Next up: GPS cradles to proxy your driving habits into granddaddy mode to get cheap car insurance.
It seems like the additional miles added might defeat the purpose
Smartphone cradle used to cheat “10k steps/day” health insurance discounts
101–110 of 215 posts
Re: Smartphone cradle used to cheat “10k steps/day” health insurance discounts
#102Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do you have statistics to indicate biking is inherently more dangerous than other activities or are you just repeating a certain assumption you have?
Lots of runners in my family. They often get injuries (especially knew) from running. Biking is a lot kinder to your joints.
Yes but not good for your testicles.
Re: Smartphone cradle used to cheat “10k steps/day” health insurance discounts
#103Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do you have statistics to indicate biking is inherently more dangerous than other activities or are you just repeating a certain assumption you have?
Between walking, driving, and biking, biking is the _most_ dangerous: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micromort#Travel Given the same commute you can expect riding a bike to be 23 times more dangerous than driving a car. Put another way, it looks like people get into car accidents roughly once every 18 years. If instead of driving your car for your commute you rode your bike, you can expect to get into an accident ever…
And according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microlife , the first 20 minutes of moderate exercise is worth 2 microlifes (or -2 micromorts).
At 15 miles/hour, the means the first 5 miles of biking costs you about 0.25-0.5 micromorts of accident risk and gives you +2 microlifes of fitness.
Riding in a car, on the other hand, incurs accident risk AND has effects on fitness.
Re: Smartphone cradle used to cheat “10k steps/day” health insurance discounts
#104Next up: GPS cradles to proxy your driving habits into granddaddy mode to get cheap car insurance.
"Black Box" car insurance already exists :)
Re: Smartphone cradle used to cheat “10k steps/day” health insurance discounts
#105Wellness programs and similar initiatives are so repellent to me that I'm pretty sympathetic to everyone fooling them.
A fitbit wellness program similar to this is attributed to one of the ignition points of the West Virginia teachers strike. The gamification program was added in conjunction with a health insurance cost increase and in the context of already very low pay.
https://www.thenation.com/article/the-west-virginia-teachers...
Our healthcare costs are insanely high, with the fundamental performance of the system the worst in the modern nations of the world, our life expectancy being the only one in the group actually dropping. Instead of addressing fundamental issues, our employer benefit systems are experimenting with behaviour modification via gamification programs like some sort of bizzare black mirror dystopia.
Re: Smartphone cradle used to cheat “10k steps/day” health insurance discounts
#106serious question: is it insurance fraud?
Re: Smartphone cradle used to cheat “10k steps/day” health insurance discounts
#107One day all of us have to do stuff like this to keep up.
Re: Smartphone cradle used to cheat “10k steps/day” health insurance discounts
#108Earlier quoted context omitted.
I rarely bike because I don't trust drivers, and you can't bike on the sidewalk.
People who use bikes don't trust drivers either. In fact I work on the base assumption that bus drivers in particular, are actively trying to kill me.
A healthy dose of paranoia is absolutely the way to survive on your bike. About the only thing you can trust not to screw you over is a tree. Of course, trees can easily conceal other objects...
Re: Smartphone cradle used to cheat “10k steps/day” health insurance discounts
#109I did something similar in college. A company paid cash for installing software that displayed ads on the bottom of your monitor. It qualified your ad viewing activity based on mouse movement. At night I would open the software, wrap my mouse cord around an oscillating desk fan, then go to bed. Earned myself $50/month
I remember the AllAdvantage.com cheat as well. It became so popular to game that one that not only were novel tactics like yours employed, but automatic mouse hijacking apps for Windows made some headway for those that didn't want to sit and click ads ad nauseum. I may have made a quick buck on this back in the early 2000s.
lol I remember AllAdvantage; I had a set of programmable Legos and I made a little jig that would sit there and spin a wheel under the mouse ball back and forth.
Re: Smartphone cradle used to cheat “10k steps/day” health insurance discounts
#110Earlier quoted context omitted.
I worked in this space, and yes, if the employer offers an incentive, people will cheat. Even for something like a $10 Dunkin Donuts gift card (heck of a incentive for a health/wellness program). We'd go through logs and see people sequentially logging for each day, one team member after another, on the last day of the competition. You'd also find people scrutinizing the accuracy of any reporting we did as a company…
Donuts as a reward for physical activity - what the actual??
"That's why little chocolate donuts have been on my training table since I was a kid..."
https://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/little-chocola...