Ontario, Canada Health Promotion Minister and former mayor of Ottawa, Jim Watson, has pitched the idea of equipping BlackBerry devices with built-in pedometers to measure the distance that BlackBerry users walk each day.
A lot of people wearing BlackBerries look like they spend a lot of time at their desk and it’s probably not a bad thing that they get more exercise, or at least recognize how little exercise or walking they’re doing,” said Mr. Watson, adding he contacted Research in Motion with the idea of planting a chip in BlackBerries to measure how far a person walks.
Although RIM officials have not discounted the possibility of adding an step counting chip to the BlackBerry, they have not committed to the idea either.
“(Our) initial investigation has not yielded an obvious possibility, but I continue to investigate. In particular, coupling a sophisticated pedometer with a Blackberry using Bluetooth (technology) would be possible,” a RIM official wrote in response to Mr. Watson’s inquiry.
If Research in Motion goes down this road, the ultimate smartphone could become the ultimate work-out device.