Show HN: Movably – Protect your health, move more while you work
movably.com
movably.com
"Proven by Science Recent study results prove that Movably is a highly effective solution. All participants reported no back discomfort. Using Movably outperformed standing and ergonomic chairs."
Link to study? Highly effective solution to what? Back pain? Leg pain? Participants reported no back discomfort vs control who did report back discomfort using other chairs or standing?
Lack of arm support.
There is an image of a male sitting on the chair. The position IS NOT ERGONOMIC AT ALL, here are the issues:
-He is forced to look down, this will result in neck pain.
-The monitor should be at eye level or just below it about arm length away.
-His arms are pressing against the desk and hands are above the elbows.
This all very basic computer work ergonomics. All this work on this product and 0 actual science on the page about ergonomics.
There is a claim, "Sitting is the new smoking".....I mean you are out of your mind.
From Mayo clinic, "Any extended sitting — such as at a desk, behind a wheel or in front of a screen — can be harmful. An analysis of 13 studies of sitting time and activity levels found that those who sat for more than eight hours a day with no physical activity had a risk of dying similar to the risks of dying posed by obesity and smoking. However, unlike some other studies, this analysis of data from more than 1 million people found that 60 to 75 minutes of moderately intense physical activity a day countered the effects of too much sitting. Another study found that sitting time contributed little to mortality for people who were most active."
Link to source: https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/adult-health/ex...
The website stinks of hyper marketing to sell an overpriced product.
EDIT: The only positive comments here so far are from users with 2 hour old accounts. OP decides to respond to POSITIVE comments from the new account but not to most upvoted negative comment. Yikes.
For the price of this you can buy a used ergo chair and hire an ergo consultant to come to your house and help you set it up.
Varier chairs (various) and the move stool HAG Capisco range Muvman stool
Hell, you can buy a saddle seat designed to augment any office desk for $100 that will also be 'backed by studies'
And failing that a simple balance ball with give you so much.
This is an office Peloton for people desperate to burn through their startup capital.
What? So of the group, who all had blood clots, a load of them sat more than the others? I'm struggling to draw a firm conclusion from that. What are you comparing that ratio to? If you picked a group of 100 people at random and found out how long they sat for, do you think it is likely or unlikely that 80% of the group sat more than the other 20%? If I bought 1,000 apples, and their size had a normal distribution, I could cut that distribution whether I want and thereby show that 80% of them are larger than the remaining 20%. I could say it and I would be right, but I've demonstrated nothing significant.
I am one of the founders at https://www.movably.com/. If you work at a desk for extended periods you may have heard the call to “move more” or that "the best posture is your next posture". The problem is we also have to get our work done. That’s what we are solving with our smart interactive chair.
Research shows that moving more often is one of the most effective ways to prevent the health problems caused by sitting. So we set out to create a way to incorporate healthy frequent movement that is easy to adopt without interrupting your work or flow.
Here is a short video to give you an idea https://youtu.be/d0D3-YBj7Zo. Test users have loved it, they usually have the “aha” moment within the first day no longer feeling sore from sitting. We also ran a formal research study with University of Waterloo (who work on chairs/sitting a lot) testing with people who show early signs of discomfort in sitting and standing with really good results- all the participants reported no pain when using Movably when compared to standing or sitting in a high end ergonomic chair. That will be published soon as one of the first times a chair was able to help prevent back pain.
Would love to get your feedback and questions!
Thank you, Mark
i wfh, am a ux designer.
Everyone absolutely should be skeptical. I have tried a lot of chairs, the most recent which allowed me to re-position most was the Hag Capisco. But to some extent it still would interrupt focus. I have also found almost no research studies showing effectiveness of ergonomic chair designs, but would love pointers to any others that may exist.
total cost - basically zero
Not only good for your body, but you'll likely get back to the problem you're working on with a fresh perspective and end up more productive in the long run...
I now walk at least an hour every day if I can and three hour extended rambles on weekends, and I'm losing weight, in less pain, my head is clearer and I'm happier. It sounds stupid, maybe, but it's the truth.
If I had the money to blow on this chair, I'd buy an improved ebike with better range and ride that thing instead.
Looks interesting. Definitely too expensive for my personal use. I hope I'll get to test it one day. Also, there are pictures on the website of people having quite non ergonomic setups. I know the focus is the chair but it's a weird contrast of a high tech ergonomic solution next to an obvious, bad work setup choices (example being the slightly slouched man, who looks at the screen of his laptop).
And yes, we do need to reshoot those photos, you are absolutely right. Arms need to be closer to 90 degrees, top of screen at about eye level would put it in the right position.
I used to have back and wrist issues, tried standing desk, it definitely helped, but the sitting position on the floor is so much better. No back or wrist issues
One other thing that has had a huge impact is that I cut a piece of foam roller about 10 inches wide and I roll my back on it 2-3 times per day, sometimes I just lay on it and just reverse stretch my back, and also massage my neck and shoulders with it. That might even be why I don’t have back pain anymore (Important not to roll it on your lower back with all your weight on it, just keep it to the upper part of your back.)
Epic vaporware. Juicero of chairs.
(Warning: rant incoming)
It’s interesting that this “sitting is [literally] the new smoking” study-shows movement has shown how limited ergonomic tools are. Maybe some ergonomic tools are just a grift to paper over the inherent defiencies of office work.[1] Think about it:
1. People get health problems from working in an office
2. Ergo company steps in to let the managers buy ergonomic equipment
3. Ergo company makes a pretty penny
4. The company behind the office just have to spend a little more money on office equipment rather than rethink the whole structure of their work environment. (Does it work? Well, the important thing is that they made an effort)
5. Win-win
So anyway. How come the bodies of (one of) the smartest species on Earth are so fragile that it can’t deal with full-time thinking-work?[2] And how can we ever make up for it when we are contractually obligated to do keyboard-clacking/mouse-clicking/meeting-sitting for eight hours a day?
1. Better remember to look at a far-away object every twenty minutes in order to combat screen/reading-induced myopia
2. Try to (as often as possible) vary your positions without interrupting your own concentration on your task (how?)
3. Better remember to schedule some movement ritual in order to not be the new “smoker”
4. Better try to not look like a try-hard idiot as you do all your anti-sedentary/anti-myopia exercises in the middle of your open office which even has (for insult-to-injury) glass walls separating it from the common hallway
5. Honestly, even with all the fidgeting and practicing the-best-positions-is-the-next-one at work, you will have to dedicate a lot of time off-work for that old school rigorous exercise (remember the eighties when that was all it took? Supposedly)
One problem might be that companies are stupid (see: open office). But it seems more fundamental than that. How are you even supposed to do knowledge work without committing sins of sedentary?
1. Maybe a small treadmill? Could work for reading tasks or meetings. But what about your gait when you are typing and using the mouse? I’ve heard that that gets awkward
2. Memorize the codebase and apply changes in your mind while you go for an outdoor hike? What kind of outdoorsy savant could pull that off?
[1] Key word “some”. I know that some people swear by certain ergo alternatives.
[2] I know, I know. There is no “why” to evolution. We just evolved in a completely different environment. Still makes me upset though.
For anti-myopia, lots of natural light from big windows could help, giving you things to look at. For my own poorly lit space, I added bright lights that try to match the sun's visible spectrum. Though, who am I to say, one of my eyes has been getting blurry in the periphery lately...
A workplace that is flexible enough and not militantly busy allows you to take breaks during the day to go on walks. I work from home and do this at least once a day during the workday. It does take time I could be filling out tickets, but I find it revitalizes me, clears my head, helps me process emotions enough that it's absolutely worth it from a productivity perspective.
But part of what you're saying is that perspective is inherently antithetical to the type of rhythm that values movement. It would be naive to think that the point where well-being is at it's peak is also the point where maximal value is created for the company. I don't know how to get to the point where we value the one over the other, as a society. Ideally we don't have targeted solutions, but the kind of environment where the behaviors we want just "fall out" naturally... Having a real say in the type and manner of work and working environment would go a long way.
Structuring cities with better public transit would help cut down the sitting commute. At my prior job, I had maybe 40 minutes of walking there and back (+20 on the train), this was built in to my schedule, no special effort required. If I had a car I would have had much less daily exercise. (And I recognize we do not live in the kind of society where everyone has that time to spare, and that's a damn shame.)
I've also been thinking about hobbies that just involve more exercise. (Have personally found exercise for it's own sake hard to sustain.) How do I design my daily environment such that being active is the path of least resistance? (Maybe walking to the grocery store, and getting fewer things so I go more often. Maybe having my standing desk be easy to use.)
The answer might be just having less work, and more time to do things on your own. More breaks, more discretionary time, fewer hours worked. Remote work is good for this, valuing work done over butts-in-seats time.