Nintendo Wii

Line waiting, the new American pastime

Keith Shaw — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 12:18:32 -0400

When I was in New York City yesterday, the bus I was riding on drove past the Apple Store on Fifth Avenue (right across from Central Park and the Plaza Hotel), and there was a huge line of people outside still waiting to buy an iPhone. Other reports in the blogosphere and anecdotally from co-workers have confirmed lines at similar Apple Stores. Personally, I'm now on Day 6 of waiting on AT&T to deliver my 16GB Apple iPhone 3G, with no new messages from the company, and the very vague "In progress" status on their "check your order" Web page. The company has been holding onto my $299 without providing the device for almost a week now, making the wait even more frustrating. Fortunately I was able to borrow a co-worker's iPhone and get enough time with it to post the official Cool Tools review, but there are still some additional things that I'd like to do with the new iPhone for other articles. Unfortunately, if this goes beyond the "seven to 10 days" that I was told (I know, they were probably throwing numbers out of their butt just to appease us), I'm losing enthusiasm for it and may end up just canceling the order altogether. At the time when I was standing in line on July 11, the whole "Order and pay now, and you'll get a device in a week" seemed like the best idea. If I hadn't done that, I would be either waiting in line at the Apple Stores for hours on end like those in New York, San Francisco, Boston, etc., or would be making phone calls to various AT&T stores like some co-workers, hoping for the random glut of iPhones that have come in. One co-worker told me he said an AT&T store member told him that the wait was now 21 days for any direct fulfillment orders. Ugh. Maybe I missed the boat on the whole "waiting in line" part. Can waiting for the next hot device be the next hot social trend? Line-waiters used to be mocked for their obsessiveness, whether it was waiting in line months in advance for the new Star Wars movie, or camping out for Springsteen or Red Sox tickets. But with advances in technology, as long as you have a laptop, broadband connection and a comfortable chair (and umbrella and appropriate weather gear), you can work and wait at the same time! If you're a blogger, even better, because you can still be social on your social networks while just sitting still. Plus, if you're early enough on line, you can attract the local TV news crews and try to get famous without any hard work, the second new American pastime. So forget about whether Apple, AT&T and Nintendo screwed up or deliberately produced shortages to create more buzz (I don't buy those arguments). They should be congratulated for creating a new cultural and social activity for Americans to enjoy. And if the government starts to revive the '70s craze of gasoline rationing, there's another line that we can wait in and enjoy. Sure, waiting for gas isn't as fun as waiting for an iPhone, but I'm sure creative people can find a way to spin it into a new venture or blog.

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Video: Wii Fit: Keith Fat

Keith Shaw — Fri, 23 May 2008 10:15:05 -0400

OK sports fans, here's the infamous video of where I do my first workout with the Wii Fit exercise game from Nintendo. I'm putting my weight and body mass index on the line for the readers and viewers of Network World. Let's hope that after 10 weeks of this, I won't look as hideous. Wish me luck!

Day 2 update: I got up to 30 minutes of activity yesterday, including the lunge exercise, and I'm feeling it in my thighs today. Yikes, this could be harder than I thought! Oh, and I forgot my lunch today, which means I have to go out to eat and face all of the bad possible food choices.

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Wii Fit = Mii Fat

Keith Shaw — Wed, 21 May 2008 17:39:16 -0400

I got Nintendo's Wii Fit exercise "game" today, which includes a new accessory for the Nintendo Wii system (the Balance Board) and a bunch of video game exercises that aim to help you get fitter through yoga, balance games, strength training and aerobics. As part of a video shoot for the Cool Tools video show (hopefully this will publish tomorrow afternoon), I ran through the first set of exercise games and went through the registration process, where you step on the balance board and it measures your body measurement index (or body mass index) and weight. The game pulls no punches. It basically told me that for my height, weight and age, that I was "obese". Yowza. I knew that I was heavier, especially after giving up the treadmill and other exercises now that I have two kids to chase around. But obese? Yikes. The ultimate insult was that the game then changed the look of my Mii character, the avatar that you create to represent you in the video games. Based on my numbers, my Mii went from an average build to a tubbo. Now there's some inspiration, to lose weight so my Mii looks healthier. After the sting of a video game calling me obese wore off, I decided to play some of the exercise games to see if the $90 for the balance board and game would be worth it. After the humiliation of the body test, you get to start training, by choosing whether to do yoga, strength training, aerobics or balance games. Each area has four to six different exercise modules, with additional modules that you can unlock as you get better in the game or if you workout longer. The strength training and yoga modules have you follow a trainer as he or she does the exercises and you duplicate their movements. Thankfully I got to choose a male or female trainer (I picked a female trainer), because I was starting to have flashbacks of my junior high gym coach, Mr. VanVleet, yelling at me for not being able to climb the ropes correctly. The aerobics area and balance games are more Nintendo-like, in that you are playing games that have specific goals, and you forget that you're exercising after a while. My first aerobics foray was the hula hoop game, where I had to swivel my hips like a goofball while trying to keep my virtual hula hoop going. The balance games had me trying to stop a soccer ball with my head by shifting left or right, as well as a skiing one that had me doing a downhill slalom game. That's where the game shines, by making you forget that you're working out. The game keeps track of your progress, so hopefully after a while I'll start to see some improvements in my figure, posture and other health benefits. I'm also trying to stop eating fast food for lunch every day, so hopefully that will help as well. I've made a 10-week commitment for this Wii Fit Challenge (with regular weekly updates on the Twisted Pair podcast), so we'll see if a video game can help me lose weight, unlike all those other video games I've played that have helped me put on all this extra tonnage. Now if I could just get my trainer to call me a "stud", I'll be all set.

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An Electronic Christmas

Mitchell Ashley — Wed, 26 Dec 2007 12:28:46 -0500

I thought I would put up a post about my experiences this holiday season with gift giving and what we are seeing in the marketplace. Most of the retail markets struggled this Christmas and holiday season, resorting to extraordinary measures to get shoppers into the stores and buying their goods. But that wasn't true across the board for all types of products.

Are we seeing a shift in holiday buying and will the current trends continue? I think so, and here's my winners and losers drawing from my own family gathering experiences this Christmas season.

The Winners

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