MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
The sport of running doesn't take much equipment. You just throw on a pair of shoes. And if you are like me, like I did this morning, you start up your running app or your smartwatch to track your route - how far you've run, how fast you've run. But there's trouble brewing in the world of running tech - a legal dispute between a big smartwatch maker and one of the most popular run-tracking apps. Here to explain is Matt Evans. Matt is senior fitness and wearables editor at the site TechRadar. Matt, welcome.
MATT EVANS: Mary Louise, thank you for having me.
KELLY: OK, so who are the players here?
EVANS: So the main players are Strava, the social network for athletes. Strava allows you to upload your workouts to a social media app, organize running clubs and things within the app, give each other likes, which Strava calls kudos. It's a really comprehensive bit of software.
KELLY: I've seen it described as Instagram for exercise, which seems to sum it up pretty accurately.
EVANS: That is perfect.
KELLY: OK. And the other - on the other side is?
EVANS: The other side is Garmin. Garmin makes some of the best running watches out there. And the relationship between them is that you can use your smartwatch to log your workout and then you can ask Garmin to automatically upload the maps and stats to Strava.
KELLY: So that all seems like a beautiful system. What's the dispute? What's the lawsuit?
EVANS: Strava's effectively suing Garmin for infringing on its patents for using segments and heatmaps. Segments allow you to log part of your run if you run in a popular area, and it'll show you a leaderboard for who's run or cycled that segment the fastest. Meanwhile, heatmaps, on the other hand, shows you the amount of activity going on in a particular area. So you can see where all the good running routes are that other runners are taking on, things like that. Strava and Garmin were both developing these features early 2010s, although Strava applied for its patents, seemingly, first. But they signed a cooperation agreement in 2015, and they've been playing nicely for about 10 years until now.
KELLY: So for runners, the timing could not be worse. I am very happily not training for a marathon this fall, but a lot of...
EVANS: (Laughter).
KELLY: ...People are. We just had the Chicago Marathon last weekend. New York Marathon is coming right up. Here's one runner - this is actually an ultrarunner - Andy Glaze. Here's how he described the battle on TikTok.
(SOUNDBITE OF TIKTOK VIDEO)
ANDY GLAZE: I'm sitting here with my thousand-dollar watch and my $80 app thinking, can we just get a family meeting and start getting along again?
KELLY: Can we just get a family meeting and start getting along again, Matt Evans?
EVANS: (Laughter).
KELLY: Is there any progress toward a resolution here?
EVANS: There certainly seems to be. As Andy seemed to insinuate on TikTok, when you weigh up the cost of an $80 app a year versus a thousand-dollar or $500 smartwatch, which one are you likely to pick? Which is the bigger investment for you? It's the smartwatch. So I think Strava may have overestimated which side the community was going to take on this. And I reached out to Strava for some comment, and the statement that came back said that Strava was going to allow some of this branding from Garmin watches. And it's almost bitten Strava in - like, it's almost - because...
KELLY: (Laughter).
EVANS: ...These people are really passionate about it.
KELLY: Almost bitten it where (laughter)?
EVANS: Oh, well, in the running shoe, obviously (laughter).
KELLY: Yeah, there you go.
EVANS: (Laughter).
KELLY: And then what about Garmin? What are you hearing from them?
EVANS: So I reached out to Garmin as well. They replied very sort of briefly they couldn't comment on pending litigation. But in a worst-case scenario for Garmin, if the court finds in favor of Strava, Garmin's either got to disable all that software remotely or risk its devices being taken off shelves. So I think it's much more likely this is a power play, and the two companies are going to come to some kind of an arrangement.
KELLY: As we wait to see if these two giants in fitness tech can sort it out - or if they can't sort it out - is there any silver lining here? I'm thinking maybe we runners should all take a chill pill and log off and just - gasp - trot off without tracking ourselves for once.
EVANS: Yeah, I think so. I think we're - we get so obsessed with Strava. And these kind of technology, while amazing and allows us to push our limits and foster community, it does sometimes create a sort of stress out of something that used to be a wonderful pastime.
KELLY: Matt Evans of the site TechRadar, thank you. Happy trails.
EVANS: Mary Louise, thank you for having me.
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