Proof Wearable Allows You To Dictate How Drunk You’ll Get (Yeah, Right)

Not yet in stores, the Proof wearable is a wrist-worn wearable designed to help drinkers manage their drunken levels of debauchery. Like a saturation gauge [read: nag] you set the level of intoxication you wish to attain, then you can drink until the device tells you you’re there.

Once you get to your desired level, whip that thing off and flush it so you can get back to drinking. It’s perfect.

For the record, this writer was once a championship drinker. It’s not a point of pride when I admit that I once belonged to the last man standing club. It’s a one person club, so club meetings are short. The point is I know all about intoxication… er, what I remember about it.

Worn on the right wrist, the Proof wearable passes for a normal wearable in design if you’re a man, but won’t stop you from being a total ass.

Normal Wearable

(source: proofwearable.com)

Look out Fitbit, I need some room on my wrist for Proof. I wasn’t using my Fitbit anyway.

The Proof wearable could pass for a Fitbit to the untrained eye. It’s a little classier, with a metal housing around the business end, but a silicone wrap for the rest.

Echoing the wearable design constant, that design for women doesn’t matter, Proof will not look good on a small wrist. Despite attempts by the manufacturers to market to women with pictures on the site of women wearing it, most women would not wear this device.

That said, as a man, I’d wear it. I’d even go so far as to call the design fashionable and simple if you don’t mind silicone.

How It Works

(source: proofwearable.com)

The prospective technology is a cartridge that sits against the skin, but I have yet to see the device in action.

There are magnets in the back of the aforementioned business end, where a cartridge snaps into place. Then you put it on and starting drankin‘. The rest of the action comes to you via the companion app.

Presumably, the cartridge knows your blood-alcohol level (BAL) via transdermal readings. It feeds that data to you in real time via the app. You don’t even have to check it. You’ll will be able to set a desired level of toxicity, then stop when notified.

Almost humorously, there is a social feature where you can connect with friends and family. That way everyone can know what lush you’ve become.

Why It Won’t Work

(source: proofwearable.com)

Go ahead, call me a cynic. I’ll wear that crown.

In a similar piece, we covered a new technology designed for the same crowd and why it wouldn’t work: With This Wearable You’ll Never Drive Drunk Again Except This One Time.

The problem with that wearable was the delay from drink to notification time. Breathalyzers are the fastest way to measure BAL, but a blood test is the most accurate. Proof does neither.

Not only does Proof not prick your skin, it wouldn’t matter if it did.

People who don’t drink to excess don’t need a device to tell them they’re okay. They have a drink, then recoil at the idea of more.

Drinkers do the opposite. If they have a problem drinking, no device is going to stop them from ordering another, regardless of the accuracy.

Alcoholics Will Buy It Anyway

(source: proofwearable.com)

Like the promise of diet pills, drunks know they should “cut back,” but they can’t figure out how. Once they start drinking, the part of the brain that controls moderation gets knocked out. It’s the first part of the brain to go.

With alcoholics, they can sometimes control the outcome of their drinking after one, but once they have that first one, all bets are off.

That won’t stop them from hoping they can one day wear the crown of control. It won’t stop them from buying Proof.

(source: proofwearable.com)

From a marketing perspective, this is a genius wearable. People like the idea of change more than the actual proof of it.

Case in point, fitness wearables as a category continue to crush other wearables in sales, despite the fact that most people who wear them won’t see results. It doesn’t matter. People like to feel like they are trying.

Later, when they are in the drunk tank, they can tell themselves whatever story they want. The makers of Proof will still make money.

What’s even crazier is the people who become brand advocates for devices they wear but fail to use. Just ask anyone who wears the Fitbit how amazing it is.

Want early access to Proof? Sign up here you lush.