Archive for February 2012
Apps: Job Outsourcing In Realtime
Business Insider: Justin Kan already has quite the track record. His second [business], Justin.tv, has turned into a runaway success since rebranding to Twitch.tv. Its traffic has doubled in the past six months. It now has more than 16 million unique visitors every month. Now he’s leaving that startup to work on a completely new [...]
Today in Entrepreneurial History: February 29
Today’s Today in Entrepreneurial History was harder to write than normal, because there’s only one February 29th at most every four years. February 29, known as a leap day in the Gregorian calendar, is a date that occurs in most years that are evenly divisible by 4, such as 2004, 2008, 2012 and 2016. Years [...]
Popular Science: Have you ever been tempted to order steak tartare but decided against it for fear of getting sick? This little cell phone scanner can take a look at it for you and let you know if it does in fact harbor any E. coli bacteria. It attaches to a typical cell phone camera [...]
Cool Material: The Scoville scale is what determines the spiciness of a pepper. For reference, a jalapeño starts at 3,500 Scovilles and a habanero starts at 100,000 Scovilles. We consider ourselves fans of spicy food, but even a habanero (there are about five or so that can be hotter) thrown into a queso dip can [...]
iPhone Creates Demand for Cosmetic Surgery: FaceTime Facelift
Robert K. Sigal, M.D., board-certified plastic surgeon in the Washington, D.C.-area plastic surgery practice The Austin-Weston Center for Cosmetic Surgery, is seeing firsthand technology’s direct effect on the demand for plastic surgery. “Patients come in with their iPhones and show me how they look on [Apple’s video calling application] FaceTime,” says Dr. Sigal. “The angle [...]
Telegraph: Courbefy, in the Limousin region, comes complete with 19 buildings and a swimming pool and at one time had a population of around 200, although it is now largely deserted. Prospective buyers have until Friday to put in a bid for the village, which is less than 30 miles from Limoges. In the 1990s, [...]
Today in Entrepreneurial History: February 28
1827 – The Baltimore & Ohio Railroad is incorporated, becoming the first railroad in America offering commercial transportation of both people and freight. 1849 – Regular steamboat service from the west to the east coast of the United States begins with the arrival of the SS California in San Francisco Bay, 4 months 22 days after [...]
Central Florida Future: What do a folding chair, a ladder scaffold support and a self-leveling vertical table have in common? They were all successfully designed and patented by African-American inventors in the 19th and 20th centuries. “Black History Month means remembering the past, and it’s kind of funny that we notice how many inventions actually [...]
Don’t like chewing? A company is currently working on making food that you can “breathe,” starting with their own energy product. AeroShot, the flagship product of Breathable Foods, is revolutionizing the way people energize their lives. Using a small lipstick-sized tube, consumers puff in fine particles of caffeine and B vitamins, which are absorbed into [...]
Entrepreneurship Conference Coming To London
The Beaver: This year’s event is the second annual conference organised by the LSE Entrepreneur Society after the great success achieved in 2011. The weekend included a series of talks, workshops and networking events hosted by distinguished entrepreneurs and business leaders. In his opening speech, Paul Schmelzing of the LSE Entrepreneur Society, said entrepreneurs should [...]
Amazon Prime is a membership program on Amazon.com. After joining, members pay an annual fee of about $80, and get free two-day shipping on just about everything Amazon sells. I know that the numbers below are true for me. Amazon doesn’t disclose details of the Prime program publicly but according to estimates Amazon Prime members: [...]
New Fishing Video Game With Force Feedback
DigInfo: Fishing Spirits, by Namco Bandai Games, is an arcade fishing medal game for eight players and features force feedback controllers. It will be in game arcades in Japan from July 2012. “This is a medal game that up to eight people can play at once. It’s totally different from previous medal games. This is [...]
Comic: How’s This for a Business Plan?
Today in Entrepreneurial History: February 27
On this day in 1883, Oscar Hammerstein patented the first cigar roller. From sweeping the floors of the cigar factory, to innovator in the cigar industry in ten years, Hammerstein held patents on 44 cigar manufacturing inventions. Although cigars made him wealthy, his real love was opera. His passion for led him to open several [...]
Steve Kordek, Double Flipper Inventor, Dies At 100
The man behind the double flipper on pinball machines, Steve Kordek, has recently passed on at the ripe age of 100. In 1947, two designers at the D. Gottlieb & Company pinball factory in Chicago, Harry Mabs and Wayne Neyens, transformed that rudimentary game into one called Humpty Dumpty, adding six electromechanical flippers, three on [...]
Do You Need A Social Media Expert?
Here is what some entrepreneurs told the Washington Post about hiring someone to handle social media. Paul Gollash, founder and CEO of New York-based Voxy: “We originally tried to manage our social media presence part-time, but we learned quickly that in order to go from just having a presence to actually building and maintain high-value [...]
Robert Herjavec On Being An Entrepreneur
If you watch Shark Tank, you are probably know exactly who I am talking about when I mention Robert’s name. With his rags to riches style business story, his take on business is something anyone with nothing trying to create something can appreciate. Here is his perspective on finding success: There really is no silver [...]
Robot Cars in Nevada Get Own License Plate
Earlier this month, Nevada became the first state in the nation to establish a drivers’ license for robot cars. Robot test vehicles will get red license plates and once the technology is ready for general public use, cars with robots behind the wheel will get green license plates. “Nevada is the first state to embrace [...]
Today in Entrepreneurial History: February 24
On this date in 1815, Robert Fulton, the American inventor and and engineer widely credited with inventing the first commercially success steamboat, died. Fulton was born in 1765 into a poor family on the Pennsylvania frontier. From an early age, Fulton showed an aptitude for working with machinery of all kinds, as well as an [...]
Use Tax Time To Evaluate Your Retirement Fund
Boston.com: For small business owners, that assessment may also mean investigating whether the plan you have still fits your business needs. Consider this: A recent Fidelity survey of more than 600 small business owners who already offer SEP-IRA, SIMPLE IRA or Self-Employed 401(k) plans found a significant lack of understanding among owners of the plans [...]
Inventor “Hooks” Idea With Foldaway Anchor
Fraser Coast Chronicle: It was no doubt after a day’s struggle on the open water, after hauling in and maybe even tripping over a cumbersome anchor, that this little fish jumped right into Franco’s head, the idea for an anchor that was easy to store, compact and hassle-free. The Rockhampton man has designed the foldaway [...]
If we can generate energy from wind turbines on the ground, imagine what we could generate with a flying turbine in the sky. Shepard describes the invention as half-windmill and half-kite. He credits his late father, David, for its creation. “Just five miles above us there is energy far more than we need to power [...]
Mark Cuban’s Guide to Sharktank
Mark Cuban is a billionaire entrepreneur who just happens to own the Dallas Mavericks. If you didn’t know, he’s also a prolific blogger. You can read his site here. He’s also one of the sharks on Shark Tank. He’s posted a quick and dirty guide to Shark Tank with many of the questions he’s often [...]
If Small Farm Central is any indication, there’s a niche out there for everyone. The web business, run by Simon Huntley, gives small farmers the tools to build a Web presence without paying thousands of dollars to do it. Huntley said a Web site gives farmers exposure they might not otherwise have, particularly when they’re [...]
Talking With the Creator of the Adapt-o-Pole Pool Pole Adapter
Today’s Walmart’s Get on the Shelf interview is with Andy Soares, inventor of the Adaptopole Pool Pole Adapter. What product did you submit to Walmart’s Get on the Shelf contest? Adaptopole Poole Pole Adapter Where’d the idea come from? It was born out of a necessity. My wife asked if I could clean the cobwebs [...]
My Modern Met: Architect James Law designed an unbelievable skyscraping residential complex for real estate company Wadhwa Group in Mumbai, India. One of the most outstanding and eye-popping features of the facility includes a series of swimming pools placed within each balcony. These pools appear like floating gelatinous molds extending at the edge of each [...]
Today in Entrepreneurial History: February 23
1886 – Charles Martin Hall produced the first samples of man-made aluminum, after several years of intensive work. He was assisted in this project by his older sister Julia Brainerd Hall. 1896 – The Tootsie Roll is invented. 1905 – Chicago attorney Paul Harris and three other businessmen meet for lunch to form the Rotary [...]
The One-Handed Touch Screen Keyboard
Doug Engelbart’s Chorded Keyboard as a Multi-touch Interface from Teague Labs on Vimeo. As the devices we find ourselves typing on get smaller, a one-handed keyboard is becoming more relevant. Most people don’t realize the idea began in the late 60′s, during Douglas Engelbart’s presentation introducing futuristic ideas like the computer mouse, hypertext, and video [...]
Niche Inventions: Floating Solar Panels
Solar Novus: Floating solar panels soaking up the sun on Italy’s Lake Colignola will provide a cost-effective, more visually attractive way to harness the sun’s power, says its inventor, Marco Rosa-Clot. Rosa-Clot says while PV panels on buildings or fields use valuable farmland, lose energy through overheating and look ugly, his flower-petal-shaped panels come without [...]
How The Guy Who Did Not Invented Email Received The Credit
Techdirt: Late last week, the Washington Post reported that The Smithsonian had acquired “tapes, documentation, copyrights, and over 50,000 lines of code from V.A. Shiva Ayyadurai, who both the Smithsonian and the Washington Post insisted was the “inventor of e-mail.” There’s just one problem with this: It’s not actually true. … As is nicely summarized [...]
Personal Robots for the Handicapped and Elderly
Economic Times: For over 10 years, an itch on his nose had been annoying Henry Evans. Many take such basic functions for granted, but not Evans. When he was 40, a stroke left him paralysed and mute. He can only move his head and partially move one finger. Evans could finally scratch that itch last [...]
4 Reasons Your Small Business is Sputtering
The following is a guest post by Dave Ashley. Ask any Fortune 500 executive and they’ll tell you that running a small business isn’t all kittens and rainbows. There’s a long, hard road to walk between hiring your first employee and retiring in Maui, and when your product isn’t selling or your business is losing [...]
Popular Science: On the frozen edge of the Kolyma River in northeastern Siberia, in an ancient pantry harboring seeds and other stores, an Arctic ground squirrel burrowed into the dirt and buried a small, dark fruit from a flowering plant. The squirrel’s prize quickly froze in the cold ground and was preserved in permafrost, waiting [...]
Infographic: Building The Better Entrepreneur
What does it take to build a better entrepreneur? Angel Investment Network takes a look.
Out of Work Techie? Write a Sci-Fi Novel
Computer engineers and computer scientists have been one of the hardest hit professions in this economic slump. For all their technical prowess, their jobless rates climbed quickly early in the recession compared to other professionals, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. But interestingly, while the computer geeks were losing jobs, science fiction novels were [...]
Businessweek: “Washington is not doing enough,” so businesses have to “step up,” Chief Executive Officer Howard Schultz said yesterday in a telephone interview. Customers of the Seattle- based company have given about $2 million to Create Jobs for USA since it was created last year. The Starbucks Foundation seeded the fund with $5 million to [...]
Today in Entrepreneurial History: February 22
1819 – By the Adams-Onís Treaty, Spain sells Florida to the United States for five million U.S. dollars. 1879 – In Utica, New York, Frank Woolworth opens the first of many of 5 and dime Woolworth stores. 1924 – U.S. President Calvin Coolidge becomes the first President to deliver a radio broadcast from the White [...]
The Invention of the Highlighter
NY Times.com: Once, when readers wanted to remember something, they had to mark important passages with thin, wobbly lines in drab, hard-to-relocate colors. Before the rise of the highlighter, says Dennis Baron, a University of Illinois professor and the author of “A Better Pencil,” attentive readers relied on “a combination of underlining and marginal notes.” [...]
Google Heads-Up Display Glasses in 2012
I’ve been waiting for something like this my entire life. According to the NY Times, Google plans to introduce heads-up display glasses by the end of the year. The glasses are expected to be based on the Android platform, and will also have a 3G data connection and GPS. People who constantly reach into a [...]
There is a reason people love the tagline, “There’s an app for that,” so much. It’s true. There are apps for everyone, including inventors. Here are a few shared by Davison Inventions. iHandy Carpenter This app has five of the most well designed tools for builders, makers and carpenters. InventionLand An app on a mission [...]
An Arabian Apprentice-Like Show To Launch
The new show may not feature Donald Trump, but it does seem to take a few cues from his American show, The Apprentice, reports Arabian Business. Titled ‘The Entrepreneur’, the show is likely to begin in the third quarter of 2012. “It welcomes a new genre of entrepreneurs: people who have ideas that are impactful [...]
Ideas Are Nothing Without Execution
What is a good idea if you do nothing with it? It is still just an idea. It takes work to build a simple idea into a successful business. So let’s consider that very first moment when you think it is a good idea to run your own show; you have read of these entrepreneurial [...]
Profit Pays the Bills, Not Popularity
Fame alone doesn’t make the car payment. Care2 explains: The best business ideas were those that were unique, thoroughly researched, and were focused on making money. While it may sound obvious for a business to focus on making money, I heard more than a few business ideas that seemed to neglect this critical aspect. Instead [...]
Good Business Idea? Free College!
NBC Connecticut: Four years of tuition at a Connecticut university’s business school? About $120,000. A chance to get it free? Priceless. The dean of the University of New Haven’s business school is issuing a challenge to its incoming freshmen: Bowl me over with your entrepreneurial idea and win free tuition for your undergraduate degree.
WKCY: Like many inventors, Maria Barile’s creation happened by accident. Six years ago she dropped a box on her foot and lost her toenail. It was summertime and, like most women, she dreaded what her feet would look like in open-toed shoes. So she came up with an idea to use an adhesive that she [...]
Today in Entrepreneurial History: February 21
1804 – The first self-propelling steam locomotive makes its outing at the Pen-y-Darren Ironworks in Wales. 1842 – John Greenough is granted the first U.S. patent for the sewing machine. 1878 – The first telephone book is issued in New Haven, Connecticut. 1947 – In New York City, Edwin Land demonstrates the first “instant camera”, [...]
Accessories For iPad Users With Disabilities
Making life easier for people in need is always good business, as one entrepreneur has discovered. The assistive devices started really by accident. My first handmade product was an iPad stylus made from a highly conductive fabric sock (knitted by my wife!) that can be wrapped around any pen holder (the Stylus Socks). They worked [...]
USA Today: Using cow stem cells grown in a petri dish, the researchers have created small strips of muscle that will be mixed with blood and artificially grown fat to make a hamburger, the BBC writes. Celebrity chef Heston Blumenthal is being courted to cook “a golf ball-size of this stuff,” physiologist Mark Post of [...]
Braille Meets Touchscreen With Free App
The increasing popularity of touchscreen phones has caused some problems for the visually impaired. However, the new BrailleTouch app hopes to fix that. In an app coming to the market relatively soon for both iPhone and Android, Georgia Tech researchers have reduced the price of realistically typing Braille on a smartphone from $1700 plus the [...]
Entrepreneurs Turning To 3-D Printing
USA Today: Matt Sullivan, a retired soldier, still has trouble explaining his right leg to strangers. The shiny chrome surface, embossed with the lightning bolt logo of his beloved San Diego Chargers, covers the calf area of his prosthetic leg, the result of a roadside bomb in Afghanistan in 2010. At the naval hospital where [...]
