13 Minutes to the Moon

Byrichard
Reading Time: < 1 minute

13 Minutes to the Moon is an interesting podcast dedicated to the Lunar Landings. This podcast, along with audiobooks, is interesting because they allow us not just to read the dialogues that took place but to hear what the controllers and astronauts heard.

At one point in Episode two, you hear two communications loops at once. It’s a shame that they didn’t balance the audio so that loop 1 was in one ear and loop 2 in the other. If they had done this then we could have heard the audio as mission controllers had heard.

The podcast is also interesting because it’s divided into twelve 50 minute podcasts so each topic is explored in depth. There is some overlap with the books I have read. For enthusiasts, this overlap is interesting as it allows them to fill in gaps in their knowledge.

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Montagne en Scène Genève
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Montagne en Scène Genève

Byrichard

Au Vieux Campeur held the summer mountain film screening event at the Batiment des Forces Motrices in Geneva. They introduced the event as being the opportunity for them to share the passion of the mountains with people who may not be aware of the activities that are possible. They then went on to say “but as we’re having the screening in Geneva we know that you’re just half an hour from the mountains so many of you are practitioners and today we may even have participants from the cancelled Patrouille Des Glaciers.

Four films were shown at Montagne En Scène. The films shown were A Line Across the Sky, a documentary following two less experienced climbers as they attempt the Fitzroy traverse during a rare good weather window, Chasing Niagra, a documentary about Rafa Ortiz and his preparations to shoot the Niagra Falls in a Kayak. The third film is Mont Rebei Project, a documentary looking to achieve a new Rope Jump record.

The Last film, and my favourite is Valley Uprising. It takes a look at the American climbing scene from the fifties up to the Modern day. This documentary is great because it provides us with a deep understanding of the American climbing psyche. Mountain climbing is a sport of passion and so to see how different groups helped this passion progress over the years is interesting.

Film screenings are in Switzerland, France and Belgium

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The Apple Watch does not fill a niche

Byrichard

The Apple Watch rather than fill a niche provides a fifth screen. According to Wikipedia the four first screens are the cinema screen, the television screen and the mobile phone and tablet screen. The fifth screen is the smart watch as designed by Apple, Samsung, Sony and others. Apple and others have designed phones that bring the mobile phone experience to the wrist.

Energy efficient

Suunto, Garmin, Fitbit and other brands fill the wrist worn niche effectively because they have designed devices with energy efficient displays that provide tracking whilst at the same time giving extended battery life.

Extended battery life in use

Health trackers by fitbit and other companies have been designed to last for a week or more whilst tracking movement 24 hours a day. Suunto, Garmin and other brands have designed watches that can track activities for hours or even days before they need charging.

Long stand by time

When not in use all of the devices mentioned above can last for weeks. In the case of the Suunto Ambit two I have found that it loses one percentage of charge per day. As a result of this it can be used as a watch for three months before I need to think of charging.

Data analysis

All of these tools are for collecting data about the route you took, the intensity of the exercise tracked, heart rate and complementary information. When synced on the computer or website a lot of information is presented. Garmin syncs with Runkeeper, Strava, Garmin connect and other services, Suunto syncs with Movescount and Strava intuitively. Fitbit syncs with the fitbit site and other fitness apps. The most interesting data is analysed on a computer rather than the wrist unit. This leaves the device to track information cost effectively, where cost is battery life, and effective is defined by how long you can track an activity.

Conclusion:

My passion for “smart watches” stems from scuba diving. I bought a Suunto D9 to track dives and loved taking dive data and analysing it in view of improving my diving ability. I tracked training at the gym, hiking and other activities with various phones and their weakness was battery life. When you go for a hike in the mountains, go for a via ferrata or do a number of other sporting activities for extended periods of time you want a device that can last as long as you do.

Suunto’s Ambit 2 filled that need very well, so well that I upgraded to the Suunto Ambit 3. As an android user I can’t  take advantage of all the features yet but that will come soon, this month in fact.

The Apple Watch does not fill any of the requirements I have listed above and for this reason I am not tempted. I see it as a fifth screen that does not fill a niche. Fitness trackers, fitness watches and other devices cost the same price or less and fill niche requirements effectively. Why would I want a gimmick?

Apple Health Step Data Sources
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Apple Health Step Data Sources

Byrichard

Yesterday I spent some time looking through Apple Health Data Sources. I see that there are plenty of data sources. These are the Apple watch, the iphone, Alltrails, move, connect, stepsapp, pacer, Suunto, Ingress and three more that are marked as inactive.


Move is the app that gets data from some Casio watches. Connect is Garmin connect and gets step data from Garmin devices. If I take steps and they are logged with a casio or a garmin device they do not count in iOS apps but if I take steps with Garmin and Casio devices without also wearing the Apple watch the same steps are not counted.


The Apple Fitness and Health apps have access to all the same data. Everything goes to a central database on the iPhone. It’s from the iphone that the data is not shared transparently between all other apps.


In practice whether you have a suunto, Garmin, Apple Watch or other fitness tracker each device should feed, or retrieve data from Apple health, and each should display that data, regardless of which device you wear.


Whether I wear my Garmin, Suunto or Apple watch I would like all three to access health data transparently so that I can choose which individual watch I want to wear on a specific day. I don’t want to have to wear all three of them. Not that I do. I only have two wrists. 😉 I can only wear two at once.


The privacy argument is moot, because each app can be granted access to Apple Health, and Apple Health can be granted access to each app. This means that all the data is already transiting both ways for all apps.


And Finally


When you buy a Casio or other watch the battery is expected to last from three years to ten years, and you are expected to replace the battery when it dies. With the Apple watch, now that it is four years old, the next step would be to swap the battery. The Apple watch is now at 70 percent. The battery costs 79 CHF to replace.


When the Suunto battery got low on the Ambit 3 I got a Spartan, but when I replaced the Spartan I went for a Garmin, so I lost the ability to keep my old log going, and had to migrate to the Garmin app. With the Apple Watch we’re on yet another silo. Every brand has a silo. With the Apple watch it’s worse, because you have the fitness app, but then you have all the third party apps. Everything would break at once if you stop using the Apple Watch.


I would love for Garmin, Suunto and Apple wath to allow the free flow of tracking data in both directions, so that I could choose the best device to wear, and the best app to fiddle around with. Strava is the giant in the room, but I don’t want to use an app where I have to pay a premium for added functionality.



Bits, Bytes and Barrels – A Review

Byrichard

Through Booktasters I was able to read Bits, Bytes and Barrels, in exchange for an honest review. The book was available to read via Audible so this time I was able to walk, run and do other things whilst listening to the book. I listened to it from start to finish despite this being the type of book that people may skim, or read part of rather than the full text.


This type of book is written in such a way that you can read the chapters that interest you, or the book in its entirety, but if you read it from cover to cover there will be some repetition. I read it from cover to cover, over a relatively short period of time because I had to provide an honest review.


I do not know much about the oil industry. I know that they have oil rigs, trucks, petrol stations, refineries and more, and that they make billions or even trillions of dollars. What I didn’t know, or at least didn’t think about, is that they had some of the first data centres in the 90s. They collected data from oil wells, from oil exploration and more, and then they got experts to go through that data to decipher where to place operations.


Something that seemed alien to me, as a person reading this in 2021 is of the idea of data as a cost, rather than wealth. It’s interesting that it took some convincing to get oil exploration to take advantage of artificial intelligence in order to speed up and increase oil exploration accuracy.


The book explores interesting ideas, and provides context for an industry that we often see in the news, but mainly when things go wrong, without understanding much of what goes on behind the scenes. This book provides a window into that world.

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A little bit of twitter history from 21/07/2007

Byrichard

Hello Twitter-ers!

As you may already know, Obvious is the parent company of Twitter
and it’s never a dull day around here. Today our little building
is abuzz with activity surrounding an announcement that Odeo
(another Obvious product) is ready for a new home. We’re
entertaining offers from potential buyers because Odeo deserves
the same love and attention we’ve been heaping on Twitter these
days. Have you been by lately? http://twitter.com

More about Odeo: http://tinyurl.com/2yoy84

Defamer Brings The Oscars to Twitter

Popular Hollywood gossip blog Defamer.com is going to the Oscars
this Sunday and they’re bringing Twitter! Sorta. Follow Defamer on
Twitter and you’ll get live from-the-scene updates. Who won what?
What’s happening in the seats? What are the stars doing? Get the
updates on your phone while you watch on TV to make things more
interesting or if you can’t watch, just get the updates.

Text FOLLOW DEFAMER to 40404
or, Visit http://twitter.com/defamer
Oscars: http://oscar.com

If you haven’t set up your phone to work with Twitter yet, now is
a good time! You can do that here: http://twitter.com/devices. The
Oscars are broadcast live February 25 at 5pt/8et on ABC. Speaking
of coveted awards, you can still vote for Twitter and help us win
the SXSW People’s Choice awards. We will be so psyched if we win.
Vote Twitter! https://secure.sxsw.com/peoples_choice/

SXSW Update

There’s going to be lots of folks from three industries
represented at the SXSW Conference in Austin next month. We’ve
heard from people in the Interactive, Music, and Film industries
who are excited to get on Twitter during the week-long event.
We’ll have big screens set up in the hallways and we’re setting up
a special, easy way for folks to get their updates on the screens.
Once we set that up, we’ll tell you more. Even if you can’t make
it to SXSW, you’ll still be able to catch all the buzz.

Office Full of Great Folks

Obvious employs less than ten people but the building is filling up
fast since we’ve opened our doors to some other really cool
companies working on interesting projects. Two of the projects are
still top secret, there’s a couple Y Combinator startups sharing
space with us, and the other folks are 30boxes.com, Boso.com, and
the illustrious Niall Kennedy. (Hi Niall!) When the secret
projects launch, we’ll tell you about them–they’re cool!

http://30boxes.com
http://boso.com
http://www.niallkennedy.com/
http://ycombinator.com/

Okay, back to work. Lots to do this week!

Happy Twitter-ing,
Biz Stone and the Twitter Team
http://twitter.com/biz

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