I’m not one of those Canadians who gets in a huff when someone from the US doesn’t know that Calgary is in the province of Alberta, and I don’t find it too surprising when there’s lack of recognition as to the name of our Prime Minister. Want to give me a pitying stare when I mention we have a piece of currency called a toonie? Sure, I’ll give ya that.

Americans can afford to ignore Canada because… well what are we going to do? Invade USA? While they’re busy in Iraq? When they least expect it?!? No… probably not.

But sometimes its hard for Canadians to not think about America. In fact, sometimes its hard for the rest of the world to not be transfixed, in the same way the drivers on a road tend to notice how well their fellow commuters are performing. After a few bounces off the concrete barrier, everyone on the road starts paying close attention to “the man behind the wheel of the big heavy bus”.

While Jon Stewart of The Daily Show maintains his show is about comedy (not politics), it shares the same attitude of bloggers and news aggregation sites (like DIGG and Reddit)… it is meta news, filtering and putting the mainstream media in some sort of useful context. Because something is clearly broken when the US news coverage of the 2008 election fails to (intentionally) entertain.

C’mon people! Leader of the free world and all that! Candidates who are all over the map! There’s enough conviction, animosity and crazy on display that a sitcom writer hammering at a keyboard for all eternity would never produce a transcript as engaging as one of the primary debates!

(This is of course due to the sitcom writer’s insistence on repeating the same basic plot devices, and simply changing the locations and character names. It is quite possible a monkey would produce a matching transcript due to the monkey’s superior internal random keystroke generator.)

So somehow the American mainstream media has succeeded (where The Daily Show has failed) in making all this incredibly boring. Way to go CNN! You win! We’ll just flip over to Fox News where at least we can count on a steady diet of T&A, if not educational political coverage.

So what does work? Well to follow The Daily Show’s example, adding educational value to a piece of entertainment is perhaps more likely to succeed than trying to “make learning fun.”

And what could be more fun than Rock Band? What if Rock Band could be modified so that while you’re performing Ballroom Blitz, you’re simultaneously becoming a better informed citizen!?! While playing the drums you learned about the various political candidates positions on the issues. And both bass and guitar informed you about their voting records?

That is not just impossible… that’s stupid.

Which is why Micco proposes a simple and fun quiz instead. Present the player with a political quote. The player guesses who said it. Guess right, get a point. Guess wrong, and the website tells you who really said it.

“But that’s impossible!” you say, “No one could ever build a site so complicated! It would take a whole team of software developers months to ever write up the design documents!”

Au contraire! Micco wrote “Can They Lead” himself, and hosted it at CanTheyLead.com. Its sitting there right now. Waiting for you to play, and waiting for you to add more political quotes to its database! (Its called crowdsourcing, if you’re both new to this blog, and new to the internet.)

The “Can They Lead?” idea is this week’s IdeaWarz weekly winner! Congratulations Micco!

Micco summarizes Can They Lead? as…

…a game that teaches voters about candidate positions. Unlike candidate websites and news coverage Can They Lead? is a fun way to compare candidates.

Micco considers this a “limited time” idea, since it will become much less pertinent after November.

I think voter ignorance and the way we let the media manipulate opinion is a huge problem, and education is the answer. I don’t think a quiz game of sound bites is the best form of education, but it might engage people who aren’t willing to make an effort to get their information any other way. A lot of people become predisposed to a candidate without knowing much about them, and a game that makes you try to assign quotes/positions to people could be a good way to confront misconceptions and preconceived notions.

If you’d like to help Micco out, consider submitting a few of your favorite quotes to Can They Lead? And while it is certainly functional at the moment, I think there’s no limit to the entertaining permutations that can be wrapped around this concept. My ideal interface would be a multi-player Adobe Flash one, similar to how You Don’t Know Jack was presented on the PC in 1995.

Nice work Micco, and here’s hoping people find your site as practical and fun as I do!

Blue and Gord’s Favorites

• Targeted MP3 Affiliate Widget by TheCougar
  

  blog widget that allows you to monetize traffic by selling MP3 files of songs targeted to your blog’s demographics.

  Proposing a mashup of 2 services, “Amazon Affiliate Program” and “MyBlogLog API”, TheCougar wants to do for MP3 sales what AdSense has done for everything else.

• Social Drinker MMO by TMentink
  

  MMO (Massively Multiplayer Online) drinking game website. Make Flash versions of Beer Pong, Flip Cup, Quarters, Etc. People log in and play against each other to earn points.

  As TMentink has repeatedly pointed out, alcohol consumption is not mandatory. It is the familiarity of the games, and the social aspect of the competition which is significant.

  Remember ladies and gentlemen: If you are gong to drink at the computer, delete your eBay bookmark first!

Oh No You Didn’t!

Oh yes we did! Recognizing under-achievement like there’s no tomorrow, we give mad props to those who aren’t afraid to share all of their ideas!

Home to Car Doorbell by kjgonia had some stiff competition in Somewhere Over the Rainbow by CaptainEd. But as a Highlander would say before decapitating his opponent… “There can be only one!”

And Einstein failed to live up to his alias as he submitted bad-idea after bad-idea. If you’re going to submit 3 ideas in 1 week involving balloons, you need to know how to spell balloon… Einstein!

Blue and Gord Freeze their Butts Off

Brenden mentioned maybe we should get out more… that the IdeaWarz videos would benefit from a change of scenery. We’ve got your change of scenery right here Brenden!

Until next week: Share your ideas. Give us your precious, precious feedback… Take a look through Cambrian House Bazaar and Forums for projects to assist in…

And… May the Best Idea… WIN!

There’s a plethora of web tools for bands to promote themselves, from SellABand to ya ole faithful MySpace (where Rupert Murdoch spends all of his time promoting his band… ensuring Fox News remains Fair and Balanced is just Rupert’s day job).

But what about determining the optimal towns for your band to tour in? Callum’s Please Play Here will eradicate this problem!

Please Play Here is a website that links the three vital people who make gigs happen; bands, fans and venue owners. Please Play Here allows fans to choose where their favorite bands will play.

Fans express their interest in bringing particular bands to their hometowns, either by voting, ranking or showing some form of commitment to the band. Bands performing to empty venues will be a thing of the past!

Callum needs technical support to get Please Play Here off the ground, so if you’d like to offer assistance give Callum a shout. Even if there’s an obstacle or opportunity you think he’s overlooking and just want to give him a head’s up, you can still comment on the idea.

We Play Favorites

• Truly collaborative team computer games by PhilipH
  

  A new generation of computer games that encourage COLLABORATIVE multiplaying between teams of friends. Computer games have long been accused of producing competitive loners with no interpersonal or social skills, despite the fact that they usually place players in situations that would in the real world bring them into contact with many people.

  While I’d venture complex collaboration can be found already in many games, PhilipH has started an interesting discussion about how collaboration can be encouraged and rewarded in games.

• eMedical Assistant by MAH
  

  Provides assistance in resource management based on current patient statuses/conditions. Keeps hospitals and medical care facilities operating optimally.

  While working in ER, MAH noticed overflowing information hubs, and nursing staff wishing pertinent information was more readily available.

Worst Idea of the Week

Adeclicious by Me_ sunk like a stone in a sack full of kittens.

Something like the million dollar homepage, but different. A clean, nice, and easy to use websites only with ads, but, first of all, not annoying ads, second of all organized in groups of relevant topics.

Callum and GroundLoad Phone It In

If you’ve ever met Blue or myself, there’s probably one thought that crossed your mind… the backs of our heads are facinating!

Have you seen the backs of our heads? Sometimes I wish I was someone else just so I could get a better perspective! Well THIS week we have something special. We like to call it “back of head extravaganza!”

You have to see it to believe it. It will BLOW YOUR MIND.

Even Callum, who video Skyped with us to discuss Please Play Here didn’t get to see the back of our heads… the backs of our heads were simply too much for him, so we chose to face the webcam!

Also, GroundLoad (Anthony) shares some thoughts on community management. Maybe the flaming-bag-of-poo Prezzles we sent to new Cambrian House community members were not the correct approach.

Ya live, ya learn.

Until next week: Share your ideas. Give us your precious, precious feedback…

And… May the Best Idea… WIN!

This week’s top rated idea by Cambrian House community is Open Problem Bank by Niansu:

For inventors who are looking for problems to solve the Open Problem Bank is a structured database of open technical problems that you can browse. Unlike patent databases our product allows searching by a specific problem.

Blue and I discussed Open Problem Bank with Niansu via Skype, and found the best points of reference to be Innocentive and Cambrian House.

Niansu’s proposal to tag and index problems could be considered an “open” version of Innocentive, which secures its challenge details behind a “log in to proceed” and intellectual property agreements. This is great for protecting companies which are looking for solutions, but it comes at the cost of blocking content from Google, and quick problem review by non-members.

Cambrian House offers open access to proposed solutions (”Ideas”), but the only structure we offer for unsolved problems is our forums. “Take it to the forums!” is the oft-heard phrase uttered by myself whenever an incomplete solution is submitted as an idea.

Certainly Cambrian House would benefit from a more structured workflow to direct members towards concerning the early stages of problem/solution brainstorming. Niansu proposes a Wiki as a possible mechanism.

TravellingGuy (Todd) is adding a public wiki to Cambrian House, and we’ll see if wiki is a helpful structure for any stage of problem or idea articulation.

We’ll give Niansu the first heads-up when this goes live, and perhaps he can help us create some sample structures which illustrate how problems can be documented and tagged.

Gord and Blue are Not Antisocial

• Stalker PLUS by CaptainEd
  

  The easy way to harass and annoy your ex without the hassle of finding 12 new pay phones every day. Does making 56 calls in one night sound like a walk in the park? Stalker PLUS will do it for you, in an untraceable voice and from a phone number in Serbo-Croatia if need be.

  Usually when there is a disagreement involving Gord and Blue, it is because Blue is wrong, and Gord is right. But this time with votes, idea comments and inappropriate idea flags, the Cambrian House community’s thoughts on Stalker PLUS are in stark contrast to Gord and Blue’s.

  Well I guess the Cambrian House community is just packed with socially well adjusted people in healthy relationships! Good! Great! Happy for you all!

• myLove by herodot
  

  myLove is a website on which you can leave your “I love you” message to your loved one (privately or public).

  Ultimately a marketing exercise more than any technical challenge, myLove could be a series of extremely niche love sites (as opposed to the ugly ILuvYou and infinitely broad Hallmark type sites.

• Fantasy Sports Leagues for Colleges by MoonDog
  

  For college students who like to compete in fantasy sports the Fantasy Sports College League is a fantasy sports website where that college students can compete directly with rival conference students.

  Word on the street is, fantasy sports is a 2 billion dollar industry. Word on the street is, college kids love their fantasy sports leagues. And what we’re hearing at Cambrian House… from the street mind you… is there’s no website dedicated to school vs school competition.

Worst Idea and Disabled Member

Relation between professionals of the luxury and individuals by Jibrils was ranked lowest by the Cambrian House community this week.

Purpose:
To promote the relationship between professionals of luxury according to their area of activity and individuals.

Jibrils did update the idea content in response to queries such as…

PeeJayEl ~
This goal statement is not entirely clear, what do you mean by “professional of the luxury”. I suspect English is not your first language, so I’ll cut you slack, but I really don’t get what you’re saying.

But ultimately I still can’t fathom the idea’s title or description. Except that, personally, I like luxury. But that’s just me.

And PowerfulMask was given the boot due to his activity surrounding Gateway of Us. Promises of “u can earn a trillion dollars” coupled with a Bazaar listing of his business for “$1,000,000.00″ called into question his sincerity.

“Who knows how many zeros are in a trillion?”

No one really knows. It is one of those mysteries of the universe…

Car of the Luxury

• Walking and chewing gum.
• Patting your head and rubbing your belly.
• Wanting out of Iraq and voting republican.

…all challenges to be sure. But they’re nothing compared to driving a car and hosting IdeaWarz…

<God I miss BLINK tags>At the same time!</God I miss BLINK tags>

Blue was able to host, drive and almost avoid several pedestrians! Join us in the lap of luxury, Blue’s 2001 Dodge Neon. It’s not power windows we clamped the camera to, ’cause we be keepin’ it real!

Until next week: Share your ideas. Rate this week’s ideas…

And… May the Best Idea… WIN!

Scientific studies have shown: ducks are funny. So what better mascot for Richexclaim’s comedy website built specifically for kids aged 4 to 16? Answer: No better mascot.

For kids who are funny, think they are funny, want to be funny, want to find out what’s funny, and/or want to find out why something is funny the Pun Duck website is a portal that satisfies these cravings.

Do you want your kid learning about comedy on some filth-ridden comedy spam site? Not only will they end up installing some sort of spyware on your beloved computer, it won’t be long before you hear Andrew Dice Clay quoted in your house!

“Jack and Jill went up the hill, each with a buck and a quarter. Jill came down with two-fifty.”

You don’t want your child talking like that! Which is why it is utmost importance Richexclaim’s Pun Duck be developed as soon as possible! Kids need a safe place to learn about comedy. Give Richexclaim a shout if you can help.

“I want my son to grow up with a good sense of humor and to be able to see the right side of life.”
- Siddey

“Need help from the CH community deciding whether there should be premium memberships or to rely on advertising for revenue. Also, will folks pay their…um…bills?”
- Richexclaim

“If I hear any more awful duck puns I’ll go quackers.”
- PhilipH

Do it for the children!

Brenden Joins us to Discuss This Week’s Ideas

• Sore Dancing Feet? by lindi_barber
  

  A pair of fold away flip flops to fit in girls handbag to slip on after a hard night of dancing in heals!

  Blue is adamant that comfortable shoes are a sign of weakness, yet Gord and Brenden believe this says more about Blue than about the idea.

• The google model for Essential Products by FreEssentials
  

  Benefiting from economies of scale, we purchase large amounts of essential products in order to decrease the cost per unit for our company. Similar to a magazine, FreEssentials will then sell advertising space placed the packaging on a per ad basis.

  Watch Blue squirm with boredom. Will Blue fold her Fresca can into a shiv and drive it into her own heart to escape the torture? No. Think about it. You would have heard about it on the news if that happened!

• X Prize by Jai (Oooh! Short names!)
  

  I am the Director of Prize Development for the X PRIZE Foundation. As part of my job, I am constantly exposed to innovative and maverick thinkers, many of whom have very compelling ideas for launching new prizes. Unfortunately, the very best prize ideas are rare, and few pass our intensive screening process. So, it is important to build a constant pipeline of prize idea submissions. I am hopeful that though Cambrian House and the emerging field of crowdsourcing, we can draw from the participation of many communities to mine the most promising business plans.

  We all agree X Prize is a cool thing, but figure this forum post is a more appropriate venue for X-Prize brainstorming.

Worst Idea Of The Week

The Email @ Symbol by Astronut was ranked lowest by the Cambrian House community.

Who hasn’t had a bad idea? I say, let the man who has never suggested a bad idea cast the first stone!

(Of course there is no such criteria for voting down on a bad idea.)

How To Record Skype Video: With a Video Camera!

Ah Skype! When I point a video camera at a monitor to record video conferences, I feel like I’m traveling back to a simpler time…

“Gord, did you enjoy the Blade Runner final cut last friday?”

“I never saw it! I’m back in a simpler time, when no one was capable of hosting video conferences, let alone recording on digitally! As far as I’m concerned the only version of Blade Runner I know is the one with Harrison Ford yammering on endlessly through the whole thing! It is a blessing, and a curse.”

To join Brenden, Blue and myself in this historic display of technological prowess, you need only click on the video below!

Until next week: Share your ideas. Rate this week’s ideas…

And… May the Best Idea… WIN!

Perhaps you’re familiar with the phrase, “You can’t believe everything you read on the world wide web”. Well its not true. You can believe! But you’d be wrong.

Wikipedia is constantly being altered by people with questionable motives. The White House website keeps removing historic content. And even Cambrian House, that bastion of accountability, has been known to replace spammy forum posts with random insults. Where will it end!?!

<deep voice> It ends at WebDSign… right now! </deep voice>

Or at least once the WebDSign software suite is built.

Natmaka has scoped out (and written a few snippets of code) illustrating how the dynamic content of the web can be sealed with a certificate, alerting readers to any alterations to the quote on the original website, or misquotes on other websites which attempt to replicate the seal.

These snapshots can be commented on and rated in a fashion similar to DIGG or REDDIT, except the commentary can be limited to a portion of a web page (or multiple conversations can be held over independent portions of web pages), and newcomers to the conversation will know what the original snippet looked like when the discussion first started.

WebDSign is also a reputation framework. When you put a seal on web content, comment on a seal or rate its quality and reliability… people are going to want to know how trustworthy you are.

The end result is greater accountability on the web, while preserving anonymity.

Check out Natmaka’s WebDSign PDF slide deck and project summary. Review his idea submission and offer feedback, then consider joining his project team!

Blue and Gord’s Insanely Awesome Favorite Ideas!

• Blue likes: Claim A Date by MarkDykeman
  

  Allow individuals to lay claim to any particular date in history. Certain dates will be free, others will be sold via auction or “buy it now” similar to eBay functionality.

  Why is it awesome? Once you’ve sold all the good dates, launch another site with a different URL and sell them all again! Mwahh hahh hahh hahhh!

• Gord likes: C2Hear by scrollinondubs
  

  C2Hear would be a simple web-based service that offers synchronized subtitle transcripts via mobile phone and enables hearing-impaired individuals to follow the movie dialog in a normal theater.

  Why is it awesome? The viewer is not dependent on any theater’s participation, and neither is scrollinondubs!

• Blue likes: Killer Bees! by Kevin_Cox
  

  For all who fear killer bees the killer bee website is a site that is devoted to killer bees. Unlike other websites that hardy cover killer bees our product is devoted to them entirely.

  Why is it awesome? What part of Killer Bees don’t you understand?!?

Network Solutions is Holding My Domain!

There’s frequent discussions in our community about what is the best domain name for a business, and swapping info on what domain names are available. I’d suggest, if you see a free domain that you know you’ll be wanting in the future a good rule of thumb is: buy it.

If you’re not careful about which site you use to determine if a domain is available, you could return a day later to buy the domain only to find it was acquired automatically by a domain squatting bot. They monitor the domain for traffic, and might just decide to keep it.

And recently Network Solutions (NSI) was found to be “front running” on domain searches. If you use NSI to determine if a domain is free, you’ll find yourself unable to buy the domain from anyone else for 4 days. This can be quite entertaining, as you can now have Network Solutions park on any domain containing trademarked names or tasteless humor you like!

By holding and releasing these domains, NSI has exposed them to domain tasters, and you could find your domain held not just by Network Solutions for 4 days, but by a bona fide domain squatter… permanently!

And if you thought THAT was interesting…

…then do we have a video for you! Natmaka monitors us via Skype as we discuss WebDSign. What he lacks in microphone and webcam hardware he makes up for with rapid touch typing skills!

Also, I have a new shirt.

Until next week: Share your ideas. Rate this week’s ideas…

And… May the Best Idea… WIN!

Richexclaim finds the current crop of project management books rather arid so he is crowdsourcing a themed project management book entitled Fiddler on the Project.

Using rich themes of the story and songs of “The Fiddler on the Roof” to convey ideas and principles of Project Management. Create this book collaboratively, using a wiki.

If you’d like to check out Richexclaim’s work so far, and perhaps contribute a chapter, you can head straight to his wiki and pitch in!

Blue and Gord Pick Their Favorite Ideas

• Gord likes: AllRight Plug-In by JuPolimeno
  

  CUnlike the traditional way of selling MP3 or paying huge radio royalty fees our product could offer a way to get money from music trough a unique Pay-Per-Day-Of-Listening basis with the Community saying how much they want to pay.

• Blue likes: Job swap by jobby
  

  A job swap website where people who are annoyed with commuting so far or want to swap jobs are able to browse similar profiles and exchange information with potential job swappers.

Disabled Member of the Week

Is it wrong to steal a loaf of bread to feed your starving family? No, of course not.

But what if your family doesn’t like bread. What if, instead, they prefer timely IdeaWarz updates and blogs? Is it wrong to unplug an Ethernet cable from the back of a computer clearly marked “out of service”, copy the IP settings of the broken machine onto your laptop and then prepare to shoot an IdeaWarz video with Blue via webcam?

No, clearly it is not.

And yet here in a 3 star resort in a small fishing village an hour away from Puerto Vallarta (Mexico), I’ve been kicked off the resort’s internet cafe.

I was told by plugging in directly to the network, I had access to the resort’s accounting computers and could create untold havoc. How reassuring! Here let me give you all my credit card numbers!

(Seriously though, it is a lot of fun here. More fun than Cambrian House you ask? MJ doesn’t stand behind a counter all day serving Tequila I respond.)

Until next week: Share your ideas. Rate this week’s ideas…

And… May the Best Idea… WIN!

Ever woken up in a haze, wondering where the heck you were last night… yesterday… or even last week? Have you ever thought to yourself, “These aren’t my clothes!” or “I’m covered in blood, but I don’t see any cuts on myself?”

Then I’m sorry, I can’t accept your friendship on Facebook.

But Magickaito does have an idea that may help you! World Guestbook - I WAS HERE!

World guest book: A mobile phone application which allows you to leave a message at virtually any corner in the world - depending on where you are currently located! It works just like how lovers carved their names on a tree in a park they met or how backpack travelers painted their names and dates at a corner in a backpackers hostel.

Obviously, Magickaito isn’t focusing so much on people who continually forget where it is they’ve been, but rather people who would use it for sentimental reasons. By targeting the “can-remember” demographic Magickaito is likely to pull in more advertising revenue, and will spend far less time helping members remember their passwords.

Congratulations Magickaito, on submitting this week’s winning idea!

Blue and Gord Pick Their Favorite Ideas

• Blue likes: What to do tonight? by ooper
  

  Have you and your significant other, or friends been faced with the question: what do we do tonight that would fit our location, date/time, budget and taste?

• Gord likes: SocialHeroes by mlimotte
  

  Create a badge or widget for public profiles like Facebook, personal blogs, etc., to honor every day heroes and thereby encourage additional participation.

Worst Idea of the Week

• We Make Your Fantasies Come True by nitro
  

  A social network with anonymous profiles.
  You share your secret wishes, and look at others.
  The power of network helps your fantasies come true.
  Many times you share an idea or an experience with someone so you can help each other.. or there is group that you can join… Life is short, at least give it a try…

Nitro forgot the first unwritten rule of IdeaWarz… don’t post drunk! Which he followed by forgetting the second unwritten rule of IdeaWarz… monitor your ideas for constructive feedback, and get engaged in the discussion.

This was Nitro’s first idea submission, but hopefully not his last.

Gord vs 202.84.X.Y and 203.177.X.Y

This week I purged 55 people from our Community. This action wasn’t performed without careful deliberation of the consequences… Blue and I debated the proper course of action for a minute. Which works out to more than 1 second per boot recipient.

Hopefully this will improve the signal to noise ratio on our site!

2 Weeks

Due to our Christmas holiday we’re going to run the next IdeaWarz round for 2 weeks. Cambrian House staff wishes everyone in our community a safe and happy holiday. Don’t drink and drive… don’t Blackberry and drive… drinking and Blackberrying is allowed but not recommended.

If you have time between family and friends over the next two weeks: Share your ideas. Rate this week’s ideas…

And… May the Best Idea… WIN!

Does your Android handset look drab and boring? Wouldn’t you rather choose from a catalog of exciting themes, instead of the two supplied by Google?

What’s that? You don’t own an Android handset? No one does? There is no demand, what-so-ever?

Well excuuuuuuuuuse us for looking ahead!

One day soon there’ll be a plethora of Androids, all looking drab and theme-less. Those new owners will be Googling for new themes… and Ccozad will be ready. Congratulations Ccozad on being the weekly IdeaWarz winner!

Canadian DMCA

This week I had a bit of an adventure, as about 40 fair-use activists stopped by The Honorable Jim Prentice’s constituency office… he’s the Canadian Federal Industry Minister, and seems to be in charge of copyright reform since the previous Director General of Copyright Policy stepped down for personal reasons.

What would happen? Would he talk to us? Would he release the hounds? Did he own hounds? If he owned hounds, wouldn’t they be kept at his home, and not at his constituency office? Maybe he owned multiple sets of hounds!?!

In fact we didn’t get much face-time with Prentice, but he did make it clear to us that he’d heard from CEOs in the entertainment industry, and felt pressure from our “trading partners”. And that broader public input would be welcome once the bill was tabled in parliament.

“The intent is to put a bill forward and then to get into a constructive process, a parliamentary committee to examine the issues, to hear from people. Anyone here who is interested in speaking to the committee, there is a process where you will be heard.” -Jim Prentice 2007-12-08

I’d prefer to see a bill tabled which guarantees consumer and educational fair-use rights. That solves the problem of orphaned works. And perhaps shortens copyright terms towards the optimal 14 year duration.

Then, after that bill was tabled, a committee could be formed where citizens, fair-use advocates and anti-DRM activists could be heard. What the heck… we could also hear from our trading partners, record labels and copyright lobbyists!

It might still happen, as the bill has now been put on hold, at least until late January. If Jim Prentice is looking for a good example of copyright reform, there’s always Israel. Israeli copyright law has a similar lineage as Canadian copyright law. Yet, when Israel felt pressure from their trading partners to tighten copyright laws, they instead added fair-use provisions, allowed backups and let educational institutions to go nuts with copyrighted materials! American DMCA is not the best lead to follow.

If you’re Canadian (and especially if you are a Canadian named Jim), Michael Geist is a good source for copyright news and learning materials. For Americans of Jim and non-Jim variety, Lawrence Lessig has made very creative recommendations how USA’s copyright laws can be improved.

But I digress!

Blue and Gord Pick Their Favorite Ideas

• Blue likes: Play For Profit Competitive Sports Video Gaming by VizionQuest
  

  Gamers challenge one another on a given competitive sports game and play for money. A social network for professional gamers and a neutral third party that distributes the winnings.

• Gord likes: HyperJot - Crowdsourcing Interactive Videos by ooper
  

  With reusable scenes you can create a story dynamically. Consider a game with squares, each being a scene with characters. As you make decisions, characters respond and you move to different squares.

• Blue likes: Social Decisions by ooper
  

  net version of asking people for personal opinions, with the added feature of weighing pros and cons with a quick way to get real numbers without the noise.

Gord Goes ADHD on Android’s Ass

I couldn’t effectively drive Android idea consolidation or investigate the friend-finder Kevin_Cox pointed out. The CH2 WOC mods need to be completed and checked in first.

If you have any thoughts how my attempts at consolidating overlapping Android ideas can be handed off to the community, fire away! I’ll be more than eager to join in as soon as CH2 has some improvements in the pipeline.

Gmail vs Todd

Many of us at Cambrian House have turned to web clients for our email. And it was hard to miss Google’s “Share your Gmail Story” option which suddenly appeared on our Gmail screens. This not only reminded us how much power Google wields… but how much we like Gmail. So random CH staffers helped us illustrate the magic which is gmail…

…and also Blue talks about Paisley. So between Canadian DMCA, Ccozad kicking ass, a goose, a golden egg and a couple blue balls… We have something for everyone in this week’s IdeaWarz video!

Until next Wednesday: Share your ideas. Rate this week’s ideas…

And… May the Best Idea… WIN!

Have you ever had to communicate in a foreign language? Something other than sweet simple English? If your experiences have been been anything like mine, you learned the painful way that louder and slower only takes you so far!

Language translation is moving from the desktop to mobile phones. And while many platforms are covered, ANDROID remains virgin territory.

Sneakers imagines this software first being used with work crews of mixed languages where walkie talkies have been replaced by mobiles: SMS messages could be translated on the fly.

Language Translator for Cell Phones hasn’t yet had many details nailed down. Does the scope include voice translation, or just text? What will be the translation engine? Will it be written specifically for ANDROID, or simply be a website people surf to using their mobiles?

The high scores garnered by Sneakers‘ idea indicates there’s a strong demand in mobile language translation services which is not yet being met.

ANDROID - Back to the Forums!

Cambrian House community did a good job of critiquing and citing existing applications for the mobile ideas. But the overlapping themes became evident as IdeaWarz proceeded. So for older mobile ideas without active champions, let’s identify the recurring themes and solicit idea champions back in the forums.

(This doesn’t pertain to any new ANDROID ideas people want to submit.)

Favorite Ideas

Oh how Blue loves to talk about her favorite ideas. Talk, Blue… talk.

• Mobile Profile Timer by whyme
  

  Set a time when I have to turn my phone off or in silent mode, so that it returns to its normal profile without me having to remember.

• Poison Pill for Mobile Devices by whoyouknow
  

  System that, based on the direction of it’s owner, destroys the data on the mobile device and optionally renders it useless. This service could be sold by wireless operators or by an independent service provider.

• Stolen Phone Monitor by gordonmcdowell
  

  Cellphone app (running in the background on an ANDROID mobile presumably) which monitors a server to determine if its considered stolen. If it is, then any GPS data it can calculate is relayed to the security company. Audio is captured. Photos are taken. Basically it becomes a homing beacon.

Oh, was that one my my ideas listed there?!? Blue, I’m sorry to ever have doubted you! Your judgment is impeccable.

And speaking of impeccable judgment, here’s my favorite idea of the week…

• ZodiBaby by Sooz
  

  Adorable customized zodiac baby onesies. Choose onesie. Choose zodiac sign. Choose description traits. Choose font. Order.

  …it could be complicated. Eventually. But right now, this cries out for a market test, and flintstoning.

Back to the Crawlspace

What has water, canned food, WiFi and a terrified Gord? The Cambrian House crawlspace! Will Blue have to drag Gord out kicking and screaming? Or will he come quietly, co-host IdeaWarz, and continue referring to himself in the third person? There is only one way to find out…

Until next Wednesday: Share your ideas. Help brainstorm ANDROID ideas. Rate this week’s ideas…

And… May the Best Idea… WIN!

When Santa asked Magickaito what he wanted for Christmas, he was in for a shock.

Magickaito looked him straight in the eye, and said he wants to control presentation software via hand gestures, freeing the presenter from needing to manipulate a remote control, and allowing dynamic integration between the position of the speaker’s hands and the presentation elements.

Santa mumbled something about busy elves, motion capture devices and a writer’s strike before excusing himself towards the bathroom. No one ever said software was his area of expertise.

Maestro Presenter

Magickaito has pitched, refined and clarified this idea in both our forums and as an idea submission.

There will be two modes - Video & Slide Mode. In Video mode, live video of presenter is broadcast to the big screen through a camera. The camera captures the gesture of the presenter. Predefined KeyInfo can then be triggered by certain gesture and overlayed in sequence beautifully.

E.g. Raising right hand will trigger next KeyInfo to be overlayed while raising left hand will trigger the previous. Raising any hand to a high position will switch the system to slide mode. As if a magician, presenter can now virtually play with these elements!

PowerPoint has its critics and its proponents, but until now, its lack of gesture recognition has gone unnoticed. Magickaito has cited this colorful HP video as inspiration for how an interactive presentation might play out. It would be fantastic to see Maestro Presenter allow even a fraction of such interactive energy in the next generation of presentation tools.

ChessSphere Online Prototype Contest

PetersonLimitedCo is offering 600 Cambros to the creator of the best ChessSphere Online Prototype! What’s that? You say your Chess AI programming skills are weak? Then this contest is for you, because machine-vs-human play is out of scope!

Facilitate play between two humans via an AJAX or Flash interface. Don’t let anyone make illegal moves. One side is black, the other side white. Simple.

You’ve got it done? Got a working prototype there do you? Want to collect 600 Cambros? Just PayPal it over to you there. Here we go. About to click SEND. Finger hovering over the mouse button here…

Oh, just one more thing. Did we mention the pieces move… on a SPHERE! Nice try Einstein. This isn’t a charity you know.

ANDROID ANDROID ANDROID

I’ve been quoted as saying…

If it says ANDROID ANDROID ANDROID on the label label label you will like it like it like it on your table table table!

…which is probably just was well since there’s plenty of stupider things I could be quoted on. Stupider, and less optimized for search engines. But could I have been too optimistic about the capabilities of ANDROID mobiles?

By adding previously submitted mobile applications to our ANDROID inspired IdeaWarz round, questions about GPS power consumption have popped up. Since every application of interest is dependent on this data, it’s a big question.

We’re taking feedback on how serious this concern is, but I’ve been quick to point out the limitations of today’s mobiles in previous IdeaWarz rounds, and it has served to stifle people’s imagination. For the sake of