社交网络打造欢乐健康生活

    网络社交游戏能帮助人们对抗肥胖吗？它能帮助企业遏制员工医疗保健费用节节攀升的势头吗？

    这正是创业家亚当•博斯沃斯的创业理念。他是互联网行业的老手，曾效力于微软（Microsoft）和谷歌（Google）。他创立的Keas网络公司旨在提升健身、健康饮食的趣味性——或者至少不那么折磨人。

    Keas原是新西兰一种鸟类的名字，发音为kee-ahs。公司设在旧金山，其基于网络的应用以企业为目标客户，由企业向其员工推广。公司员工们可以五六个人一组组队参加竞赛，组员们获取积分的方式包括：在线回答关于健康食品的问题、工间抽空休息片刻缓解压力、或者完成每周摄入水果蔬菜、睡眠当然还有锻炼等方面的目标。通过一个类似于Facebook动态消息推送（news feed）的界面，参与者的所有相关活动都会彼此分享，团队成员或竞争对手可以发表评论、给予口头表扬或者互相督促。

    Keas的收费标准是每个用户每年12美元，企业可对网站进行个性化设置，并选择是否向赢得竞赛的团队发放奖励以及发什么形式的奖励。“略微改变人们的行为是可行的，但必须让他们觉得过程足够有趣，”博斯沃斯说。他曾负责运营现已停止的谷歌健康项目，即这家搜索巨头试图创建网络医疗记录的服务：“人们往往难以坚持到底，这时候就得靠社交机制帮他们重燃激情。”

    初步应用的结果颇为喜人。建筑巨头柏克德（Bechtel）推行的大规模保健计划中就包含了Keas。遍布44个国家的8,000名员工同意使用该服务，在最初的12周中，就有约一半的员工报告称体重有所下降。进步软件（Progress Software）的成果更加突出，该公司约有600名员工参与，三分之二的人报告体重出现下降，三分之一称压力有所缓解，还有数十人称减少了不健康食品的摄入量。进步软件人力资源总监乔•安德鲁斯称：“如果和别人一起参与，就会形成彼此支持的机制。它的影响非常巨大。”

    不过，有专家警告称，尽管Keas等健康应用潜力喜人，我们仍必须客观看待。“任何行为的短期改变都是可能实现的，”加州大学洛杉矶分校（UCLA）公共健康学教授托尼•彦西称：“真正的困难的是让人们长时间的改变其行为模式。”

    尽管企业保健应用的总体功效还有待验证，它们仍在迅速普及，部分原因在于，许多投资者都认为可以利用社交游戏开发商Zynga带动的社交网络热潮来对抗肥胖。Keas已经从投资者那里募集了1,750万美元，其竞争对手包括理查德•布兰森的维珍集团旗（Virgin Group）下的维珍健康里程（Virgin HealthMiles）及红砖健康（Red-Brick Health）等。这话听来可能有些违反直觉，但如果依托于游戏模式的保健公司最终能够取得成功，它们或许还得感谢农场乡村（FarmVille）或黑帮战争（Mafia Wars）等懒人最爱的游戏，因为正是它们带来了这个商机。

    译者：小宇

    Can an online social game help fight obesity? Can it help businesses put a lid on ever-growing employee health care bills?

    That's the bet entrepreneur Adam Bosworth, a veteran of Microsoft (MSFT) and Google (GOOG), is making with Keas, an online service that aims to make exercising and eating your vegetables more fun -- or at least a little less painful.

    San Francisco-based Keas (pronounced kee-ahs, it is named for a bird found in New Zealand) sells its web-based app to companies, which in turn push it out to their employees. Co-workers form teams of five or six and enter a competition in which members earn points by answering online quizzes about healthy foods, taking breaks at work to reduce stress, and meeting weekly goals for eating fruits and vegetables, sleeping, and, of course, exercising. All the activities are shared among participants on a Facebook-like news feed, where teammates and rivals can comment, give verbal pats on the back, or urge each other on.

    Keas charges $12 per user for a year and lets companies personalize the site and choose what rewards, if any, they give to winning teams. "You can change people's behavior a little, but you have to make it fun for them," says Bosworth, who previously ran Google Health, the search giant's now defunct effort to create online medical records. "People will fall off the wagon, and that's when you need a social mechanism to help them climb back on."

    Early results are encouraging. Bechtel, the construction giant, deployed Keas as part of a larger wellness initiative. About 8,000 employees in 44 countries signed up, and roughly half reported losing weight over an initial 12-week period. At Progress Software (PRGS), of some 600 employees who signed up, two-thirds reported losing some weight, one-third said they were less stressed, and scores said they pared down unhealthy foods. "If you are engaged with others and you have a support mechanism, it is going to have a tremendous impact," says Joe Andrews, who heads human resources at Progress.

    But experts warn that while promising, health apps like Keas should be put in perspective. "You can change behavior for a short time with just about anything," says Toni Yancey, professor of public health at UCLA. "Where the pedal hits the metal is in getting people to change behavior for the long term."

    Despite questions about their overall efficacy, corporate wellness apps are proliferating in part because many investors are betting that the social-gaming wave popularized by Zynga (ZNGA) can be harnessed to fight obesity. Keas, which has raised $17.5 million from investors, competes with Virgin HealthMiles, part of Richard Branson's Virgin Group, and Red-Brick Health, among others. It seems counterintuitive, but if game-based health companies succeed, they may have couch-potato favorites such as FarmVille and Mafia Wars to thank.