Nintendo says Wii Fit
can get gamers to exercise
Photo credit: Nintendo of
Canada |
Can
Wii Fit shape up vid kids?
TOKYO — In what will certainly go down as the greatest
marketing campaign since Tom Sawyer's endorsement of
whitewashing the fence, Nintendo's Wii Fit is making
exercising cool — and profitable. The Wii Fit interactive
platform ($90), an addition to the hugely popular Wii
console ($270), resembles a set of bathroom scales on
which the player stands and shimmies about — er,
exercises. The platform picks up the player's movements
and portrays them on the screen performed by a large-headed
cartoon version of herself. Not-so-fun-sounding activities
available are yoga, aerobics and strength and balance
training. Sorry, Nintendo: exercising still sucks.
Sad but true: teens would
rather talk to computers than to doctors
Photo credit: Nationwide
Children's Hospital |
Computer
talks to teens so you don't have to
COLUMBUS, OH — Teenagers often hate talking to
doctors about their sex lives and drug use. But teens
do love computers. Ergo, American researchers have designed
a wireless handheld computer that asks kids what they've
been up to and then dishes the dirt to their doctors
(wouldn't it make Gossip Girl proud?). Health eTouch
caught and relayed 31% more "behavioural concerns" than
did old-fashioned history-taking, according to a study
in the June issue of Pediatrics.
McMaster chemist Roger
Luckham holds up a sample of bioactive paper
Photo credit: Sentinel Bioactive
Paper Network |
Psst:
wanna buy some antimicrobial paper?
ESPOO, FINLAND — Canadian scientists working on
bioactive, microbe-killing paper products faced off
with Finn rivals at the First International Conference
on Bioactive Paper in late June. The commercial potential
of paper that can detect and destroy bacteria and viruses
is apparently so great that conferencegoers refused
to reveal anything but already-published results.
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