Fitness apps Gympact, Fitsby can earn you money

A couple of recent apps are cashing in on the idea that money is a primary exercise motivator.

With Gympact, you tell them how many days a week you're going to workout, and you pick a penalty that you'll suffer if you miss a day. The minimum penalty is $5.

Gympact uses GPS to determine where you are. It knows when you're in the gym, and when you're not by using a database of more than 40,000 gyms. If you don't go, you get penalized. If you do keep your pact, you get a share of all of the money from those who didn't meet their agreement that week and were penalized.

You're not going to make a ton of money doing this, it may only be $1 or $2 a week, but the threat of losing money may be enough to stay consistent with working out. The company makes money by charging you $1 every time you want to deposit your earnings into a PayPal account.

Fitsby is a similar app for Android that has you competing against your friends. You wager on who can go to the gym the most. You check in every time and at the end of the week or the month, you win the pool. Beware, the company takes a cut of winnings.

Since these apps use GPS, they don't really work if you exercise at home using programs like P90X or Insanity, or if you workout in your apartment complex gym.

And be careful -- if you get sick or forget to change your settings, you could be out of real money for the workouts you miss.

Is money enough to motivate you to go to the gym? Or are these apps too much technology for people with too little will power? Let us know in the comment section below.
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