Spark People a good resource?

[tobetinytina]

I found spark people the website online when I was looking for a free diet plan but I’m not sure if it’s good or not. I get that it’s great because you don’t have to pay for it, but I don’t want to put a whole pile of time and effort into a diet that does nothing. Is this a good resource?

[tara]

It's probably the best free resource that I've ever seen. It's not a complete package, in that you will need to do a lot of it on your own, but if you're looking for tools and guidance, it's a really good one, just like weight-loss-center.net is another fantastic one. These two, together, are where I get most of my info.

[ffviifan]

Considering it's free, it really has a lot to offer. I think the purpose of it is to sell some of its side products. They have an activity tracker that I find very tempting. I've stared at the page for it more than once. But really when it all comes down to it, the website on its own is actually quite impressive, even if you don't buy a single thing. You can get a lot of resources out of it.

I think the thing that I like the most about it is that it encourages fitness, not starving yourself, and it does so in a very realistic way. You can tell that the target market is real people, not just people who are already in great shape. It makes it much more appealing and relevant.

[suzie]

I actually like this site a lot. I think that the points are rather stupid and trivial, but the ability to track everything, produce reports, and use a huge number of tools and resources is great.

[1000kw]

After seeing this post, I signed up for it to see what I thought of it. It looks like a good resource with a lot of stuff, but it has a lot of things that I would really never use. So much of it is focused on taking part in their blogs and forums and that's really not what I want to do on that program. I really like the forum here because everybody seems normal enough. The people on that forum are intense. It's like they're hyperactive about dieting! I can't keep up and I don't feel that I can relate with them.

Also, their points system stinks. You win these points so that you can get badge, but they just seem to hand the points out arbitrarily. You even spin a "wheel" to see how many points you win just for signing in every day. That seems ridiculous. It means that I could work my butt off but someone else could get more points than me just because they were lucky when the spun a wheel! silly

[speeddemon]

I did this for a while, but I found that the points were annoying, there was too much of it that I really didn't want to do (I didn't like their hyperactive forum, it didn't seem real) and it all seemed to be a sales pitch for their products

[jenny25]

I like it. Especially since it's free.

[treehuggertodd]

It's not bad. It's articles are pretty generic. You can find similar ones all over the internet that say almost the exact same thing. They remind me of a teen magazine or something. Not a lot of depth.

But the good part of that is that there is a lot of it all in one place and it is always being refreshed so eventually something is likely to appeal. The exercise videos are good. I haven't found their recipes to be very good.

[Gina]

I find that their articles are essentially puff pieces, but their video library can't be beaten. They have fantastic exercise videos. I think they're probably all available on youtube, too in case you don't actually want to sign up for the program iteslf. Just look for the name of the program at youtube or look for coach nicole. SHe's great. I like that a lot of the videos are short so that if I'm doing strength training exercises, I know that it will take me only six or seven miutes per video (depending on what it is).

[freddyboy]

I find that their articles are essentially puff pieces, but their video library can't be beaten. They have fantastic exercise videos. I think they're probably all available on youtube, too in case you don't actually want to sign up for the program iteslf. Just look for the name of the program at youtube or look for coach nicole. SHe's great. I like that a lot of the videos are short so that if I'm doing strength training exercises, I know that it will take me only six or seven miutes per video (depending on what it is).

I actually like the articles. THey change them every day and there's usually one (out of about four) that interests me in some way. They usually have top ten lists and things like that (top ten ways to avoid cravings for sweets, top ten reasons you're hurting your own diet...that sort of thing) because they don't just tell you what you're doing wrong but also what you're doing right or how you can correct what you were doing wrong so that you will do it right. Sorry, that sounded very confusing but I don't know how to say it another way.

The videos are good enough but I find that they have a huge library but I only really use 3 of them. THey're also available on youtube.

[char]

I think that all of their points systems are bull. I don't like any of their social stuff and at first I felt like I was going to be "punished" or excluded from things in some way because I don't want to blog or post in forums, or take part in teams, etc. BUt it's easy to ignore all that crap.

Their food tracker is better than anythign I've ever seen. And for free!