By John C. Havens
I’m a geek, and have been writing about tech and culture for a number of years. I love the gadgets and am a huge Apple fan although I’m not much interested in their Watch as I already have an iPhone so don’t need to strap one to my wrist. While I am fond of the idea of sending self-drawn emojis, it’s the inclusion of Apple Pay in the watch that’s truly genius. Apple already trained us to purchase music and movies via one-click payments attached to our credit cards – now they’re doing the same with one-authentication arm gestures at Point of Sale.
But the new Health App in the iPhone 6 is set to truly transform culture. By allowing multiple quantified self and tracking apps to aggregate data in one place, the app will help a person understand their physical wellbeing like never before. I say “wellbeing” versus health, because the focus of my work is on quantifying happiness as it manifests in the form of active and passive data and I believe this type of Health App can help people understand and increase their sense of self worth like never before.
In my book, Hacking H(app)iness – Why Your Personal Data Counts and How Tracking it Can Change the World, my hypothesis is simple – if you want your life to count, you have to take a count of your life. By formally taking a measure of your life, you gain insights about the actions and behaviors that bring you a sense of purpose and increase your wellbeing.
The physical measures like the ones featured in Apple’s App are fairly easy to track. In my case, I’ve been actively measuring my exercise, sleep, and weight data with a Withings Pulse Monitor and Scale. The monitor tracks my steps, sleep, and heartrate via a small wearable and their Health Mate app. The Scale measures my weight and body mass, and synchs with their app. Here’s a sample of some of my recent data: