Paper Reading #18 - Jogging Over a Distance Between Europe and Australia

Comments:

Reference:
Jogging Over a Distance Between Europe and Australia
Florian Mueller, Frank Vetere, Martin R. Gibbs, Darren Edge, Stefan Agamanolis, Jennifer G. Sheridan
UIST '10

Summary:

"Jogging over a Distance" is a system that seeks to allow people who consider jogging a social activity to communicate while jogging, even when not in the same location.  Two joggers agree to job at a certain time and equip a headset and heart rate monitor.  A mini computer and mobile phone are contained in a small waist pouch.  They set a target heart rate, which acts as the basis to determine how the joggers locations are related to each other in virtual space.  When they are both at their target heart rate, the audio they receive makes it sound like they are right next to each other.  Should one joggers heart rate rise while the other remains steady, it will sound like the first jogger is pulling away.  As the focus is on social jogging, the actual pace and distance covered by the joggers was unimportant to the study.

Based on data recorded from jobbers in Austrelia, Germany, and the United Kingdom, the researchers determined that Jogging over a Distance can facilitate a social jogging experience.  Participants enjoyed that they could jog as fast or slow as they wished and still be able to communicate with their jogging partner.  They also reported that the sense of jogging with another person made them push themselves farther than if they were on a solo run.  Having the system tied to the exertion of the joggers made it seem more real.  In the future, the researchers will examine if any other exertion interactions could reveal more possibilities for the design.

Discussion:

While I don't find this particularly interesting on a personal level, on an intilectual level I can see possibilities for other applications.  First, there is the old truth that having a workout buddy helps prevent becoming lazy.  But what if this system were tied into a virtual reality setting, where you could hop on a treadmill and run with your friend through just about any place you could think of?  Could this be used by the armed services to get a better idea of what's going on in the field (based on the exertion link, I don't expect a squad to go jogging through the middle of a battlefield).  It will be intersting to see what this technology produces.