Announcing a new way to Spread the Spark - Facebook Connect

Wednesday, April 08, 2009

Hi everyone,

I'm really excited to announce that you can connect your SparkPeople account to your Facebook account to share your updates from SparkPeople with your Facebook friends. I think this is a great new way to Spread the Spark and help many more people reach their goals! However, if you don't have (and don't want) a Facebook account, we completely understand. (There are many other ways you can still Spread the Spark.)

As a SparkPeople member with a Facebook account, you can choose to automatically feed certain SparkPeople activities, such as status updates, blog posts, and more, to your Facebook account. You can do this by using Facebook Connect to link your SparkPeople account to your Facebook account.

To be honest, the most valuable way you can Spread the Spark to others with Facebook Connect is by updating your current status on SparkPeople, which will appear prominently on Facebook.

For example, I like making status updates on SparkPeople like, "I just added 50 fitness minutes to SparkPeople!" or "Two SparkPeople members were just featured in USA Today!" Each time I update my status here, it automatically updates on Facebook.com, too (thanks to Facebook Connect). This is a fun way to motivate my friends on Facebook to join me at SparkPeople to get healthy and reach their goals.

Thanks a bunch to anyone who chooses to help Spread the Spark by enabling Facebook Connect. We appreciate your support! I hope that you'll help some people you know by doing so, too. This is one of those things that if enough people decide to do it, it could make a real difference in our mission to Spark millions of People to live healthier lives!

Click here to learn more and to connect your accounts

SparkCheers!


SparkGuy

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1 Billion SparkPoints Earned!

Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Congratulations! As of about 11:30 a.m. EST, we've racked up more than 1 billion SparkPoints!

By tracking food, reading stories, posting on the Message Boards and just being active on the site over the last five years or so, each and every SparkPeople member has worked hard to earn those 1 billion Points.

This milestone is less about the Points than the steps we took to get there. We tracked our food and cardio, forged friendships in Teams, and shared our success on the Message Boards. Not about competition, this milestone proves how powerful we can be if we work together to reach our goals.

To earn those 1 billion Points, we:

Burned more than 5.6 billion calories!

Lost more than 7.2 million pounds!

Drank more than 162 million cups of water. (That's more than 40.500 tons of water!)

We all deserve a pat on the back! What will you do today to earn your SparkPoints?

  

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SparkPeople Members Featured in USA Today!

Monday, March 30, 2009

Good afternoon, SparkPeople! Have you picked up a copy of USA Today? If not, you should!
SparkPeople member MISSG818 and her inspiring story are featured in a series that kicks off today and runs each Monday through mid-May.

The USA Today Weight Loss Challenge focuses on losing weight on a budget--a topic SparkPeople members know well!

Read my blog post at the dailySpark for more details!


Oh, and be sure to pick up USA Today on April 13, when SparkPeople member SWEETZMIX, will be featured!

Remember to share this story with your friends and family, too.

Cheers!
Stepfanie

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Friend Feed and Activity Feed Updates Based on Your Feedback

Thursday, March 19, 2009

Hi everyone!

As most of you know, we launched Friend Feeds and Current Status updates this past Monday. (Click here to read a full-length article explaining these features.) The response from our members was mostly positive, but we did have a few requests. We hear you!

Today, we launched a couple upgrades to these features based on your feedback.

1- We've added an Activity Feed page, where you can more easily see which of your activities are "fed" into the Friend Feeds of your mutual friends. Please note that from this page, you can also delete items from your feed. Click here to see your Activity Feed.

2- You can now choose whether your Activity Feed shows up on your SparkPage (or not). Some people didn't like how their Activity Feeds looked on their Pages. Now, you can choose to remove it completely on your privacy settings page. To remove your Activity Feed from your SparkPage, you must UNCHECK the "Show My Activity Feed on my SparkPage" at the bottom of the preferences list. (Or, go into "Edit" mode for your SparkPage to find the same checkbox.) Please note that your Activity Feed will still show up on the Friend Feeds of your mutual friends—just not on your SparkPage. Also, your "Current Status" will continue to show up on your SparkPage—but only one status update at a time will appear.

We hope you will enjoy the new updates to the Friend and Activity Feed Features that allow you to better customize the look of your SparkPage!

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New Feature - Fitness Maps

Tuesday, March 17, 2009

Hi everyone

We're very happy to announce Fitness Maps. This feature allows you to measure, save, and see how far you walk, run, or bike when exercising outdoors. What we love about this feature is that its very easy to use. Just:
1) Go to the Fitness Maps page (it is located under Healthy Lifestyle/Fitness, in the center of the page)
2) Enter the starting address
3) Click points on the map to draw your route; note that you can zoom the map in or out for more or less detail
4) Enter the amount of time it took you to complete your workout (to calculate your average speed)

We will then give you your total mileage your average speed, and even the calories burned. You can then add your calories burned to your fitness tracker.

In addition you can also:
- Save your route to access later
- Share your route so other members can see
- Use the city dropdown at the top of the page to see routes in your city

We hope this feature makes it easier to calculate your distance and calories for routes, to remember your routes, and to find great new routes that other members have done! If you have any questions or comments please make a comment below.

UPDATES:
This works for any country in the world supported by Google Maps. We experimented with routes in Paris, Toronto, London, Sydney, Seoul and other world cities!
You CAN edit your route or delete steps (click on the red marker to delete a leg of your route).

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