

Seeking Angels: Fitocracy Hits 16K. Users with 6K More on Wait List  [Invites] - ccarella
http://www.betabeat.com/2011/06/07/seeking-angels-fitocracy-hits-16k-users-with-6k-more-on-wait-list-invites/

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skizm
They should get Tim Ferris to invest if they are looking for "fitness-
oriented" investors. Although I think he may have bigger fish to fry.

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ccarella
Reddit is a valuable tool for acquiring early users.

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jcampbell1
Fitness is a ridiculously profitable niche. They don't need that many users to
reach profitability. The margins for stuff like P90X, supplements, and powders
is enormous. People who are into fitness spend $1000s per year on it, and they
should be able to tap nice piece of this market.

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ryanfitz
I would consider myself as someone who is into fitness, or at least
lifting(deadlift 400, bench 280). I honestly don't think fitocracy, as it is
today, is for people who are into fitness, but rather a gimmick to get people
to workout.

For the most part, fitness people want tools that will help them improve their
lifts, diet, overall looks and how they feel. Thus why some are willing to
spend $1000's on supplements to assist getting them there. Knowing that I'll
get a virtual badge if I pull 415 x 5 next time I'm at the gym gives me no
extra incentive or edge towards accomplishing that.

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edkennedy
I think you're missing the point of Fitocracy. It's not to get badges. It's to
share your progress and contribute to the journey of other people. Recipes,
workout plans, diets, all get shared. There are challenges for people to try
new exercises, to expand their workout plan and learn new things. You may
think you have skills and strengths far beyond the average user on the site.
However, many users from /r/fitness have migrated over there and are making
immense lifts.

I've learned about foam rollers, bridges, and countless other things about
fitness by being a member. The actual weightlifting may be an individual
journey and challenge, but gym culture has always been a social activity. To
dismiss the entire site because it has colored badges which are provided for
entertainment seems ignorant.

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ryanfitz
I know for a fact that I don't have skills or strength beyond others, I'm not
even the strongest guy at my local gym :) If my initial post came off that
way, I didn't mean it like that. I just wanted to preface it that I have been
involved with fitness for at least a few years, and I know the founders are
definitely involved in fitness for many years.

I'm not familiar with the /r/fitness people, but was more talking about the
ironaddicts and anabolicminds of the world. Some of these people are
definitely in the spend $1000's on supplements crowd, which is what I was
replying about in jcampbell1's comment. I have not tried the site since it was
first announced here, but at that time it was labeled as the rpg of fitness
apps and did not appear to offer much in terms of routines, diet plans,
nutrition tracking nor did I really think it was supposed to be aimed at that
crowd.

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edkennedy
Ahh got it. I found your tone rather dismissive and read too much into it.
Fitocracy is a primarily a social network and tracking service, the rpg aspect
is secondary. I'm not sure how they plan to monetize it, but I'm sure they
would make a lot of money with an ad service like PoF or Facebook.

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ryanfitz
I do think informercials and many lousy fitness products have made me, as well
as others, very quick to judge and write off most fitness products as gimmicky
without much thought. It might not be fair, but its the world any fitness app
must live in.

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wilshire461
It'll be interesting to see if this actually does take off...in its current
state though for firefox a lot of the ajax elements conflict and make for a
terrible experience when trying to log activities which is why I stopped
bothering with the site.

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pbj
My wife loves your app. She's been using it for a while now. Good luck with
your endeavor.

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brianmwang
Tell your wife that the sentiment is very much appreciated.

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Aloisius
This made me feel like I really need to work out. Sadly, judging by my
history, my motivation for going to the gym lasts about five weeks. I've done
boot camps for upwards of 18 weeks, but injured myself so badly that I had to
stop.

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brianmwang
Why do you think your motivation wanes after a few weeks? I'm genuinely
curious.

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Aloisius
Frankly, I get sick of being tired all the time and it gets to the point where
just going to the gym feels overwhelming. Once I decide to skip one session,
it becomes a lot easier to skip another, and then another and pretty soon,
weeks have gone by and I know if I go to the gym, it is going to really hurt.

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mwphisro
Those Asian nerds have some _serious_ gunz. Talk about dogfooding your app!
ruff ruff welcome to the DOGPOUND!

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Hisoka
16K regular users, or 16K signups? if the latter, it's not that impressive

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brianmwang
Appreciate the thoughts.

The 16k is total registered users at this point, though it's worth noting that
we're invite only.

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Hisoka
What % of users are engaged on a daily basis? Can I get an invite code? email:
vzhou218 at gmail dott com

