Vibrating Pond

If you get a tray, fill it with water and then vibrate the tray, the surface of the water ripples in a really hypnotic way.

How about a large public water feature, like a fountain, but not a fountain, more like a gigantic vibrating pond?

The surface of the water would look so cool. And kids could jump in and feel the vibration on the bottoms of their feet. If you threw in coins, they would jiggle around everywhere.

What if instead of a vibrator, it was giant bass speakers installed under the fountain?

Ad-supported everything

I'm amazed at sites that run merely on banner-ad support.

One of my favorites: FreeRice.com. It's a vocab game. For each word you get right it donates 20 grains of rice to a starving child. And it's supposedly all ad-supported.

It made me start to think about all the things that are ad-supported. Is it possible to use ad-support for good, not evil?

Some ideas:

  • Ad-supported Greyhound buses. You get to ride the bus for free, but there are ads playing on a small TV on the back of the chair in front of you. (No audio, of course.)

  • Ad-supported housing projects: "This tenement sponsored by Vegenaise."

  • Ad-supported schools. Many schools give free(?) advertising anyway: vending machines, professional sports teams, milk (dear LORD!) some schools even have fast food chains on campus.

Seriously, it makes me sick that milk gets so much free publicity, as if it's a public-service. "Does a body good." Milk is a business!

This is a bad idea. Scrap it.

Snow Chains Snap-On

Know what I dislike about snow? Putting chains on your tires.

And... (this may prove what a coddled nancy-boy I am) I can't get my snow chains on. Is it just that my skeleton fingers freeze-up in the cold? Or is it that these chains are a 100-yr-old design that needs some serious updating?

So, here's my idea: Remember snap bracelets?

The WhimStar Snow Tire will look like a giant plate. You just line two of them up in front of your wheels and then drive forward. They automatically roll right onto your tires.
I'm going to get my engineers to start work on this right away.

That reminds me of another idea I had last year: It looks like someone already beat me to my snap-bracelet watch idea,

but how about a snap-bracelet cell phone? Eh? Can anyone say wrist cancer?

Beepless Microwave

Why does everything have to beep? Beep-beep-beep-beep! Your food is warm! Beep-beep: There's a utility vehicle somewhere in a 50-yard radius that's backing up. Beep-beep-beep-beep: You're trying to open the side door to your Honda Odyssey when it's in gear (by the way, worst design ever, that car.)

Beep-beep-beep-beep: You're in a hospital, construction zone, school campus, city street. Pretty much anywhere, you're surrounding by a ubiquitous high-pitched chirp. It's supposed to alert you to something, but it's so ever-present that you've learned to tune it out, just to keep your sanity.

Furthermore, is it just me, but I have a hard time locating high-pitched sine waves especially if they are really short...?

So, here's my invention. It's simple really: A no-beep microwave!

Yes, that's it. Million dollar invention, right there.


1. You'll know when the microwave stops humming.
2. You'll smell it.
3. You put it in there 3 minutes ago. How short is your attention span?


Or how about this idea (at the risk of making microwaves even more complicated than they already are): Have a setting for how loud you want it to beep, or if you want it to beep at all. It could even be turned up really loud, like a foghorn, so you can let the whole apartment know that you're having nachos.

I got 99 ideas, but I aint sold one

We were in da club last night when 50 Cent came in talking about

"We gonna party like it's yo birfday
We gonna sip Bacardi like it's yo birfday."

I was thinking today about the popularity of that song. And how Bacardi sales probably rocketed after the release. Maybe Bacardi cut him a deal ahead of time. Or maybe Bacardi helped push the popularity of the song after it had been released. Or maybe none of the above: Bacardi just leaned back and sailed on the profits of free advertising.

The music business does a lot of product placement. If they're doing it for free, they need to wise up. Movies do it all the time. Need a few extra grand? Throw a can of Pepsi into Brad Pitt's hand. But whereas the Pepsi can is there for only two seconds, the "Bacardi" line stays on people's lips for years.

So, I've decided, the next Ultricon Convoy release is going to include product placements galore. (But they'll be products I support, of course.)




Here's a sampling of the track listings:
1. Tempeh Powerballs
2. 8-Bit Soyrizo Burrito Princess
3. Vegenaise Blastoff
4. Tofu Warpzone
5. Level Golden Tofurkey
6. Guayakiller YerbaMate Miniboss
7. Coconut Bliss Bazooka Nuts

Henna Tat Pen

While we're on the subject of tattoos.


We have a solid tradition of drawing all over each other with sharpies at parties. (Is that toxic, by the way?)


Problem is, they only last a couple of days.



So, why not something a little more permanent, like henna?




The benefit is that would last a lot longer, like for weeks.


And while you're at it, make it more user-friendly than a paintbrush. You could have it available as a simple pen.


Oh, look, somebody already invented it.


This blog should be entitled "My awesome inventions that someone has already invented."

Magic Eye Tattoo

I was just thinking that everyone with a tattoo automatically has something to talk about at the party.

(Which made me have this other idea about a character who has a tattoo of everything in the whole world on his body. That way he could try to fit in: "You have an anchor tattoo? Me too!" "You like rocket ships? My favorite! Check out my left ankle!" "Mobius strips! Hell yeah! Look under my right buttcheek!")

But anyway, if were ever to get a tattoo, I'd want one that's totally fresh and totally me. Something that hasn't been done before.

So, remember those Magic Eye puzzles from the 90's? Where you stare at them, and a 3-D image appears? I need a tattoo of that.


Best Tattoo Ever


Maybe after you've stared at it long enough, the words "Think fast!" appear.
Then just at that moment I smack you in the face.

Related: That reminds me of Peter Mucha's idea (I love that guy)Skin will become the ultimate hi-def screen. How about a tattoo that's always changing, showing constantly morphing images like a hologram. Or even better: A screen tattoo on your belly like the Telletubbies that shows whatever you want. "Check out this youtube video on my belly." You could even have a nanocam inside your body, so your tattoo shows everyone what's going on inside you. Close up. (Damn, that would be awesome! Like those "Womb with a view" t-shirts, only better.)

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