All users great and small

Fierce Healthcare reports a study showing that users don′t track their activities for ever. Personal health trackers are abandoned after some time. Then it is concluded that device makers should account for different users and their experiences instead of supplying one size fits all.

Experiences of ex-users included data collected not correlating to behavioural change (if there was any). Surprise? Hardly, as some people even felt relieved when giving up tracking.

Fits my own experience. I enjoy running much more since I left the heart rate tracker with the flat battery in the drawer. My running is now more regular, I look forward to it every time and after a while I started timing my runs with the phone. Which by the way does not remind me of what I should be doing ;-). My motivation to run is intrinsic.

So may be we should not expect the trackers to raise the fun but see them as what they are. A tool, that can help us organising something we really want to do in the first place. If and when we want to do it.