To promote the 2014 Winter Olympics, being held in Sochi, Russia, a promotional body called Olympic Change has set up a very special ticket machine in the Moscow Subway. Instead of taking money as payment for a train ticket, the machine will accept exercise. In this case, 30 squats will earn a commuter a free ticket – thus helping promote Olympic change. And presumably some form of fitness.

It goes deeper than that, though. The ticket machine also promotes the Olympic Change programme. Visit the website, and you’ll see there are 37 days remaining for (presumably) Russian citizens to suggest their own idea for promoting change. The most popular ideas will be judged by a panel consisting of two Russian Olympic medallists as well as the president of the Russian Olympic Committee. The winner gets an all-expenses-paid trip to next year’s Winter Olympics.

Sadly, it’s only open to residents of Russia – and that puts paid to our idea for a pizza vending machine that serves up hot slices in exchange for a 10-minute jog.