Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

Yup Ken, I`m familiar with Bluetooth.  it`s been around a few years and thus far not really lived up to its promise.  It`s good for things like associating a wireless headset to a cell phone, or a mouse to a computer, but it starts to lose its scalability once you start trying to use it to keep two computers entirely in sync.  The theory is there, absolutely(*), it`s just not been proven out in practice yet.

(*) Steve Wozniak, founder of Apple and a legend in geek circles, is a confessed gadget junkie.  I recently heard him say, "I bought my new car entirely because it came with Bluetooth and I wanted it to talk to my phone."




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Personal: http://www.morinfamily.com/blog
Geeky: http://duanesbrain.blogspot.com
Shakespeare: http://suchshakespearestuff.blogspot.com

Yes Matt.

Did anyone see American Inventor last night...kind of cheesy, but tell me you don`t feel the pain of the folks who don`t make it to the next round?

I like your desire for this specific product, But I have to ask what is the size of the market for such a product,,, unless you can come up with another use for it because honestly there are not many people who would need it for that use and /or are willing to spend that kind of money.

 

I know its partly a wish product and to generate ideas and a topic to talk about.  I guess this is just my way of saying that I know  nobody personally that has any interest in the feild of innovations or as an entreprenuer.  This is why I like this group because I have found like minds.

 

Yes I do believe it is feasable and a large enough market can be developed if the use of the product are  expanded upon.

 

Hi I&I,

The idea was entirely a brainstorm on the spot, so I have no real vested interest in making it a reality.  However, I bet you`d find the market for such a thing (the original device) as huge.  "Organize my life" is just a tremendous market, and everybody is trying to come up with the optimal way to do so, from websites dedicated to tips and tricks, to tools (anybody seen "pico pad"?) to full on electronic gadgets.  Just last week, Merlin Mann over at 43folders spoke of distributing sticky note pads around his house (such as on the inside of kitchen cabinets) for exactly the purpose I described, being able to jot down ideas as soon as they come to you.  If somebody produced a device that was cheap enough that you could have sevearl of them throughout the house, and it was as easy to use as a memopad, and they were all interconnected so all your ideas could be aggregated in one place?  I think it`d do quite well.

I prefer to envision a world where I interact with a million tiny devices that all do one thing so well that it is invisible to me, not a world in which I have one mega computer integrated under my skin between the shoulder blades that does everything.

d



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Personal: http://www.morinfamily.com/blog
Geeky: http://duanesbrain.blogspot.com
Shakespeare: http://suchshakespearestuff.blogspot.com

Bard...do you think Apple is going in the direction to which you describe with the ipod?

I ask because you sound a little like Steve Jobs...lol

Didn`t anyone like my "smart" refrigerator idea?  A refrigerator that can actually create a shopping list based on reading bar codes of product containers.  When you`re low on milk you`ll receive a message...lol

Oh geez, I wish I sounded like Jobs :), or at least had the gumption to change the world like he`s done.  No, right now I don`t think that the iPod is the key to Apple`s world domination, at least in the sense I`m thinking.  Apple sees the world in a very media-driven way.  They want to make it possible for you to get "content" (be it radio, movies, pictures, blogs, etc...) as easy as possible.  Their whole mac mini concept is really a home media server that you can use to blast tunes around your house (via Airport Express) or play (or make) DVDs, etc...

the iPod is a player of content.  It`s not an interactive device at all, when you think about it.  The current balance right now is heavily slanted toward the consumers of content, not the producers.  Podcasting`s a great example.  Everybody says "Anybody with a computer and a microphone can do it!" and to a degree that`s true, but consider how many people listen to music versus how many people sing.  Or how many people read novels versus writing novels.  Just because you have the means to publish content does not mean that you want to be a provider of that content.  Sometimes all you want is devices to make your own personal life better.



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Personal: http://www.morinfamily.com/blog
Geeky: http://duanesbrain.blogspot.com
Shakespeare: http://suchshakespearestuff.blogspot.com

ok...one more time give me the "Bard`s idea for dummies" description of your idea...I am a complete techno nerd, but I want to fully understand your thought process.

Call it -- them -- "idea collectors".  Don`t ever forget anything again.

Imagine a typical whiteboard, maybe a little bigger than the standard 8.5x11 pad, maybe a little smaller, depending on where you plan to put it.  Now imagine that whatever you write on it, be it words or pictures, can be transmitted to your computer so that they can all be kept in one place.  Maybe you have such a board in the shower, or at least in the bathroom for when you`re getting ready in the morning.  Maybe one is in the kitchen, or on the nightstand.  The key value proposition being that wherever you have the idea does not put a burden on you to carry it with you from place to place.  You have it, you send it off, you know it`s available to you when you need it.  If you are in a position where you can`t "send it off" (maybe you`re not in a wireless network range) the device has the capacity to store the information and send it when it can.

There are many variations on this idea already.  Voice memo devices being an obvious one.  The cameraphone.  I love the "lifehack" I saw once that said "When you`re at a restaurant and you have a bottle of wine you particularly like, use your cameraphone to snapshot the label so you remember it."  Brilliant, and exactly the sort of thing I`m talking about.
Note that I do NOT count palm-pilot like PDA devices, which is more about trying to jam an entire computer in your pocket, and not the same thing as the sort of "memory augmentation" devices we`re talking about here.

This device is more for those "Aha!" moments where you need to record something original so it is not lost.  Maybe it`s when you`re sitting on the couch watching tv and you think "Remember to buy flowers for the wife tomorrow" but you don`t want to get off the couch.  Maybe it`s that brilliant idea for a new kind of unbreakable crayon that hits you in the shower.  The goal is to alleviate the burden of "I have this thing I want to remember, but no  easy way to record it so I`m sure I won`t forget it."  I want something like a clock.  How many different rooms of your house have a clock in them?  Why?  Because you want it convenient that you can look up and see what time it is in certain situations.  Likewise I want it convenient that if you get the urge to remember something you can jot it down and forget it.

Some people say that the way to approach this is to have on your a portable media *capturing* device so that everything you see, hear and experience is captured for you, and you don`t have to remember to take a memo for yourself.  Lots of work going on in the thinktanks about this sort of idea (and the social implications -- imagine never having to wonder if you misunderstood somebody, because you could always go back and replay it?).  But right now there`s not enough horsepower in a device small enough to carry around with you to make this happen.  I`m not even sure it`s ever going to be technologically feasible, once you factor in all the various conditions where you might need such a device (and I cite my regular examples, namely driving a car, lying in bed just before going to sleep, and taking a shower)  and the kind of resource constraints you`d need (power supply being the big one).

Whew.  The more I write, the more I open up room for questions (like on the clock thing, "What about wearing a watch?") which I don`t have time right now to tackle.  After all this started out as a daydeam, not as a project I have any intention of actually creating.  Gotta go help the missus prepare the baby`s room.  Could be any day now.

D







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Personal: http://www.morinfamily.com/blog
Geeky: http://duanesbrain.blogspot.com
Shakespeare: http://suchshakespearestuff.blogspot.com

http://www.polyvision.com/products/interactive-whiteboards.a sp

Start there.  Then make it so small and cheap it`s like the sort of thing you pick up at Walmart for $15.  I`m sure there are other companies making similar things, but I`d be very surprised to discover that anybody`s making a mass market version of such a thing.




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Personal: http://www.morinfamily.com/blog
Geeky: http://duanesbrain.blogspot.com
Shakespeare: http://suchshakespearestuff.blogspot.com