Invention Idea: Auto-Rotating Pot

Burning flame captured several days ago.

While observing a pot of boiling cream of wheat, I had to keep stirring it to cook it evenly. The pot slowly started spinning on the countertop. I thought to myself: How about a pot that you can put on a stove which automatically rotates clockwise or counterclockwise based on internal sensors that determine which part of it is the least cooked? In other words, it tries to maintain constant temperature for each portion of the food.

Invention Idea: Self-conforming cup lids

Self-conforming cup lids. Putting on plastic lids on top of paper cups sometimes is difficult when the paper cups deform. Can we have a material (not plastic) that conform to the shape of the top of a paper cup even if it deforms a little bit?

Questions of Curiosity

Sometimes, I wake up with curious questions. I am not Googling the answers yet until I think about it myself and hypothesize explanations. Here are some:

1. Why does water left overnight taste flat in the morning? However, this doesn't happen with spring water.

2. Why is coffee made at a hotter temperature than tea?

3. What is a way for colorblind people to tell traffic lights apart? Why can't we change the colors of traffic lights?

4. How many books can an average bookshelf hold?

5. How many different ways are there to make light?

Entrepreneurship: Some Ideas

Recently, I have been rediscovering my creativity. Over the span of last year, my creative spirit has dipped, probably due to a combination of tedious managerial and organizational duties I held as well as a persistent nagging financial worry. Now, I have reduced my boredom and anxiety allowing my mind to dedicate a portion of the day to dream and think of new projects to pursue in the future.

I have listed out the creative ideas which I plan to work on in the next decade:

1. Predict Plan Website (Time Management Tool)
I started this out a while ago but stopped on it since I realized it's far more difficult than anticipated. I want to create a web application that can take your schedule and your mood which matches your schedule and analyze it through some algorithms to offer you the best schedule for tomorrow or even several days in advance. I realized after two months of working on it that I need to get another web developer to help me as well as talking to psychologists and management experts to actually develop the algorithm.

Income will be from advanced user subscriptions which will charge monthly.

2. Funny Survival Book (Print Information)
This will be a survival book which is also funny. Most survival books are terribly boring. When I'm dying or close to dying, I will like to be able to laugh at a last funny joke. I want to write a similar book with humor like Max Brooks' Zombie Survival Guide.

Income will be from book sales and collecting royalties. Originally, it can be sold via Amazon Kindle.

3. Subliminal Website (Social Media Website)
This website will allow users to upload a stream of images and one line of text. The image algorithm will then take the images and text and combine them in a way that the original message is lost to the conscious mind. However, the subconscious mind will still be able to decipher the message. Users can then take these messages and spread them like a virus on the web impacting millions with the hidden messages. I will need to talk to some cognitive scientists and visual perception researchers to develop the algorithm.

Income will be from advanced user subscriptions which will allow more images to be uploaded and no restriction on length of text.

4. Bottle Rockets for Kids (Social Entrepreneurship)
This social organization will help kids in poor neighborhoods build bottle rockets. I saw an inspiring video a little while ago on poor kids in slums who were so inspired by playing music made from junk. While I was sitting at the airport in France a month or so ago drinking from a water bottle, I thought to myself: Why can't the same inspiration for space can't be translated to these kids? This organization will send rocket scientists to poor slums around the world and teach them how to build bottle rockets from empty bottles and junk.

Income will be from government and private foundation donations as a nonprofit.

5. Slow Time Choices (Entertainment/Film)
Time shouldn't always go this fast. There's plenty of movies which show action scenes in bullet time. Just look at the Matrix or any John Woo film. However, what about having an entire film which plays at slow motion and yet doesn't annoy the viewer since it's so slow? What I want to do is take slow motion in short sections and string them together. For instance, the first scene can be a glass vase falling from a table crashing onto a marble floor. The second scene is a guy running  across the room towards the vase to catch it before it falls to the ground and breaks. The third scene is a closeup of the second hand on the guy's watch while he is running. These three scenes alternate between each other. The purpose of this project is to promote the idea of stopping and appreciating the nature of time.

Income will be from a crowdfunding site such as Kickstarter.

Entrepreneurship: Bottles for Rockets

While drinking the last drops of the Vittel spring water bottle, I just had a social entrepreneurship idea. Water rockets can be easily built from bottles and some metal, plastic, or even paper fins. These items are common in developing nations but bottle rockets are uncommon.

I saw an inspiring video recently about kids who live in slums that made beautiful musical instruments out of junk. Music brought meaning to their lives that otherwise would be just dirty and miserable. It brought magic. Similarly, space can also bring magic.

Imagination can be fostered in even the worst places. These kids' interest in science and technology are very limited due to lack of exposure to books, videos, and educated peers or parents.Yet, if they can make bottle rockets out of scrap, they can see that the magic power is all around them. This can be an excellent plan for developing nations and even developed countries with slums.