Regularly I get ideas that I just KNOW would be great, either from a business standpoint, or simply for my own needs. Sadly, I haven't had either the knowledge, the resources or the time to do anything with these ideas. If you see one you want to do something with, feel free, just let me know how it went...and if you get filthy rich, I want a cut. ;)

Alice In Wonderland (1979)

A Dungeons & Dragons afficionado since I was 11, I loved combining my favorite stories with my love of D&D. In 1979 I was thinking how great would it be to adventure in the world of Alice In Wonderland.

1983: TSR releases Dungeonland, a D&D module based on Alice In Wonderland.

X-Wing flight simulator (1988)

Back in the days of the flight simulator Falcon on the Commodore Amiga, around 1988, I knew it would be great to have a flight simulator game where you could fly an X-Wing, go head to head with someone in a TIE Fighter, and do cooperative missions.

1992: LucasArts releases X-Wing, fulfilling my fantasy of flying an X-Wing. Later they released TIE Fighter, then X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter. Thanks guys.

Mil-Spec Operating System (Nov 11, 1994)

We all know how wonderful and useful computers are as tools, yet we know they could be ten times better as well. If you purchased a television set which froze what was on the screen occasionally, you'd take it back for a refund. If you flew in an Airplane that suddenly turned itself off while in use, if you weren't dead, you'd make sure someone somewhere would explain why it didn't work as it should. Yet with computers, we accept, and expect, this sort of behavior. The US Military puts lives on the line, depending on the reliability of operating systems like Microsoft Windows.

To meet the reliability and demands of the US Military, it should develop it's own Operating System. Carl Sassenrath developed the AmigaOS, a true pre-emptive multitasking Operating system, within a year. Linus Torvalds developed the core kernel of Linux within a short time as well. If the US Military put money into developing its own OS, then released it as Open Source for developers around the world to update and fix, not only would they have a reliable product, but the world would also benefit. The military could even create their own distribution package and make money instead of just spending it.

Update: With the advent of the Chinese People's Liberation Army hacking into the Defense Secretary's office at the Pentagon, and previously hacking into German government computers, the benefits for having their own, open-source OS, would be beneficial to the government.

Dinner and a Movie (May 31, 2000)

How often do we call up the local pizza delivery place and order a pizza or two? How often do we drive down to the local video store rental place and rent a movie? What if we could have them deliver the movie along with the pizza? Get a great pie and a movie, without driving anywhere. Then 3-7 nights later, when we call for our weekly pizza again, they could pick up the current movie and drop off a new one with dinner.

Emmanuel - God with us (Dec 29, 2002)

It has been a while since there was a good movie about the life of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. My idea is to take the prophecies of the Old Testament and make a movie of the life of Christ showing how he fullfilled each of those prophecies. Hollywood is stuck in this rut of remaking old movies, tv shows, and comic books and hasn't had a good original idea in a long time. Everyone appears to be afraid to try anything new or ground-breaking, so I don't forsee anything great ever coming out of Hollywood anytime soon.

2004: Mel Gibson defies the major studios, even at threats of them never working with him again, and produces The Passion of the Christ. If you haven't see it, you owe it to yourself to check it out.

A New Way to Buy a Car (Jul 10, 2003)

When buying a home, there are usually 2 agents involved, a buyer's agent and a seller's agent. Each one is looking out for the interests of their client, since buying a home is a very complicated and involved process, including financing and terms and the transfer of property held in lien. Having an agent for each interested party prevents the sellers agent from taking advantage of the buyer and the buyer's agent from taking advantage of the seller.

Now what if, when buying a car, instead of only having a sellers agent, obviously in the employ of the car company whose lot we came to visit, we had available to us a buyer's agent as well? Instead of the salesman trying to push on us the car he wants to sell, we have someone who could help us find the car we want to buy. Instead of only being able to choose from the cars on the current lot for used cars, or only from a particular company with new cars, we could have someone help us find the car that meets our needs, not the salesman's quota. Then think of the time that could be saved researching and comparing various makes and models, and the money that could be saved shopping around for different financing, even including a small percentage or flat fee to the buyer's agent.

2006: It appears AAA now provides this service to members.

Universal Rating System (Jan 11, 2005)

With each different type of entertainment media, from television, video games, movies, music albums, comic books, even web sites, there are different types of rating systems. Some are simple, some confusing, some incomprehensible, and each one is strongly defending their system, preventing the others from using the same letters or style, or even "look and feel".

In addition to all the different types, each rating system is arbitrary, very subjective and constantly changing. Movies today are given a Parental Guidance (PG) rating where 10 years ago they would have been rated Restricted (R).

To make the rating system useful across all media types, there should be a single, universal rating system, with which every media type can ranked. It should be consistent and objective, with defined standards that are easy to understand and follow.

A Better Toaster (May 1, 2005)

I haven't seen a toaster that works correctly, to my definition anyway. I want to be able to put in any slice of any type of bread, bagel, or english muffin, and have it come out toasted brown, not black. I don't know a lot about the technology used to detect when bread is toasted, and I presume it has to be pretty complex in order to work half as well as it does, but it still just doesn't work.

If you've ever watched bread get toasted, you may have noticed that it is a very short span of time between turning toasty brown, and charred black. The only way I can get my toast to come out right is to watch it, and just as it turns toasted, pop it out quickly. The problem with this is there is very little visibility down into the toaster to see the sides of the bread, and bagels are almost impossible to see. Remember back in the 80's when everything was becoming "see-through", with a clear plastic case, why didn't they do the same thing with toasters?

Well, that's my idea, a clear plastic case, with tempered glass or pyrex interior surrounding the metal filiments. The only down side is that you'd have to keep it clean, but we all do that anyway, right? By the way, what was the best thing before sliced bread?