Tuesday, 6 January 2009

New Year Fitness?

It’s probably the same where you live, but here in the UK the TV ads are full of advice as to what one needs to buy to recover from the excesses of the holiday period. Whether it’s diets, detox or a new fitness regime, we are all being encouraged to make health and activity part of our New Year resolution list.
Which got me into thinking about us Mac lovers who spend endless hours in front of our machines, both at work and at home in our leisure time. Are we less fit and more prone to obesity than the wider population? More interestingly, are we really achieving a better sedentary-activity life balance than our PC counterparts, as the appearance of the characters in the famous Mac-PC ads (both UK and US versions) would have us think?
Not surprisingly, Google reveals little regarding this particular query. There’s a lot about safe ways to sit and avoiding eye sight problems when using the computer and there appears to be much fitness software on the market. Keying in ‘obesity’ and ‘computer’ brings up pages about children and the harm caused to them by poor diet along with too much time spent with the TV, computer and other indoor ‘toys’.
So we could be breaking new ground here. Would it be fair to say that Mac lovers, if we don’t watch ourselves, can be easily seduced by Apple’s marketing methods? We have to regularly remind ourselves that Apple is in essence just another big company that wants our money. Yes, it makes great, reliable products that look good but that’s where it ends. A Mac is not a lifestyle. And yet there is something about its advertising, on TV or web that might attract a certain kind of person? One who values a lifestyle which includes a certain level of activity and fitness? What do you think?

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