The next frontier of wearable tech: your shoes

A smartphone app is used to automatically tighten Digisole smart shoes at The CES Unveiled press event, January 4, 2016 in Las Vegas, Nevada ahead of the CES 2016 Consumer Electronics Show. CES, the annual consumer electronics and consumer technology tradeshow in Las Vegas boasts some 2.2 million net square feet (204,386 square meters) of exhibition space. AFP PHOTO / DAVID MCNEW / AFP / DAVID MCNEW (Photo credit should read DAVID MCNEW/AFP/Getty Images)

You’ve heard of smartwatches and smart glasses, but now Nike and PUMA are joining the wearable technology market.

Nike started a couple years ago with a prototype pair of shoes that could lace themselves, but their new release incorporates bluetooth-enabled, gyroscopic technology that gives athletes feedback on their form, and adjusts tightness based on how swollen your feet are getting. PUMA is working on their first pair of smart shoes too.

The shoes are designed for high-performing or even professional athletes, which is probably why they can afford to put them on the market for $350.

Would you be tempted to spend the money for some smart shoes? Is the extra technology worth the higher price tag? Or, is this taking wearable technologies a step too far?

Guests:

Peter Rubin, creative/senior editor at Wired, who has written about Nike’s smart shoes technology; author of the book, “Future Presence: How Virtual Reality Is Changing Human Connection, Intimacy, and the Limits of Ordinary Life” (HarperOne, 2018); he tweets

Tweets by provenself

David Krum, a researcher and computer scientist at the USC Institute for Creative Technologies; expert on virtual reality, 3D graphics and wearable computers