"Trying out a fitocracy group for a group of friends from fitbit and work who want to challenge each othr with more than steps."
Today I wasted an hour or so trying out http://fitocracy.com
Drawn to fitocracy because it seemed to be site/app most focussed on a variety of workouts other than running/walking/steps/distance.
Fitocracy does have the ability to track exercises other than steps and distance. Supposedly more than 700 - "Most Popular 200" appears on your dashboard. The exercises seem mostly gymrat weightlifting, generalized to things like walking, jiu-jitsu... Or perhaps I should say "genericized" - the gymrat template of reps/sets is applied to most exercises. Which can be a start, but is not always useful. E.g. what does it mean to do "sets" of my 2 hour dog walk? For which they allow me to record duration and distance, but not steps or vertical?
(One of the things that I would like to try challenges fr is vertical, eg as measured by fitbit's altimeter, inaccurate as it may be.)
The fitocracy website seems to be like facebook, cranked up and cranky on steroids. This is not a compliment. The website is loud, in your face, obnoxious. The visual equivalent of loud music playing while you pump iron. Looks like it would like to be a dating site, probably with as much or as little success as gymrats have picking up girls in the weight room. (I know, I was such a gymrat once.)
The killer for me seems to be that fitocracy doesn't have "percentage of goal" challenges (as I describe in ISO social fitness challenges beyond steps, which allows friends of different levels to usefully challenge each other).
fitocracy doesn't even allow competitions on absolute, albeit self-recorded, metrics like pushups.
Instead, fitocracy seems to compare "points", calculated by an annoying "FRED robot glyph". Supposedly allowing comparisons - but in what sort of dimensionally warped unreality I do not know. (I don't like NIKE "fuel points" either.)
Coupled to this, indicators of poor quality:
I entered my first not-really-a-workout, just a simple record of a hike (where fitocracy would NOT allow me to record vertical). Fitocracy seemed to insert this more than 7 times into my stream - perhaps once for every group that I had joined? Or, rather, once for each of the groups that I had bee automatically been added to, in addition to those I chose.
Fitocracy seems to take the "default in, optional opt-out" approach. Indicates desperation to build society - but in my case, repels me.
Having created the group that I hoped to invite my friends to, I noticed a misspelling - "othr" rather than "other". Part of that hour was wasted trying fruitlessly to find a way to edit the group description.
Once again, an indicator of a website designed in a rush.
As far as I can tell, fitocracy does not have any automated synch facility. So you would have to enter workouts by hand. (If it has automated synch, it is lost in all the UI crap.)
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BOTTOM LINE:
- I like that fitocracy can handle typical gymrat workout items
- But fitocracy doesn'do do %age of goal challenges
- And so many other things about this site piss me off.
- Not even going to bother with the iPhone app.
Overall, I have wasted too much time on fitocracy as is is. Time better spent actually working out.
META-COMMENT:
I think that the difference between "challenge" and "competition" is an important indicator of mindset - whether of app, or the social milieu of an app or website.
"Competition" tends to imply absolute, who gets to be the winner.
"Challenge" tends to imply "we are all in this together".
'via Blog this'
