Alex Gourley is one of the co-founders of Active Theory, the company behind BitGym a mobile application that has been getting a lot of recent buzz including recent features in TechCrunch and VentureBeat. Alex studied computer science at the University of California, Davis and before founding Active Theory, held engineering positions at Loopt and Krugle. Alex is an enthusiast of both fitness and gaming so Active Theory provides an entrepreneurial outlet to create market solutions in both these areas of interest.
Here are my 5 questions with Alex and my summary of his answers:
1) One of the core value propositions behind your BitGym product line is to provide an exercise option to those that aren’t necessarily interested in traditional fitness. When was that “ah ha” moment that you were on to something (i.e. you had the solution to a problem)?
The initial idea to combine proper video games with exercise was first conceived during a conversation with a friend. Wanting to test it out as soon as possible and see what people thought, I had several of my nerdy and non-athletic friends over to my house. I had set up an exercise bike with a bunch of wires hanging off it leading to an Xbox 360 controller which itself was wirelessly connected to a racing game running on the screen in front of them. I told them their speed of their pedaling would accelerate the car and to steer they would simply use the controller like normal.
They all had a blast and were sweating in an uncharacteristic way. That’s when I first knew I was on to something. Of course, my bike sensor didn’t actually work yet. Unbeknownst to my friends I had run some wires to a hand-held knob which was controlling the acceleration. As they sped up I would simply turn the nob a bit to match their effort. Active Theory has been a lean start-up from the very beginning!
2) It can be argued that some of the success of your technology relies on the content and engagement of the games you provide. Game play and game environments tend to uniquely match up to certain player attributes such as: gender, personality, and other psychographic characteristics. This is a problem that is outside the realm of designing for the general fitness user. What is your strategy to work with content owners and game developers to maximize your reach in the fitness market?
Our approach is to learn by observing the video game industry. One thing we know by watching Nintendo is that there are certain aesthetics and game play concepts that have wide appeal. For example the Zelda series has universal appeal among gamers and the Wii Sports series has universal appeal to, well, humans. The games we produce in-house will follow this tradition of non-offensive aesthetics and a focus on accessible game play.
We also observe that if you have a user base willing to pay money there are always game developers willing to create experiences for them. We see it as our job to get people excited about the idea of exercise video games while establishing that they will cost more than regular iPhone/iPad games. If we can accomplish those two things we can foster an ecosystem of developers working to build exercise game experiences for all types of people.
3) The United States Surgeon General and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology have challenged technology developers to build apps that “empower users to engage in and enjoy healthy behavior” (United States Surgeon General’s Healthy Apps Challenge). You have uniquely positioned your company to influence non-fitness enthusiasts into a healthier lifestyle through mobile devices. Through the point of view of Active Theory’s market vantage point, what role do you think mobile devices will play in helping people get healthier?
First of all I view these app challenges with skepticism. Building the app and winning the contest based on app quality and adherence to the contest rules is only step one. Actually getting it into people’s hands and getting people to use it – that’s the real challenge. However with that said, mobile devices (mobile phones and the coming wave of smart wearable technology) are clearly poised to bring about significant change in people’s health.
But specifically in diet and fitness, we’re not quite there yet. I would argue that right now what we have is only iteratively better than the analog tools we’ve had in the past. How many apps are simply replacements for a workout notebook, workout tapes, or a meal diary? These only help the people those analog tools would have helped… those with enough willpower to deploy the tools.
Unwilling or occasionally unwilling participants (most people) still find no help from diet/fitness apps and devices. But that will change soon. The next generation of mobile technology will be full of trickery – exploiting our impulses instead of trying to suppress them. And it will be very powerful.
4) Conceding that it requires critical mass first, how far do you think you’re away from the ability to offer a MMOG (massively multiplayer online game) version of one of your fitness games? For instance, is it in the realm of possibility to offer a virtual 10K race, or maybe even a virtual marathon, in the future?
Taking the analog concept of a marathon and making it digital is something we’ve kicked around a lot at BitGym. But before copying a thing you have to know the true essence of a thing. The essence of a marathon isn’t thousands of people running in the same place at the same time – the essence of a marathon is a hard schedule of self imposed training followed by a dated and well-understood certification of accomplishment.
So then let’s paint a picture of what a virtual marathon should have. It should have a concept of persistent identity. It should have schedule of challenging fitness tasks to accomplish. It should have a set end date (perhaps one every three months) so that people can experience it in sync with participating friends. It should have a standardized certification of achievement. All of this will be possible in BitGym mid to late 2012.
5) In building a platform to inspire people to workout, what is one thing you have learned about fitness in the process that you did not know before you started (that you wish you had)?
I wish that when I started I had a deeper appreciation for the difference between a fun cardiovascular experience and a sticky cardiovascular experience. From the day of my first Xbox prototype we knew how to make an exercise machine fun. But fun isn’t enough, and I know now we still have a lot of work on the behavior modification part of our product before we’ll really convert non-exercisers into exercisers.