The company I am working with and am president of is releasing the PrimusZ mod.
Information about the mod and details of it and its eco-system are available in other posts on my blog (
http://lwgat.blogspot.com).
The mod will be sold through
http://www.elementvapors.com.
This mod represents a complete game changer for the world of vaping in several important ways.
First, this device is able to, with reasonable accuracy in the range of maybe 98%, track each vape from a device down to a resolution of .1s. If you are "bound" to a GPS-enabled device you can know exactly where each vape occurred, how long it was, etc.
Short of something like a cellphone there is no other "low level," e.g., cigarette-like device, that is able to collect that much information (there are some emerging devices with lesser ability so we are not alone nor the first).
Is vaping good or bad for your health? I don't know.
(And, of course, neither does anyone else. I am fascinate by the full spectrum of direction people get about vaping from their doctors: don't to do...; doctors
fear vaping... doctors
think vaping ..., etc. It all about control and nothing more.)
But I do know that data collection at the level PrimusZ provides will far surpass, in terms of accuracy and reliability, any other kind of medical or research data collection for this kind of device because t
he device you are using is also able to collect the data. You don't have to write down each time you smoked a cigarette: your cigarette keeps track of it for you.
Similarly, you can track your juice type, juice usage, battery life, coil changes, etc. etc.
The PrimusZ checks its internal state and track problems: shorts, open coils, etc. and records them.
Your car, if its new, does some of this.
Second, in conjunction with VaporsCloud (
http://www.vaporscloud.com) you can visualize your vaping, that is, see charts, graphs, table and so on that tell you exactly how much, when and where you are vaping.
So all this technology will make it easy to know, not guess, if you are vaping more or less this week or last week, vaping more because you family is coming to visit, and so on.
Third, this bring issues like privacy and security to the forefront and we at PrimusZ believe that these are critically important issues for vapers.
On the security front VaporsCloud makes it possible to let you see what your friends are vaping, where they are vaping, and what ever else they let you see about them. Vaping is a social experience as much as anything else and its always nice to see what others are doing around you. Wouldn't it be nice to have the vaping information you wish to share available to select Facebook friends? Wouldn't it be nice to have
local shops that stock parts, juice, and tips you like available at your finger tips?
At the same time most vapers I know
do not want their personal information and vaping details to fall into the
wrong hands, i.e., the hands of the FDA, medical or insurance companies, employers, and so. The wrong people knowing you are vaping, or how much you are vaping, could mean losing a job, being disciplined, or worse.
Fortunately the PrimusZ mod keeps
absolutely none of your personal information inside of it. Only a magic UUID (a UUID is just a 128 bit random number that represents your mod) is kept in the mod that your other computing devices know. If someone steals your PrimusZ other people's devices won't be able to talk to it. It also means that no one can "hijack" your mod with their PC or phone.
The PrimusZ does not require you to do anything with a phone or a computer in order to use it.
Its designed, out of the box, to work just like any other mod. Push a button and vape.
However, if you choose to get involved at the next level, you can with just your phone or computer. Your phone or device will collect the raw mod data and make it available to you on your computers file system. You can do what you like with
your data.
Finally, if you are so inclined, you can use VaporsCloud to collect, manage and view your vaping data. Though VaporsCloud requires a login (user-id and password) you can certainly choose one that keeps you anonymous (minus any security requirements to establish an account). With an account you will also be able to voluntarily decide whether or not you'd like to make your vaping data
anonymously available to us. You'll also be able to decide if you want others to make you offers based on this data, for example, offering you a discount based on your purchases of juice.
The benefit to you with this is that others who would like your business, for example a vape shop, might want to make an offer to people vaping consistently within a certain distance of their vape shop. Battery manufacturers might be interested in how their batteries are performing in various vaping scenarios. And so on...
We also understand completely if you want nothing to do with all of this technology and stick to your mechanical mod.
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About three years ago I wrote a series of posts on nicotine and the future of vaping (see
this,
this,
this this and
this). I think they very accurately have predicted where things are going in the world of vaping at many levels.
But there are a couple of things I missed: pot legalization and bullying of smokers.
On the pot side I am curious why no one is too worried about whether or not kids will pick up pot smoking in places like Colorado but they sure are worried about some vape that has a fruity flavor...
On the bullying side I have come to realize that the government, by their very definition of bullying, applies bullying to smokers (see
this post).
Many vapers I know literally cringe at the thought of the FDA having knowledge of their vaping, of destroying the vaping industry, and losing the feeling of well being and control vaping gives them.
To the point, I think, that they literally act in fear as
if they have been bullied (and, of course, they have been).
But there is a double edged sword here.
Having the potential information that something like a VaporsCloud provides is also a potential weapon against the very disinformation and bullying tactics used against vapers.
(Smoking, like CDs, mail, phone booths, etc. is dead. It won't be long before the notion of inhaling smoke form a burning ember will be viewed as a stone age activity.)
Smoking will die and go away by-and-large.
But vaping is here to stay - but only if vapers are willing to take action against those who would attack them.
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I have never smoked save for one cigarette in the culvert with my pal Ricky when I was about 10 years old.
Today I vape as part of my job building the PrimusZ.
How ironic is that?
As anyone who reads my blogs knows I am somewhat of a health nut but, at least so far, I really don't notice much of an effect from vaping (and yes, I do vape some blends with nicotine).
And, as for "full disclosure" - K & D Vape Shop is part-owned by a family member (K & D subscribes to the notion that it must be a place where your mom, her 18 or older kid and your grandma and your great grandma can go, feel comfortable, bring their family and children, and vape without the red velvet curtains, sitar, and glass bowl selections to make them uncomfortable).
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I hope that those reading this blog (and related posts and links) will contact me with their ideas and thoughts.
Make no mistake, I am a capitalist. I plan to make a living through this mod.
I also plan to battle the windmills and to devote a certain amount of time to that as well.
I am also interested in seeing that smoking dies to the extent that it can.
