Useful gadgets just waiting to be invented
I just heard about an exciting new invention — the “smart bin” — a self-catching garbage can on wheels that automatically tilts to catch whatever you throw.
This is incredibly useful for wannabe basketball players practising their shots with apple cores. Or people too lazy to leave the table to toss their leftover meatballs.
It rivals other marvels like the “connected fork” that counts your bites, and the combination TV remote/beer opener.
Essential as these devices are to humankind, they’ve got me thinking about other tiny inventions to make life a bit easier — if only someone would hurry up and invent them. For instance:
1. Who-zzat? Shazam is an amazing app that lets us identify any tune playing nearby. Now we need “Who-zzat?” — to identify peoples’ faces and names, then whisper into your hidden earphones:
“You’re talking to Phillip, the brother-in-law you haven’t seen since the wedding five years ago. His daughters’ names are Trudi and Leni — and no one ever thanked you for the wedding gift.”
2. Why-Am-I-Here? How often do you head downstairs to do something, but once you’re there you forget what? So you trundle upstairs to remember why you went downstairs.
We need to invent a memory-jogger. You’d just shout “WHY AM I HERE?” and your gadget would flash a photo on the wall showing the room you’d just left. Then — Eureka! You’d remember! … You came down to do your laundry!
You’d also see something in the picture of upstairs you forgot to bring downstairs: Your laundry.
3. Open Sesame: With selfdriving cars the coming rage, how long before we see self-tying shoelaces, self-folding laundry and most importantly for the sanity of humanity, self-opening packaging.
We’re all frazzled by hummus containers sealed in plastic film we can’t grip; tech packaging so tough your scissors snap; jars so tightly sealed legions of seniors expire opening them.
That’s why people started buying music online — no one could get their CDs out of the cellophane wrapping. Otherwise iTunes and Spotify wouldn’t exist.
We need self-opening milk cartons that never shred, tech packaging that unzips itself and jars you just command “OPEN SESAME!” – and your sesame butter opens.
4. Get-Me-Outta-Here: You’re trapped in downtown construction traffic, aggravated by multiple-festival road closures. Help! You need an emergency out!
Just shout: “Get me outta here!” — and hear: “Take first back alley left to escape Grand Prix gridlock … In 10 yards, remove construction signs, then drive down closed road ... Now, back up 100 metres the wrong way on Drummond.
“Park on sidewalk. Take Bixi home.”
5. No-Lose Keys: GPS key-finders can track your keys after you misplace them — but how about something to prevent us ever losing them?
When you put your keychain in an unusual spot, you’d hear an alert: “Hey! Don’t leave me under these socks — you’ll never find me. Hang me on the hook in the hall — please!”
The same for other items. When you leave your umbrella somewhere, it should find you — not vice-versa.
“Josh, you’re leaving my 20-foot perimeter — don’t forget me … Josh! It’s gonna rain in seven minutes! You need me!’’
6. The Disentangler: The great mystery of today’s wireless world is why we’re still tangled up in wires. Audio wires snarl with phone cords, charger cables and earbud wires that attract each other, then intertwine and tie the knot.
There’s an explanation for this in physics, but if I wanted it, I’ve have studied physics. We need wires that automatically repel each other. If they do somehow tangle you’d just shout at them — and they’d instantly disengage, like teenagers caught necking by their parents.
7. The Silencer: The world keeps getting noisier from more traffic, music and restaurant TVs, while people shout into their cellphones: “HEY SIRI! — what’s the weather forecast for the next 25 minutes? … And what’s the capital city of … ummm … Mongolia!?”
We need electronic shields to block unwanted music, car horns and conversations — in a cone of silence. It would also filter air pollution, block falling objects and replace sunblock.
8. The Indecision-Ender: Ever get that frazzled, paralyzed feeling because you can’t make a tiny decision? Do you want your sandwich on organic wholewheat nine-grain flatbread, or gluten-free pita, or focaccia sourdough muffaletta? With chipotle mayo, or low-fat salsa verde?
You need the Indecision-Ender to make tiny meaningless choices for you.
“You’re having the six-inch, nine-grain low-fat club!” it would announce. “You always love it and never finish the 12-inch. I’ve already ordered and paid electronically, so you can’t cancel.”
There are many tiny things we terribly need: bathroom mirrors with windshield-wipers that never fog during showers. Garbage bags that automatically tie themselves, no matter how full. Spray-on gift-wrap, so I can finally stop giving crinkled birthday presents.
How about one charger that works with every gadget: phones, computers, eBooks, razors, electric toothbr-… No, that’s an impossible dream.
I’ll just write it down, crumple it up and throw it in my new selfcatching garbage can.