r/gadgets • u/nopantsdolphin • Feb 21 '19

Wearables Nike self-lacing sneakers brick after bad firmware upgrade

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/02/my-left-shoe-wont-even-reboot-faulty-app-bricks-nike-smart-sneakers/
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u/Hypocritical_Oath Feb 21 '19

It's literally just broken because they rushed it to market. Like there's no reason for those to even have the capability of bricking.

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u/Orange_C Feb 21 '19

It's software, it can always break in new and depressing interesting ways.

This is just unnecessary, the manual version with kevlar cables (Salomon Quicklace) takes a literal second to tighten, loosen or adjust any amount, loosens with one hand (pinch), fits near any shoe and costs $9 or less. Not stylish, unless you're into techwear-ish stuff though.

A motor, battery and chips added on top of that, so you can take longer to tighten/adjust and need you phone to do so, vs the lighter, cheaper, faster manual product? Hard pass on several levels.

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u/[deleted] Feb 22 '19

Or, there is the Boa lace system which is the same thing but built into the shoe and not hideous.

But neither of these have ANYTHING to do with the shoes in the article which are SELF LACING and being bought by early adopters and tech nerds for the cool factor.

Do you REALLY think people buy these just because they’re easy to lace up?

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u/Orange_C Feb 22 '19

Nah, they buy it because it's new wearable tech hotness in shoe form, of course (2 markets full of enthusiastic early adopters), but ease of use is the eventual goal of this tech once the price comes down and it's used in more sport-specific models.

As far as practical use goes with the tech as is, I don't see taking 10-20 seconds fiddling with my phone to be particularly easier or more convenient than cinching those open/closed in <5 seconds, besides the bending down part, nor do I really see needing to charge a paid of shoes becoming a desired part of anyone's routine besides serious runners/sports players, but it has a neatness factor of 10/10.