The FreedMan Chair - A better way to sit. | Hacker News Reader

The FreedMan Chair - A better way to sit.

kickstarter.com

69 pointsericmsimons52 comments

Hey Everyone, Simon Freedman here. The retailers told us we should pitch them at $2K! Eric is right, I'd love to bring the price down. If I can make them cheap enough for schools to buy that would be great, but we've got to go high(ish) to start. Also, we want to make a low -price wheelchair. I've been talking to the President of the International Paralymic Committee and am very excited about the possibilities!

Pravda, please contact me about that bullshit detector. I'm applying for my PhD course at the University of Huddersfield. Do you think we've evolved to the point were we're meant to farm or sit? That's 10k years of agricultural life and 15-20 years of widespread computer use...I'd be really happy to talk more if anyone has questions. Getting late over here in London though. Back in the am...

Simon, can you post some more pictures of people sitting in the chair? Or even better, videos of people trying the chair out?

It's hard to buy a chair without trying it first.

From the kickstarter page, they have a picture collage of people sitting in the chair (link to image: https://s3.amazonaws.com/ksr/assets/001/213/229/3b559aca5e03...)

I originally posted this to HN because I bumped into Simon's launch party while I was in London last week. After testing the chair myself, I was sold. It feels like you're using a standing desk (except with no foot fatigue/pain) as it forces you to have good posture.

I had the opposite reaction. I briefly scanned the page for price first, and didn't immediately notice the rest of this sentence.

> And at £319/$499 you'll be making a saving of over 50% of the eventual retail price.

At "only" $499, I figured, it's probably of lesser quality. A quality chair, and I'm not claiming $999 automatically makes this chair so, is an investment for a decade, which puts price in perspective.

I'm not pravda, but my bullshit detector is going off too. I'm even willing to tell you why.

Your kickstarter campaign contains 90% marketing fluff copy, with a small section on what your chair is supposed to do. However, it only claims to do things, instead of explaining in detail how the chair does things; it doesn't compare postures and such between "normal" office chairs and your chair; it doesn't cite any papers on effects; it doesn't cite any studies on effects of even similar products.

You throw out a massive promise and ask a bunch of nerds to take you on faith. That's not going to work.

Lastly, chairs and other sitting implements have been around for at the very least 6700 years, so please be precise in what you talk about: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:CucuteniNeolithicChair.JPG

Addendum: I want to believe you. I want to have a chair that actively makes me healthy, because i know my current sitting work makes me unhealthy. So please take this to mean that you need to do a much better job at explaining and proving how your product does this, not that i wish you to go away.

> That's not going to work.

Obviously it did work, They're 80% of the way there after only a week.

You're right. I was trying to express an idea that is not easily expressed and did so clumsily. In a more verbose manner, i was thinking that he can't post something like that and not expect some people to be highly sceptical of the validity of his claims.

Thanks for stopping by and taking time to discuss this! (since you appear to be new to HN, please take the abounding hypercriticality with a grain of salt)

I personally think it's great that you are innovating in the field of workplace ergonomics, and, since I've been trying to improve my own posture and general health (and I think the design looks cool, too), I'm looking to back your project.

I have three questions for you if you want to fully convince me of your invention: (1) How, from your scientific view, does the Freedman compare to a sitting ball or a standing desk? (2) From an engineering standpoint, the buttock pads (for lack of a better term) are going to take a lot of pressure over time. How did you keep them flexible (since they adjust flexibly to bodily asymmetries), while preventing them from wearing out? (3) Conceptually, you make the point that chairs are, quite literally, killing people (e.g. your argument above "were we meant to farm or sit?", or in the video "[what the press means by saying that sitting kills] is that in a normal sitting position, which is often slumped, you turn of an enzyme [...]. After an hour, you have 20% more bad cholesterol [...]. That leads to metabolic disorder."). How does your invention, itself a chair, though a completely rethought one, counteract this? The studies you cite (e.g. Edwardson et al., http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjourna... ; Zderic & Hamilton, http://jap.physiology.org/content/100/1/249.full ), show that any kind of prolonged inactivity (in humans and rats, respectively) will lead to the adverse consequences you list. What are your thoughts on this?

Again, I entirely commend you for putting in the effort and expertise to develop this -- I think the result looks great, and you have my complete support. You certainly seem to have found a market eagerly searching for a solution to the lifestyle diseases of our times (which is a huge expectation, even you citations recommend a "multidimensional" approach, cf. Burton et al.). All the best!

My bullshit detector is going 'ting..ting..ting..'

Speaking of magic chairs, I remember when the kneeling chair was all the rage. Whatever happened to the kneeling chair?

Oh, I guess they are still out there: http://www.ebay.com/bhp/kneeling-chair

Wikipedia article for kneeling chairs seems quite positive:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kneeling_chair#Academic_studies

There is even one 2012 study quoted there.

So I'd say that lack of popularity/adaptation is not really a good measure of the quality of the product, ie just because the trend passed doesn't mean that there wasn't real improvement in there.

If people don't find it comfortable enough to use its really not a very useful idea. Like the standing tables. Okay it works, but I still want to sit on a comfy chair.

It is useful for people who already have experienced backpains and are willing to sacrifice bit of comfyness to gain long-term comfort.

While you may have some valid points to share about the value of this chair, you didn't actually state any of them.

Instead, you insulted the creator and made a sarcastic attempt to correlate this chair to a (potentially) failed product without any explanation.

Could you share the reasoning behind your opinion?

This chair is expected to sell in retail for $1,300 USD.

It would be nice if someone could produce an innovative but affordable solution for the 'rest of us' working poor, since we have to sit also for long periods of time.

Agreed - I wouldn't be surprised if this is the creator's grand strategy though. Sell the first premium version at a high price to help cover the initial costs, then build more affordable versions once the majority of R&D has been completed. Very much like Tesla's strategy.

My thoughts exactly. Why doesn't what he was saying in the video apply to these offerings (which I can buy right now btw) http://www.sitbetter.com/view/chair/egc-ergo-saddle-stool/er...

http://www.sitbetter.com/view/chair/sto-ball-chair/the-origi...

Except Tesla hasn't built an affordable car yet. You could argue the same for Dyson's vacuum cleaners, which are still premium devices much more expensive than regular vacuums.

Originally stated by Elon Musk:

1. Build sports car

2. Use that money to build an affordable car

3. Use that money to build an even more affordable car

4. While doing above, also provide zero emission electric power generation options

Tesla is on schedule with their strategy; they obviously can't just jump from step 1 to 3. We'll see if they can move from step 2 to 3, but their success from 1 to 2 is super promising IMO.

This is actually a very common strategy for introducing new technology to the market. It seems like this strategy was applied for the initial iPhone as well, as it originally cost $600 (far more than any other phone on the market). Pretty soon it was $400, and then after a generation or two, you could purchase one for $200.

The iphone is a poor example as the original wasn't carrier subsidized. There were a number of phones that unsubsidized were just as expensive as the original iphone. The cheapest unlocked iphone you can buy today is still $450.

http://teslarumors.com/Teslanomics.html

Except they have. It's just that the costs are mostly up-front vs over time as with ICEs.

What bothers me to no end when someone makes outstanding claims at being 'the best product to accomplish task x' is that they're usually not accompanied by solid evidence.

Why not film some comparative long-term lab experiments that involve more than just someone sitting on it for a few minutes, run some Autocad or Matlab simulations or so on? Perhaps even provide just a table with numbers for the metrics they used to determine that this chair is indeed better than most, if not the best? Besides the 27 degrees angle that is supposedly optimal.

Also, from what I'm aware, osteopathy is not actually real medical science, it's an alternative view/philosophy of healthcare. This is a device touted to be a preventive cure for so many problems, yet there was not mention of it being validated by real doctors. The designer himself is probably not a doctor, I doubt he would've missed the opportunity of garnering extra-credibility for his KS campaign by adding Dr. next to his name.

The unfortunate truth that most people don't want to deal with is that the best way to prevent back pain, assuming you don't have major anatomical problems, is to simply exercise regularly. It takes a bit of time and willpower to not give up after the first few seconds. I've also had some pretty serious back pain caused by prolonged sitting. Resting even more in a fancier chair or worse, in bed, did not make them go away. What did fix the issue was simply using an exercise bike for a few minutes per day.

In conclusion, I don't think you should feel sorry for not being able to easily afford spending $1.3k on a chair. Consider pressuring your boss to get an exercise bike for the office instead. It is unlikely that there'll be that much of a difference between a $200 chair and a $1.3k one.

To be fair, a bike won't help the back much. I commute 7km to work all year round on a bicycle and due to biking posture being very similar to office chair posture i still have lower back issues.

Oh, not a regular bike. I use(d) an exercise bike turned on maximum difficulty. I think a regular bike would work for this purpose only if someone were to climb a very steep hill for instance.

I use a standing bike: http://www.elliptigo.com/. It's more of an elliptical trainer on wheels than an actual bike. They're pretty awesome, and a much better workout than a road bike. If you don't want to actually cycle around with it, an adapter transforms it into a stationary trainer.

This is awesome! Thanks for mentioning it!

I recently moved office and the company gave us all new chairs. They had eight different adjustments, and could presumably be made comfortable for most people. Most people didn't spend more than 30 seconds trying to adjust before giving up. They had no instructions and where very confusing, with weird locking mechanisms.

Very adjustable chairs exist that are reasonably affordable. What is lacking is a standardised mechanism to make those adjustments easily and in the correct way for your particular body shape.

Interesting, I'm in the market for a new chair. However, I've read even standing for long periods can give similar back pain (I've experienced this myself), with regular movement being the optimal thing to do all day. So what's the truth? Will this chair really solve my back pain?

I'm so tempted, but that's a lotta money for this starving coder.

Backed. Eager to see innovation in the sitting market. When I worked for ITA Software we had an ergonomic consultant available, and it took half a dozen chairs until we found one that worked for me. After I left I tried without the chair for a few months, and back pain persisted. Ended up buying the chair ( http://lx.tc/chair - note: Amazon referral link ) for myself, and things have been pretty good since.

But I still believe things can be better. I see colleagues struggle, going between standing desks, different chairs, seeing massage therapists. As a nation many jobs are shifting to knowledge-based work, and people are spending more time in chairs. We can't leave everyone with back problems as a result.

Even if this ends up not being the ultimate solution, I think its great to see work and innovation to move things along and encourage others to spend time looking for answers.

OT, but you should've at least mentioned the name of the chair rather than hiding it behind a cloaked link. Some people do not like to click on referral links, even when disclosed.

What is the name of the chair?

I'll be the brave soul who clicks the link. The chair is called:

Sprinkle-Black Global Total Office Stamina+ 24 Hour Office Chair with High Back and Posture-Tilter

I have limited experience with a standing desk, but what are the downsides to that system vs. ergo chairs?

It seems like it would be much cheaper to outfit an office with all standing desks and work areas.

Hey Pallandt,

Apologies for the delayed reply. Our Kickstarter launch has been nuts. The FreedMan Chair is a paradigm shift in sitting theory. Osteopathy in the Uk is a real medical science with a four-year full-time course and in the US the study results in Osteopaths being Doctors. I myself have been an osteopath for 26 years and have dedicated 18 years to the study of sitting ergonomics and chairs. My Phd thesis at is "We are not meant to sit" and my PhD supervisor, an international authority on ergonomics and spinal research considers me one of the most knowledgable people in the world when it comes to sitting ergonomics. I disagree about your idea that the best way to prevent back pain is to exercise. Sure exercise is great but there's actually very little robust evidence to show the best way to do it to prevent low back pain. This is a good paper to start with http://www.backpaineurope.org/web/files/WG2_Guidelines.pdf

To be honest I think The FreedMan Chair may well help you with your back problems. Someone could buy both a cheaper chair and an exercise bike too, but this seems a bit excessive. I am working on a quadruple blinded randomised controlled trial of the chair, but this is a long and expensive process-we'll get there. And, yes I'd agree that most of the claims other chairs make are nonsense. Your bed and the chair you spend many hours sitting on should be the most expensive pieces of furniture you own. You really do get what you pay for and this is the most sophisticated chair in the world...and considering that it's reall not expensive. I'll get to cheaper versions but this is as cheap as we can get he first one.

This is a true, real-life disruptive technology.

I've dedicated 26 years of my life to looking after people and improving their lives. Sometimes people do things because they truly desire and believe they can make the world a better place.

Best wishes,

Simon

This is very hard to judge without trying one out. Are there any testimonials of people who have used this for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week? I need a new chair and anything over £150 will be a serious decision for me.

Probably not the best criteria to judge a posture perfect chair - but boy is that thing fugly. Throw in the outrageous retail price and I'm guessing it will be a hard sell.

You're right, that is a completely ridiculous criterion.

No it's not. A chair is one of the largest objects in the room. You and others will see it a lot. It's completely reasonable to consider its appearance.

I should also add that our kickstarter campaign http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/929020713/the-freedman-c... has raised over $390k and you just 7 days to save $800 on the future retail price. I hope you get one. Cheers, Simon

I always wondered whether a chair that would put you into an almost lying position would be best for your health - I believe you could easily fight sleepiness, while the reduced load on your back and knees would make it possible to work very long hours with minimal health effects...

Kind of like the Emperor 1510 - maybe we could team up to develop something like this :-)

I think I read some people's experiences with a chair like the Emperor; what they were basically saying is that it gets very uncomfortable over time, no matter how comfy the chair is. It's a fallacy to state that the most relaxed or supported position is good for you. Better to sit or stand in an active position - like what this chair is trying to do.

Reminds me of the theory with bicycle saddles. The gel ones are good for short rides, but if you want something for the long haul you are better off with a good leather saddle that properly supports your sit-bones.

Being prone for an extended period of time isn't good either. The problem is that your musculature does some of the work to keep everything aligned. If you're not using the muscles in your back and hips to keep you somewhat upright (which even a regular chair does to some extend), then you are letting those muscles atrophy even more. You don't want to be completely cradled for extended periods of time.

Interesting - what if you combined it with regular exercise?

Right now I'm sitting and my upper body is supported only by the lower back (arms on the armrests, hands on the keyboard tray). It's comfortable, except my back starts to hurt after sitting for hours at end (so I stretch/exercise once in a while).

Which is why I believe a lying position would be more comfortable...

You should be doing regular exercise anyway, but I think the greatest damage in lying all day is done to the small support muscles. These muscles (like your abs) are design for a constant level of moderate engagement, like walking, and sitting does engage these muscles to a moderate degree, particularly if you are sitting 'properly'.

As a comparison, I'm thinking of the difference between slouching in a chair vs. sitting up. If we mapped these on a scale of what is best for you, I'd say that lying down is probably better than slouching, but sitting up is going to be best.

These are just my thoughts, I'm not a doctor or physiotherapist.

This is interesting use case for Kickstarter. It's the kind of product that would normally be very hard to find an investor to, questions would be raised about market acceptance of a chair so different, or not being backed by a famous design studio but rather a physician.

> a physician

osteopath

Just to clarify, in the UK osteopaths aren't physicians. Osteopathy is pretty clearly in the alternative healthcare camp.

If you missed it, the "animation" video is spectacular:

http://vimeo.com/74490099#

I've been looking into creating a video for my own project and after looking at dozens of ways to do it this one was hilarious.

Damn, I'll have to see if I can convince someone to give it to me as an early Christmas present. I really need a new chair, and this looks like just the one for me.

They'll even give you a full refund, if you don't like it.

"We have only been sitting for the last 150 years." Yeah, right...

I know, it's taken me an age to reply, but our launch has been nuts http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/929020713/the-freedman-c...

Yes, most of us really spent very little time sitting up to 150 years ago. Around the world approx. 10k years ago societies turned agricultural. Having a 'farmers' physique meant, better farmer, more food, more surviving kids, passing on of useful characteristics. So I think we have farming phsiques, and you're definately too young to remember, but I for one didn't have email til 2000! Convinced?

Hey Everyone,

Many thanks for the comments. Apologies, for another delayed response. We're approaching $500K for our Kicstarter with 40(ish) hrs to go. WE'll end up top 20 in design, to date.

Here are some responses. Mmm, I guess there something that makes you guys, err, just a touch critical. I think we need to organise a testing group of you guys for the Quadruple-blinded Randomised Controlled Trial, that I am working on for my PhD at Huddersfield University in the Spinal Research unit there, we estimate 3yrs to do a good job, (before anyones scepto-meter goes off I'm sure most of you know what quadruple blinded is aiming at but please google if not). Sometimes they let osteopaths to University in even if they are a bit alternative. Maybe I should call myself a doctor like chiropractors do, as that will give me a lot more credibility. You really think so???

Ok, bit cross there, apologies.

Mithaldu, Jeez! Marketing fluff, clumsy..woah.

You'll find my website if you google and I give a smattering of papers there to get people started. Doing a Phd means that you have to know more about your subject than anyone else in the world. You are creating new knowledge and it is the most awesome feeling. There's a picture of a cucetani chair in the beginning of my animation. I thought mine was from 7.5k ago, but will check. I'd imagine there were others before that but that's the earliest I know of.

Mezzopiano, Thanks for the great questions.

sitting balls- 1. No height adjustment 2. Good for core work out, but all day long? 3. People look a bit of a plonker sitting on one...

We can make polymers last for a long, long time now, too long in most cases. How long do you think the fabric ones last?

I've been assiduously avoiding 'selling' The FreedMan Chair. I've just tried to tell the story in the best way I can and asked people make up their minds. I'm saying the world is round guys. If you can't see that you're living on a flat one...

I really hope you come along for the ride and give it a go.

Cheers,

Simon

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