Why should the square shape always go in the square hole? Life doesn’t always hand you well-fit squares for your square holes, but we all have to learn to improvise with what we have.
If you have ever seen the baby toy where you need to hammer the square cylinder into the square hole, this idea takes the challenge to the next level. On the board would be three uniquely colored shapes with “oddly” cut holes. These shapes would be a circle, a square, and a triangle. The board would include three cylindrical styled shapes with colors matching the shapes color on the board. The natural tendency would be to insert the shape into the matching color and shape hole. However, the shapes have oddly cut holes. The circle will be a small circle hole with three notches such that the triangle shape may pass through. The triangle will contain an irregular style hole that allows the square cylinder to pass through. The square has traingle shape hole that allows the circle to pass through, but is too small for the triangle cylinder to pass through.
The fancy version of this toy could include some basic electrical contacts and digital logic that determine when all three shapes have been inserted correctly, at which point it plays a song.
Basic shape recognition begins in childhood development around age 12 months. I believe this slightly more advanced toy would be suitable for children of this age.
Apparently my strength-o-meter idea wasn’t that novel. In fact, I think the total count of chapters that built a strength-o-meter was five. Damn.
However, *nobody* built a strength-o-meter banner that was 12*sqrt(3) feet high. One might say, “But the rules state that the banner must fit inside a 12×12x12 foot cube.” And that person would be correct. However, nobody but Phikap considered the fact that the cube could be positioned such that the banner extends along the interior diagonal hypotenuse of the cube. Brian drew up autoCAD diagrams to prove that our banner which towered over 14 feet high into the sky would, in fact, fit inside a 12×12x12 cube.
We didn’t place, but we were happy. We didn’t place in variety show as well. I had a fun time shooting photos. I need to stop using the 70-200 and start exclusively using the 135 prime. I think the shots would have came out much better had I done that and never use a flash. I also need to get a monopod one of these days.
What we need is a non-mechanical shutter implemented in an SLR camera. This non-mechincal (aka - digital) shutter could be made by making a very special type of LCD screen. Rather than going from transparent to opaque, it should go from as reflective as a mirror to transparent.
If you replaced the mirror inside an SLR with this special LCD screen, you could “flip” the shutter digitally by simply passing a voltage through it. When the voltage passed through the LCD screen, it would turn transparent and the underlying CMOS sensor would record the image. When the voltage is stopped, the crystals would return to a reflective state and the light would bounce through a series of mirrors to the viewfinder - just as SLR cameras work today. The benefit would be that you could digitally change the state of the LCD rather than wait on a mechanical shutter which can only shoot around 8 frames per second in the most expensive digital cameras.
Of course, the ideal situation would be a shutterless camera. The problem with this design - from ‘rumors’ I have heard are that:
- The CMOS sensor will eventually “burn out” due to overexposure to light (not sure about this…)
- The CMOS sensor is highly sensitive to light and can’t ‘reset’ quick enough. In which case, this new idea might not help anything - but would at least probably reduce the point of failures (those shutters don’t last forever), increase battery life, and eliminate ’shutter vibration’ which can cause blurring in long exposure photography
As far as I know, nearly all electronics manufacturers allow their printed circuit boards to be exposed inside their products. This allows ‘hackers’ to create and sell mod chips that circumvent digital rights management and use illegal pirated software. Instead of leaving the circuit exposed, they could create a sandwich layer boards that adhere to the circuit board with a thermal epoxy. To prevent heat buildup, the sandwich board would contain metal heatsinks embedded in it.
Of course, this adds additional costs to the product. It also creates a new point of failure in the manufacturing process. These two factors alone are probably the reason why we don’t see this idea implemented. In addition, it could make troubleshooting a defective product difficult, if not impossible.
In order to justify this idea, it would be necessary to estimate the lost revenue due to piracy created by exposed circuit boards. I suppose this idea is not cost effective in many situations.
A webstore selling dolls that are modeled on the exact “average” based on US/world census data. Make one for each gender, racial group, etc and include a fact sheet on what their name is, profession, salary, etc.
Heh, it might catch on 
Probably not…