Are thoughts and emotions your last vestige of freedom in this world? Do you hold tight to your misery because at least that alone is yours and no one else’s? Well sorry, Charlie: if Hitachi has its way, your innermost feelings may soon become your boss’ business.
In order to gauge collective workplace happiness, Hitachi has developed a device that looks similar to an I.D. badge (more like an id badge, amIright nerds?) but uses an acceleration monitor to measure the wearer’s motions throughout the day in real-time, based on the concept that an employee’s physical movements indicate or influence mood. When the devices are worn by an entire office, workplace happiness is measured on a scale of 1-100. Here, enjoy this artist’s rendition of an office with a happiness score of 1/100:
Hitachi plans to start offering their Orwellian mood rings in April; according to Uproxx, the meters will be available on a subscription-based service for an annual fee of approximately $834.55 USD per card.
Oh brave new watercooler, that has such happy people around it.
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