It’s not the first shoe to feature some sort of digital integration, what with the “Adidas 1’s” self-adapting, $250 marvel that came out a few months ago. This offering, from company VerbForShoe, on display this weekend at Wired Nextfest, packs a bunch extra features.
By extra of course I mean, it’s not self-adapting at all, and does a bunch of other somewhat interesting stuff.
They have memory in them that keep track of your fitness information. The integrated circuitry analyzes your movements during the day and the physical life of the shoe. Running on the Magellan OS they then connect to your computer through Wireless G, allowing you to view and analyze the information.
Another application is that they also keep track of your phonebook. In other words, this allows you to trade contact information with other people wearing the shoe by holding both shoes up to each other. Of course it only works if both people have are wearing them.
Seeing as they go for over $500, you’ll be hard pressed to find anyone else at the park with these on their feet. Nevertheless, for what it’s worth, it’s interesting to see people trying to integrate all this expensive technology into something whose innards will inevitably end up smelling of death, fermented onions and foulplay.
You can check out the website here, but be warned that it comes with an annoyingly lengthy Flash intro and a clunky navigation. Story VIA QuenteCafe.
