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Steve
 
Not Rated
Getting a caller ID on your phone display is a neat thing if the caller is already in your address book. However, if the number is unknown, it isn't exactly very helpful. It would be cool if the phone could do a quick lookup in an online phonebook database and display the caller anyway. Maybe this would be possible via Bluetooth technology?
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Steve
 
Not Rated
12/06/2004
We all know how battery testers work: you find a battery in your home or office and have no clue if it's still usable. You attach it to a battery tester and voila - the battery is flat so you can happily dispose of it. But on washing day, what are you to do if you find a couple of stray socks? Sure, you can smell every single one of them, but that isn't only unpleasant, but it can actually damage your health, e.g. if you're allergic to dust. Alternatively, you can throw everything you...
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Steve
 
Not Rated
11/20/2004
This one's for the cold season... Have you ever found yourself kissing a girl on the sidewalk in winter - cold winds blowing - snow falling... can be pretty romantic, but if you're not careful, you'll get *very* chilly fingers in no time at all. Sure, you could wear gloves, but do you really want to caress her with mittens on your hands?! The solution is so easy that I really wonder why nobody came up with it before - pretty girls should have kissing pockets (or a kissing muff if...
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Steve
 
Not Rated
10/30/2004
I had this idea at a halloween party, but there might also be other, more serious applications. What if you could poke out your tongue at someone and display a certain design/words, and the next time your tongue comes out of your mouth, there's something completely different written on it? In theory, there are many (more or less convenient) options to achieve this, like putting a (mini)printer into your mouth, or hiding a tiny projector in your nose to project the image on your tongue...
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Steve
 
Not Rated
10/30/2004
I usually don't carry a wallet with me, so if I take a credit or ATM card along, I typically put it into a pocket of my pants. When you keep sitting on your plactic cards, they will start to bend, and eventually break (so you will have to get a new one). I propose that plastic cards come in two flavors - the usual straight type, and a second model that comes with a natural curve. Of course, using a more elastic material might also work.
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Steve
 
Not Rated
All over the world, teachers are obsessed with the idea of teaching kids the "real" British English. This obsession is making it unnecessarily hard for people to actually learn the language. British and American English are different in many ways, and depending on your mother-tongue, one flavor should be considerably easier to learn than the other. British English for example has a very hard and distinct pronunciation of consonants, while American English is softer and blurrier. For people...
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Steve
 
Not Rated
I think it's terrible to see a presidential debate where one candidate claims that the sky is green while the other says it is yellow, and then the interviewer nods solemly and moves on to the next question. This stuff is poison for any democracy - yet this strange type of political interview seems to be spreading like the plague! Let the viewers reach their own opinions? What a bunch of hogwash! The viewers (including myself) simply don't have the facts, they have jobs and a family...
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Steve
 
Not Rated
09/03/2004
There are several European countries (Ireland, Norway) where you're not allowed to smoke in public bars. However, the law isn't explicitly against smoking in bars, it just says that smoking at the work place is prohibited - and bars are the working places of bar tenders and waiters. The obvious solution would be to create automatic bars - places where nobody works and you can buy the beer by tossing coins into a slot machine. Or put the barmaids into a plexiglass box where they can...
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Steve
 
Not Rated
08/28/2004
Ever tried to organize a surprise birthday for a friend? Well, the huge problem about surprise birthday parties is that they never actually come as a surprise - people KNOW when they have birthday, so if someone takes you to a surprise place on your birthday, it isn't very hard to guess what's gonna happen. Introduce the REAL surprise birthday. Let the government give everyone a random surprise birthday that changes on a yearly basis. Make the info available to everyone except the...
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Steve
 
Not Rated
08/01/2004
For those of us who don't have access to a golden credit card lounge, sitting at the airport and waiting for a flight can be extremely dull. Why not offer airport cinemas? At the entrance to the cinema, you'd have your boarding card digitally scanned. For that, you get a wrist band with an alarm that alerts you when boarding for your flight is about to begin. Airport cinemas might even prove as an incentive so people turn up at the airport in a timely fashion.