Everyone survived because there were four medics on their bikes in the immediate vicinity. Or, a “most memorable” from University of Wisconsin police officer, Kurt Feavel who remembers busting a couple of dope smokers in their car and having one of the articulate lads say, “Dudes. We just got busted by the bike cops. Cool.” (I think I went to college with that guy).

One of the best stories from the officers on bike patrol comes from Charlie Summers who has been an officer for 15 years and a bike patrol dude for the past 10 years. Charlie works for the Illinois State University in Normal, Illinois. While on patrol one day, Charlie was apparently on the wrong end of razzing from some fellow officers who were making fun of his bike patrol status. This continued UNTIL a law breaker took off running and left the officers on foot in his dust. This perpetrator didn’t count on the speed of officer Summers’ Enduro bike. Charlie overtook the crook, made the arrest and got the last laugh on the officers who had mistakenly made light of a cop on a bike.

Now that had to be sweet.

Thanks for taking care of our neighborhoods and businesses officers in the International Police Mountain Bike Association. And thanks for using GameBike to get in shape!

So, have you got a bike patrol story that you want to share?]]> Archive http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=8 Thu, 7 Feb 2008 22:26:00 -0400 http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=16
“The Video Game Biz Has an Epic 2007…Revenues up 43% to nearly $18 Billion.”

Holy Halo 3! Those are some big numbers!

According to the NPD Group, a market research company, the total retail sales of video games last year was $17.94 billion. This is up from $12.53 billion in 2006. This sales tsunami was led by Nintendo’s Wii and Microsoft’s “Halo 3.”

Even though Mom and Dad felt too pinched to buy little Sean and Suzy a new sweater or other more pedestrian presents, they eagerly shelled out the cash for both hardware and software this past Christmas season. Video game hardware sales rose 54% to $7.04 billion, while software sales climbed 34% to $8.64 billion. A big chunk of these sales came in December.

Just about everyone attributes this amazing growth in the category to the success of Wii. This system is groundbreaking because its motion-sensitive controller allows for physical interaction with the games. This is good news for companies who are involved in building products that serve the active gaming niche.

The best selling game of 2007 was the first-person shooter called “Halo 3.” In a “Business 101” textbook example of how a company can brilliantly integrate one product with another, these “Halo 3” sales helped to sell 4.6 million Xbox 360’s in 2007. It’s no coincidence that Microsoft owns ‘em both.

In the “so you wanna act like a rock star” category, Activision’s “Guitar Hero” games remain the industry’s best-selling franchise. The GH games accounted for more than $820 million in sales for various consoles.

The breakdown for games is as follows:

* #1 Halo 3 (4.82 million units)
* #2 Wii Play (4.1 million units)
* #3 Call of Duty 4 for Xbox (3 million units)
* #4 Guitar Hero II on PS2 (2.7 million units)
* #5 Super Mario Galaxy for Wii (2.5 million units)

As if they needed any more kudos, Nintendo’s biggest success was with the handheld DS console which sold a walloping 8.5 million units. This made it the best selling videogame devise in 2007. Sony’s PSP was a distant second with 3.8 million units. So, now you know what all of those little kids in the airport, doctor’s office, grocery store, ballgame and any other place on the planet are playing with.

So, what does this mean?

Probably many things, not all of which are positive.

First off, if I was running an entertainment company, whether it’s a TV network, movie studio, cable channel…whatever…I wouldn’t be worried so much whether the writers ever come back from their strike. I would be scouring the little web design studios and the independent comic book artists and writers and start throwing money at them to come up with the next big video game thing. I would also try and figure out how to get the dreck off TV and movies and make these media more compelling and more interactive. Less cheap-to-produce “reality” programs and a lot more good stories told well.

If I was a PE teacher or a physical fitness instructor for children or workout facility owner, I would be figure out how to harness this amazingly popular medium to get kids excited about the fun of movement by interacting with these console games. It’s hard to hold the attention of a 13 year old with laps around the gym after she has played “Dance Dance Revolution.”

There will always be people will think that video games are the Beelzebub of entertainment and there’s no question that too much of any “eye candy” will lead to couch potato gut and brain rot. However, the real question here is not whether kids will buy and play video games. The jury’s in on that one.

A better question is: How do we use this incredible medium to get kids and adults some aerobic exercise while they’re having a blast?

I think we know the answer to that one too.

So have you got a Boffo Riff from Tinseltown? Have your guy call my girl and let’s do lunch real soon. ]]> General http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=16 Thu, 24 Jan 2008 01:18:00 -0400 http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=15
Some of the products that I worked on were winners but there were lots of duds that seemed like winners at the time that we foolishly decided to make them. It’s very difficult to predict what a kid will enjoy playing with. If you’re a kid reading this, you know what I mean. You guys are much tougher than adults. Adults are fairly logical, sensible, mature and boring. And kids…well…kids are diabolically brilliant. And they do not suffer fools well.

There was one team of toy and game developers that for some reason always seemed to know what millions of kids would pester Mom and Dad to buy. This duo was Richard Knerr and Arthur Melin and they were the most successful toy inventors in history. They started a little company, maybe you’ve heard of it…called Wham-O!

I was reminded of the Wham-O story by the death of Richard Knerr on January 14, 2007. He passed away from complications from a stroke at age 82. Mr. Melin died in 2002.

Not since the team of Hanna and Barbera have two guys made such an impression on kids.

The New York Times ran the obituary of Richard Knerr a few days after his death and as they say on TV, “you couldn’t make this stuff up!”

After graduating from college and refusing to go into their respective families’ businesses, Knerr and Melin decided to go into business together and their first product was a slingshot. They got the slingshot idea because they had pet falcons and wanted to hurl hunks of meat up into the air to train the birds. The sound that the slingshot made was…you guessed it…”Wham-O.”

In 1955, they ran into Walter Morrison who was selling he called “Pluto Platters” in the parking lot. Some say that these flying disks were originally pie tins made by the “Frisbie Pie Company” of Bridgeport, Connecticut and thrown around by Yale students. Mr. Knerr told the NY Times in 2002 that it was a coincidence and that the Wham-O disks were named after a comic-strip character named Mr. Frisbie. Under any circumstances, the Frisbie took off, literally and figuratively. Since its introduction, millions of students have wasted millions of hours tossing the Frisbie.

Arguably the biggest toy invention in history came in 1958. Knerr and Melin were talking to a friend from Australia about a wooden hoop used in exercise classes in that country. The big idea came when the Aussie showed the two entrepreneurs how to gyrate their hips to spin the hoop. The Wham-O duo gave it a cool name; “Hula Hoop” and decided to manufacture the item in colorful plastic.

In the first year of Hula Hoopla, the company sold more than 40 million Hula Hoops! By 1960 they hit the 100 million mark, a level that no other toy had ever reached. After just about every household in developed world had 2 or 3 Hula Hoops, the craze came to sudden, screeching stop leaving Wham-O holding about a bazillion tubular plastic hoops. When the final dust cleared, Wham-O had a total profit of only $10,000, the result of business inexperience and millions of unsold Hula Hoops.

Now here’s the best part.

Did this brutal lesson in inventory management and the capricious minds of 12-year olds make Knerr and Melin bitter and drive them away from the toy business. Heck no! They just made some more great toys.

In the next years, Wham-O brought out some of the best toy products in history. Who can forget the sheer delight of bouncing a SuperBall off your grandmother’s dining room floor, ceiling, table, light fixture, floor, ceiling, china and back to the ceiling? Or those great summer afternoons running from the Water Wiggly Sprinkler or busting your booty on the Slip ‘N Slide water slide? How about the Limbo game? And what birthday party is complete without someone getting about a pound of Silly String in their hair?

It doesn’t get any better than that baby!

It’s also fascinating to learn about the Wham-O products that were duds. Some of my favorites were the mail-order mink coats for $9.95 and the $119 do-it-yourself bomb shelter. These were products that were, shall we say, ahead of their time.

In 1982, Knerr and Melin decided to chill. They sold Wham-O to the Kransco Group for $12 million. It was later sold to Mattel which sold it to an investor group.

While I never met Richard Knerr and Arthur Melin, I am positive that the money they made from their company’s products and ultimate sale was least important part of their lives. These guys had a BIG time. They made products that kids loved. And I’ll bet they laughed a lot.

That’s a life well lived.]]> General http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=15 Wed, 23 Jan 2008 01:17:00 -0400 http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=17
These are weighty subjects and you deserve some answers. Pronto!

I don’t care how sophisticated you might think you are, at some point in time, you yawn. It might be behind closed doors, or you might try and stifle it by keeping your mouth closed while you cheeks strain to let that baby out, but you yawn. We all do.

There. I’ve said it. Now that this dirty little secret is out in the open and we’ve admitted it, the next step is to understand why we yawn. It’s actually a very interesting story.

I learned about the yawn one afternoon during a particularly boring meeting around a client’s conference room. Somebody was droning on and on, ad infinitum about the third quarter numbers not meeting expectations…or something equally scintillating. BTW, this self-important mumbler is no one that you know. He/she is not anyone I work with now, nor anyone who might want to give me a big, fat performance bonus. Got that? If you are a current colleague, client or friend, this is not about you! It was some other boring, bag of wind.

As I was staring at my laptop, pretending to take copious notes of what was being imparted by this sad excuse for a communicator, I happened upon an article by Heidi Dawley who writes good stuff for www.medialifemagazine.com. Her piece was entitled “The real truth about yawns.”

She had me at “The real truth.”

Turns out, the yawn is not a sign a sign of boredom. Nope. The real purpose of a yawn is to cool the brain. Whenever we open that big Boca to yawn and that fresh air comes rushing in, the brain gets a refreshing shot of this. Heidi talked to scientists and they agreed that the fresh, cooler air invigorates the brain, allowing it to better focus on whatever matter is at hand. Including, but not limited to the adverse impact of the third quarter numbers!

So, rather than a rude sign of boredom, the yawn can be seen as an expression of interest.

Professor Gordon Gallup from the psych department at the State University of New York in Albany noted that yawning is as natural as scratching our heads. It begins before we are born and it is also common among many animals.

Mr. Gallup further added that the idea of yawning cooling the brain arises from the fact that the old noodle uses lots of calories to operate, about one-third of our caloric intake, and this kicks off lots of heat. “Brains are like computers, notes Prof Gallup. They can operate efficiently when they are effectively cooled.”

Side bar: If the brain is burning those kinds of calories, why aren’t we trying to think our way out of this obesity crisis?

But, I digress.

Apparently, when a person’s brain temperature becomes too elevated, it triggers a yawn. When the poor schlub yawns, large volumes of cool air pour into the lungs, cooling down the blood in the capillaries. This causes the heart rate and blood pressure to increase and this in turn sends a cool wave to the brain. Et voila’… a cooler brain.

So, what about the phenomenon of contagious yawning? You see someone else yawn and you have an urge to do the same. Gallop tested this “cooling the brain” theory on a few (no doubt, bored) grad students. He showed them video of people yawning and instructed them to breathe through their noses or hold a cold pack to their heads. He found that the yawning stopped while the participants were engaged in these brain cooling techniques.

There’s also a theory about how contagious yawning got started. In the cave-dweller times, vigilant watching was important for group safety. Nod off and some wooly mammoth would take a bite outta your backside. So, if someone yawned it would have shown that the person’s brain was performing at a “suboptimal level” (that’s a little anthropological term to see if you’re still awake). A big ol yawn all around could have helped ensure that the group maintained vigilance.

So, the next time someone bores you to tears or you’ve been trying to cram an entire semester’s reading assignments into one night, go ahead and let out a giant yawn. It’s cool for the brain.

So, do you have any bodily functions that have been perplexing you? Post them here. We will publish the clean ones.]]> General http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=17 Thu, 17 Jan 2008 01:20:00 -0400 http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=18
This daydream of winning an NFL game with an 80-yard pass with 22-seconds left to play or dating Hollywood starlets who may or may not know how to spell N-F-L is perfectly understandable. However, this whole fantasy thing has gotten a lot more organized.

We’re talking virtual worlds where we can experience the thrill of victory and the agony of rejection without leaving the safe confines of our computer terminal. And it’s moved way past the Dungeons and Dragon crowd when Second Life has tens of millions of consumers traveling on “islands” paid for by Coca-Cola and IBM.

So, which demographic group would you guess is the fastest growing bunch living in this fantasy world of avatars and no-guilt urls? >

Yep. It’s those wacky kids again.

By 2011, an estimated 53% of U.S. children and teen internet users will visit virtual worlds according to eMarketer. This is according to Debra Aho Williamson, a senior analyst with the organization. This is up from the 24% of teens and children that dropped into the virtual world in 2007. This report further forecasted that 87.1% of U.S. teens will go online at least once monthly. I would have guessed that number would have been about 99%.

Needless to say, where there are this many teens and younger kids (this includes the dorky account executive in the cubicle next to you), there are marketing people working until all hours, trying to figure out how to sell them something.

As Steve Martin first exclaimed….”Oh, it’s a profit deal!” And in this great, supply-and-demand, free market country, there’s nothing wrong with that. Up to a point.

The granddaddy of all children’s marketing companies; The Walt Disney Company is all over this virtual world. It purchased Club Penguin, a virtual world for kids recently for $350 million. It also owns the virtual world of Toontown Online and Virtual Magic Kingdom and has plans to create virtual sites based on “Pirates of the Caribbean” and one based on the “Disney Fairies.” If you’re a proud stockholder of this very successful company, rest assured they are not investing this kind of cash because they have a few hundred web designers sitting around needed something to do.

Some other well known and successful kid’s marketing and entertainment companies have also made the trek through the internet ether of virtualosity. (I know. Spell-check just told me…not a word). Huge kid’s entertainment companies, Viacom and Warner Brothers have jumped in with both avatar feet.

Viacom has a bunch of TV-themed properties like Virtual Laguna Beach, Virtual Hills, Virtual Pimp My Ride, Virtual Newport Harbor and Virtual Real World Sydney. While WB will launch someplace called T-Works in early 2008 and this environment will be ad-supported and will allow users to create avatars that are based on cartoon characters.

An article on this virtual world for kids phenomenon written by Laurie Sullivan of Media Post mentioned a few other well-traveled virtual world sites for kids. These include BarbieGirls.com, Nicktropolis, Stardoll and the big kahuna Webkinz. These sites have traffic numbers that will make consumer product companies that target kids salivate. Barbie Girls had more than 1.1 million unique U.S. visitors in 2007 and Nickropolis had 2.2 million unique visitors.

Hello banner ads for kid products!

There are also some interesting virtual worlds that encourage kids to learn some healthy habits. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has a site that had some avatars randomly become Ill and they had to find a local CDC center to get virtually inoculated. In the process, these sick little avatars learned why they got sick and how to live a healthier life.

Hopefully, these sick avatars had some virtual health insurance. Otherwise, they might be taking a second virtual mortgage on their virtual home to pay the virtual hospital bill. Have you seen the rates for virtual office visits these days?!?

Have you got a Clue on virtual life? Fire up your personal avatar and have him or her shoot us an email.]]> General http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=18 Thu, 10 Jan 2008 01:21:00 -0400 http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=19
Like you, I read the “Great Ideas for Gifts” columns, which now start to appear in October. But instead of filing them away for my Christmas/Hanukkah buying frenzy, I have decided to focus my rabid consumerism on the season that every physical fitness nut lives for…the New Year. Now, we can all scream in unison…Happy New Gear!!!

If the truth be known, part of the reason I’m doing is this because I write this blog for a company that makes products that are designed for this fitness crowd. Plus, I knew if I waited for all of the other media to file their obligatory “Great Gifts” columns, some of them would have cool fitness products and this would make my researching process MUCH easier.

I may be lazy, but I am not as my sister used to insist a “copy-cat.” Or, at least when I am a copy-cat, I will give the publications proper credit for all their good ideas.

One publication that I got a bunch of Happy New Gear ideas was Austin Fit Magazine. In fact, giving someone or yourself a subscription to this terrific magazine would be a really good way to bring in the new gear!

Here are some other great ways to spend of that holiday cash and get healthier.

If you play any kind of sports, you should check out the best sports bags on the planet. They are produced by Sfear and as the company says, they “add some flash and fashion to your functional needs.” Sfear makes the Roksak (for basketballers), the Kiksak (for soccer kickers, get it?), Stiksak (baseballers) and Blitzsak (footballers). Great products and a great company made up of sports fanatics and hysterically funny people.

Need some tunes for your run? How about the Sony S2 Sports Walkman?. This unit is small enough to ensure you are not weighted down and designed to be the perfect auditory stimulus. And, as we all know…there’s not enough of that going around.

Nothing says “Happy New Gear!” like a new upright GameBike home version. Unless you’re just hitting this web site for the first time, you know how cool GameBike is. But did you know you could order the home version on this very site? Click here and make your dreams come true. While we don’t sell the GamePad on this site, you CAN get information on getting one by clicking here. We will have an authorized dealer to get you a GamePad pronto!

Two of the best cardio and upper-body exercises ever just got a little more high tech and high touch. The Calorie Counting jump rope is a great twist on a classic piece of equipment. If you want to turbo-charge your push ups, check out the Push Up Pro. These two handles allow your wrists to swivel as you are pushing up, thereby engaging more muscles and guaranteeing you that you will never, ever have sand kicked in your face at the beach again.

Many runners are closet cardiologists and need to know everything that’s going on with the old ticker while they are pounding the pavement. If you’re one of those runners, you might need a Hudson Fitness Sport Deluxe heart rate monitors. The same folks who designed and make GameBikes & GamePads make this little beauty and in addition to having a stopwatch, lap record, maximum heart rate display and a bunch of other clever features, this watch has target heart rate zone setting with audio and visual alarm and an audible heart rate zone alarm. This unit is the perfect way for you to know more than I ever want to know about matters of the heart.

Are your kids bored with the high tech video games, MP3 players, Ipods and TV’s built into a toothbrush, etc? Well, how about letting them take the Fit Deck Challenge. This deck of cards, invented by a former Navy SEAL and fitness instructor is one of the coolest and “lowest tech” product ever to get kid’s excited about exercises.

If you want some other Happy New Gear stuff for your GameBike, how about getting some of those chase games that work with your PS2, Xbox, Gamecube, Nintendo. Click here to get a list of some games that work with your GameBike

So, have you gotta a CLUE on how to say Happy New Gear? Post it here and we’ll share it with the rest of the class. ]]> General http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=19 Fri, 28 Dec 2007 01:25:00 -0400 http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=20
Who doesn’t love to sleep?

Kids, that’s who.

I can remember putting up a fight when my sweet grandmother made me take an afternoon nap when I visited her. Of course, to show me what a good sport she was, she took a little snooze with me. I now appreciate all aspects of that dynamic.

For as long as there have been kids, they have balked at going to bed on time. For some reason, in the past couple of generations, parents have balked at being parents…thus allowing kids to stay up later and later.

So, what’s the big deal? The kid’s happy. She’s up in her room watching TV or texting friends, or surfing the web or any number of other multi-tasks. You’re happy because you’re in your den watching more adult fare or web surfing or pontificating on what’s wrong with that crazy younger generation.

The problem, dear Brutus or Betty is that your kids need more sleep than they are getting. If they don’t get this sleep and don’t get any exercise, they are very likely going to develop obesity and everything that comes along with that ugly word.

In the November issue of Pediatrics magazine, researchers led by Dr. Julie Lumeng of the University of Michigan found that every additional hour per night that a third grader spends sleeping reduces the childs chances of being obese in the sixth grade by 40%! The less sleep the child got, the more likely he/she was to be obese in the sixth grade, no matter what the child’s weight was in the third grade.

The study noted that the optimal time for third graders to sleep was 9 hours and 45 minutes per night. Sleeping more than this lowered the risk for obesity significantly.

Some studies among adults suggest some reasons for this. Apparently, a lack of sleep affects two hormones that control appetite regulation. Sleepy gown-ups produced more ghrelin, a hormone that promotes hunger and less leptin, a hormone that signals fullness. This might have a similar effect on kids. Another explanation: tired kids are less likely to exercise and more likely to sit on the couch and eat cookies.

This research should give parents and kids some motivation to stack some more ZZZ’s. Who wants to be fat when you can get a little exercise and sleep more? Plus, it’s a very good argument to enforce bedtimes, restrict caffeine in the form of soft drinks and remove the TV and computer from the bedroom.

Your parents, their parents, their parents and so on back to the beginning of time have all set and enforced bedtimes. Somewhere along the way to our current state of affairs, we have gotten away from being “parents” and became “buddies.”

Just so we’re all on the same page, parents look out for their kids. They don’t let them do things that will make them sick. And if they’re lucky, they get to take a nap with their kids and call it “important physical fitness activity.”

So have you got a clue about sleeping? Wake me up and post it in morning. ]]> General http://www.gamebike.comindex.php?itemid=20 Thu, 20 Dec 2007 01:28:00 -0400