Health product manufacturers TANITA Corporation have come up with a novel way to get otaku off their butts and start exercising, in theory anyway. Their members-only Karada Karute (Body Chart) service is a 2-year course that uses a body composition meter, a pedometer and a special receiver device to record and transmit data about the user’s daily activity to a database via the Internet. Users will then be sent dietary advice based on the data, complete with funky graphs in order to monitor & manage their weight, body fat etc.
Come 16th February, you’ll be able to get your hands on a special limited edition model featuring seiyuu Nogawa Sakura (Nemu in Da Capo, Hina-Ichigo in Rozen Maiden) for the ultra-low price of ¥90,000. Yes, ninety-thousand yen (roughly US$1,000). Cheap price for losing that spare tyre methinks – the price tag includes the 24-month Karada Karute course that usually costs around ¥1,200 per month.
Mike’s Take: oy. Now that takes commitment–commitment to being “encouraged” to lose weight by the voice of Hina-Ichigo, the most annoying voice in Rozen Maiden in my not-so-humble opinion. Or maybe that’s the point–she’s going to wheedle and whine until you finally get that BMI down to a healthy level, ya fat otaku!
It looks like you are essentially signing up for an entire two year program, and actually the price is still quite high, despite what the article says. Two years of the program only adds up to ¥28,800 total, which means more than two thirds of the cost is still going to the scale and its associated devices. It’s a fancy Internet-aware scale, to be sure, but I guess this is one of those things that is not only for otaku-only, but for rich-otaku-only. Just like that Evangelion snowboard.
This sounds like another one of those gadgets that people buy to assuage their angst over being out of shape. They’d spend money on these gadgets so that they don’t have to actually exercise!
Rah’ra Clemens: heh, people also treat gym memberships the same way too. Sometimes the mentality is that if I’m spending money on it, it’ll give me incentive to go and exercise, but ultimately it comes down to how much you’re willing to put into it in terms of discipline and willpower. I know I need more of it…