Netflix engineers hack Fitbit to track when you fall asleep during a video

What do you get when a bunch of Netflix engineers participate in an internal hack day competition? Lots of really cool stuff, of course.

One group of engineers decided to use a Fitbit activity tracking gadget to determine when you fall asleep while watching a movie or TV show on Netflix. When you do finally pass out, the hack remembers the exact place in that video and allows you to resume watching at that point when you wake up.

As someone who requires the TV to be on before passing out at night, this is kind of awesome. I usually resort to watching old episodes of Star Trek Voyager, but if I could use this hacked Fitbit, I’d be able to watch stuff I’d never seen before without worrying that I’d lose my place when I fall asleep.

But that isn’t the only thing Netflix engineers did. They also managed to use Apple’s Bluetooth enabled iBeacon device to “bump” videos from one device to another — sort of like that Bump contact/business card sharing app.

For a close look at the hacking projects, check out the demo videos embedded below.