Ideas 2012 Part II – High-Tech

So I wrote a list of some online startup ideas I had. Part II includes a list of ideas that require tech but are not purely internet-based. As before, feel free to discuss – I am most intrigued by your comments.

1. iPads in Restaurants – First of all, having iPad for a menu is greatly superior – colorful, easy to navigate, update-able, exciting. iPads in a restaurant can be built-in the tables, or slide in-and-out of them. Then you could also not only look at what’s offered, but see pictures of the ingredients, how it’s prepared, watch video etc. Then you could of course order it. Orders go straight to the kitchen, no time wasted, where the chefs can mark the progress, so you could see if your food is in queue, being prepared or is ready and coming. You could also rate your food, write recommendations to friends right away, call the waiter, pay. Many many possibilities. Feels like this has to become the standard and yet I haven’t seen a place like that.
2. Gamification For Dominos Pizza – Those restaurants that deliver pizzas and other food have accounts of people – their phones and addresses. Dominos for example always gives some promotions and discounts to users. Every time I order pizza I give one coupon and receive a different one. But no one actually tracks and makes something out of what I order. They should create a gaming concept such as “Every meal you try for the first time is 30% off.” or “Every time you order 10times the same thing you get it for free” or “You are the mayor in radius of 5 blocks, you eat at 50% discount”.
3. Eye Helper – When you code 10h/day doctors say it is bad for your eyes, because they get lazy – they focus too long on the same short distance and the muscles weaken. You could in theory use 3d goggles (or Google’s project Glass) to simulate the same screen information to be far in the distance so that eyes can adjust and not lose their flexibility.
4. Online Receipts – I know that exists, but in my opinion this should be the standard. Anything you buy, you receive on your email or online account. You never have to keep receipts for your clothes, toys or anything. Can be done with RFID, Proximity chips etc. All this data then can be analyzed by YOU the owner of the system.
5. Layered Music – Most of the songs are recorded in a studio these days. What would be cool is to record each instrument, voice, sound on a different layer in a file format that supports this. Then, a tzunami of remixes and music experiments w/ music contents will be unleashed.
6. GPSed Luggage – Would it not be awesome to actually know where your luggage is at any point? Stick a GPS, track it on your phone. Bulletproof unlostability.
7. Electronic Party – I am a firm believer that people need to have more power and not concentrate power in the hands of a few. So I believe there needs to be a system that allows people to take active position and actions on various matters. The first steps of which is an e-party that does anything online. They promote themselves on the net, they display transparently their plans online, they create tools for communication between masses and organization towards actionable goals. Army of coders creating the tools to run a country more efficiently, more transparent, more power for the people.
8. Species Finder – You pick up an animal you look at it and you have no idea what it is, what it does, is it dangerous or not. I would love to have a site that guides you through a wizard and displays the results. “Insect? Color? Number of legs? etc. “You are holding a rare deadly spider…”
9. Journalism Wikiness – Every event should be objectified. Instead of having searchable texts, each event should have its own ID, so that all events and people and objects can be linked authentically to each other. Data and analysis can follow to reveal a totally different understanding of what essentially is going on.
10. Real-Size Pictures – I don’t know exactly how, but it would have been nice to have a standard that displays on screens objects in their real size. Just like the image of the iPhone on the box is the exact same size as the phone, there should be images online that show real sizes. I guess this can be calculated with a mix of screen resolution, pixel density, focus distance when image was taken etc etc.
11. Bike Locks – Bike locks are super heavy and expensive. Bike stands are a huge and complicated system that can’t be used always and everywhere. But lock stands would be nice.

Soon comes Part III, the Non-Tech ideas…