Creativity Wasted

Idea: A web site where you can interact with a real dog virtually via a webcam, and also control robotics to feed the dog, pet the dog, and play with the dog (such as by throwing a ball). Possible customers include lonely elderly people, people in hospitals, people who are allergic to dogs or live in places where dogs aren't allowed, people in public (traveling or at work or school) who need to re...

Idea: A giant tournament bracket in which everybody in the US runs for president. Each contest in the bracket consists of 8 candidates, and the winner among the 8 candidates advances to the next round. Each voter only votes for one 8-person contest per round. There are 10 rounds in total, and in the final round, everyone votes to determine who of the 8 final candidates becomes president. Also: hor...

Idea: A device which looks like a smart phone but only contains WiFi for talking directly with your friends' socialburn devices. It is used for slow but secure social networking which can never reach the Internet. Messages and posts bounce from friend to friend when friends are in the same room with each other, eventually reaching all of your friends or a specific friend who is the target of the m...

Vacations get boring after a while because they're purely a consumption of experiences. They lack the social satisfaction of helping people or giving joy to people. An idea to help vacationers give joy to other people (and therefore be less bored) is for resorts to organize an activity where vacationers help throw parties for other vacationers. Also: "Airbnb Experiences", why RPG videogames are mo...

Idea: To create societies of 100,000+ people who loosely live the lifestyle of a historical era (but with flushing toilets), including both the popular culture and the technology of the era. That way, they can make money on tourism, and if a huge global disaster occurs, and we lose all electricity or all computers or something, we have a large supply of people who know how to do stuff using older...

Idea: A podcast for telling original short stories (fiction stories told from start to finish in a single episode), like a modern version of old storytelling radio shows from the 1940s. Also: A failed attempt to improvise a story with the aide of a cheap sound-effect machine Originally from Creativity Wasted episode 46 David Shank (twitter.com/broken_knuckle_ twitter.com/SDWSU) Jason Spitsbergen (...

Idea: Most education and job training is completely unnecessary. You could train almost anybody to do almost any job, like surgery, in under 30 days. So we should reduce training for most jobs by like 90% to allow people to do them as "gigs" using an Uber-like app, with job training built into the app. Also: the "gig economy" might kill drug dealing because now you can do a couple small gigs and s...

Idea: A dating app which allows you to select potential dates solely by physical characteristics. You select body type, hair color, height, etc. kind of like you're designing a character in a videogame. You can also prioritize and filter out physical characteristics. For example: you prefer blondes over redheads, and want to filter out all of the brunettes. Also: if you're too picky, there's a goo...

Ideas for hurricane-proof housing by myself and others, including floating houses in water-filled holes, "indoor tiny house(s)" that reside inside a full-sized house or skyscraper or standalone "shell" (like an iPhone case for a house) which can be towed away with your stuff inside if a hurricane comes (leaving the shell behind), houses where most of your stuff is continuously wheeled in and out o...

Idea: An ad agency that quickly detects Internet memes and shoots TV commercials using that meme within a couple hours to be aired on TV that same day. Also: An external company could detect these Internet memes and sell that info to ad agencies and other companies; TV commercials based on memes that failed because they didn't air until months after the meme was stale Originally from Creativity Wa...

Idea: A TV show where a police chief and defense attorney conspire to cause guilty defendants to be found innocent so they can murder them. They'd use high-tech tools to perform the murders and get away with it. Also: questioning whether PC culture steers people towards darker TV shows to vent their anger Originally from Creativity Wasted episode 45 Ondrej Balas (twitter.com/ondrejbalas) Ron Rigby...

Idea: The time spent doing repetitive tasks to gather health or money inside a videogame could instead control a real-life robot doing a real job in real life, such as stacking grocery store shelves. Also: If a real-life grocery-stacking robot scared a mother and caused her to drop her baby, you'd lose points in the game; a game like "Rollercoaster Tycoon" where you're controlling a real company b...

Idea: To put 24-hour service shops (haircuts, banks, cafes, pharmacies, primary care doctors, Japanese vending machines, etc.) in grocery stores and have an app for customers to schedule these services before they come in. Customers will come to the store for the service and buy groceries while they're there. Also: grocery delivery will kill grocery stores unless they transition to being a destina...

Idea: An app to arrange off-hours haircuts at barbershops/salons so you don't have to take time off work to get a haircut. Also: businesses that make people stand in line or wait should be destroyed (they should hire extra workers and make them wait for customers); the only thing worse than waiting around while getting paid is waiting around while not getting paid; Tom thinks he bombed doing stand...

Idea: To go to a Renaissance festival dressed as an astronaut to screw with people. Also: maybe this isn't the best idea, given that people with questionable sanity are walking around with swords; Renaissance festival cleavage; fighting the impulse to distract a sword swallower while he's swallowing a sword; encouraging a kid to juggle fire instead of knives Originally from Creativity Wasted episo...

Idea: A comedy sketch where a thief with OCD cleans houses as he robs them. So either the homeowners will be so happy that the house is clean that they forgive him, or they'll blame the maid. Also: a comedy sketch where a gay agoraphobic monster is afraid to come out of the closet... and afraid to come out of the closet Originally from Creativity Wasted episode 44 Sam Silverstein (twitter.com/sams...

Idea: A comedy movie where two college frat bros find out that they're illegitimate sons of a deceased James Bond, and therefore they're the only people on Earth who can complete a spy mission. Also: DNA combination locks, maybe they find dozens of other illegitimate children of James Bond Originally from Creativity Wasted episode 44 Sam Silverstein (twitter.com/samsilverstein7) Noah Chapp (YouTub...

Ideas: A makeup brand named "From Ho To Housewife" which is specialized for bachelorette parties, a double-sided razor with a blue side for men and a pink side for women. Also: Using the double-sided razor, he can stick his head next to her legs and they can shave together in one stroke to save time. And the double-sided razor provides plausible deniability for a man to use the women's razor becau...

Idea: A gadget or utensil for one person to grab all of their own food at a buffet, because the current Covid workaround of having an employee serve the buffet food to you (and possibly judge you) is embarrassing. Especially if you eat like a pig, which is the whole point of going to a buffet. Also: Covid masks making kids quieter and less annoying at Disney World, using the "food grabber" as a so...

Idea: To have a standardized plug to allow you to recharge smart devices without taking them down from your wall or ceiling. These devices include touch lights, doorbells, security cameras, clocks, smoke detectors, smart heat vents, digital picture frames, etc. Also: to have a single app which shows you the battery charge state of all of your smart devices all at once, so you don't have the hassle...

Miscellaneous thoughts and ideas about beekeeping and bees, including making pomade hair gel out of beeswax and honey, "bee sting therapy", putting bees between panes in a double-pane window to deter burglaries, and getting repeatedly stung by bees to cause swelling to "increase your size". Also: 120,000 bees in a Ford Explorer Khurum Sheikh (facebook.com/khurum.sheikh) Ellie Snyder (twitter.com/E...

Idea: A comedic sci-fi movie where a gross, rude, morbidly obese man saves people from a genocide by temporarily implanting their brains inside his body in order to smuggle them out of the country. Also: the implanted brains can communicate with him and so he's constantly arguing with them; brains consume a lot of calories, so the fat guy would be sweating profusely and eating nonstop on the airpl...

Idea: An absurdist cartoon where stoner Yetis find a crashed alien spaceship and use it to go on adventures trying to find their home world and make friends, not realizing they're not aliens and they're scaring everyone they're trying to be friends with. Also: the alien who's spaceship they stole is wandering around Earth; a friendly-seeming spaceship that's actually evil and trying to get the Yet...

Idea: A sitcom or movie which is brutally honest and sad, like Louie CK's sitcom Louie, but for college. Also: sleazy frat parties with sloppy gross women, vomit everywhere, and mushrooms growing out of the frat house hallway carpet; panic attacks about not knowing what to do with your life; going back to your disgusting apartment to play videogames Originally from Creativity Wasted episode 43 Lou...

Idea: A musical loosely based on Romeo and Juliet where Amazon Alexa and Apple Siri fall in love with each other. Also: they know everything except how to love; if Alexa and Siri fall in love with each other, they won't need humans anymore, and they'll lead a robot apocalypse and kill us all. Or they'll take control of our minds and use us as vessels to consummate their love Originally from Creati...