A Dumb Idea Everyday

A credit card that's meant entirely for business reimbursement.  You can log into the app and take a photo of the receipt right away and even snap a photo with your lunch attendees if your business requires some proof that you were entertaining clients.

Target should find growing areas where breweries are popping up and use a third party construction company to build 6 story apartment buildings, which will include small format commercial space for the store.  Y.U.P.pies that enjoy craft brew are probably aligned with their target market.

Netflix should let you tag movies when the first trailers are released and they'll alert you when it's on Netflix. They could use those requests for deciding which movies to buy.

USB memory stick that has plug in slots for micro usb drives so you can use all the old, now too small, memory drives in one place. Like a recycled RAID.

Bike locks that also act as the bike wheel's axle. The rider pulls the tabs from the end out of the axel that are connected to a retracting wire. The wire loops through or around a secure stand and then connects to the other side of the axel, or if you have two, they can cross front to back. No, this wouldn't prevent anyone with wire snipping tools from stealing your bike, not that many locks can do that, but more to prevent opportunity crime, which is most bike thefts.

Minneapolis should add more "meters" around town that accomplish other goals.  One such meter should allow dog owners to pay for the dog permit and the yearly dog park licence.  Sure, there should be a website too but sometimes a visitor from out of town just wants to visit the Minnehaha Off leash dog park for one day.  There should be an option to pay a small fee to let their dog enjoy the park.  Right now, I would assume that there is a very very low rate of compliance because it is never enforced.  Negative enforcement reduces the usage rate for outdoor spaces so it would be better to just install the meter and positively enforce permits by an honor code.

Employers should be required to pay their employees triple time for every hour worked on designated holidays.  I would suggest New Years Day, Easter, 4th of July, Thanksgiving and the day after, Christmas eve and day.  This doesn't make it illegal to have your shop open on those days, it merely puts an enhanced incentive for them to close.  If a gas station on a popular route for example wanted to stay open, they could make the business decision to remain open.  This wouldn't apply to emergency workers or automated machines that don't require a human like a gas pump.  

Restaurants and bars are going to start putting wireless chargers in the actual bar wood so that patrons stay in their spot longer and order more beers.  Bonus points if the patron can order from the phone.  The phone can keep track and refuse the patron from driving for a set amount of time and order an Uber if the patron shouldn't be driving at all.

California should build a new mega city from scratch in Northern California, which is the poorest part of the state.  The new city should balance commerce, art, public space, and the environment.  Skyscrapers connected by a subway/tunnel system, skyways on the second floor and commuter bus stops built into the sides of the buildings would help encourage quick movement of workers in the dense downtown. The city would be built extremely dense by US standards from the start so that entrenched homeowners would not be able to stop growth. The state would encourage large tech companies to move their staff to the new city to alleviate the housing crisis in San Francisco, as well as poaching tech companies from cheaper states.  The new city would be well positioned geographically between Silicon Valley and Seattle/Vancouver.  

Trash on call. Self driving trash containers that show up at your door when you have a bag of trash.

Automated check in kiosks for the animal shelter.  a small room with several gated cages of different sizes.  The person who finds a lost dog or cat can enter a few fields like where the animal was found, if it was theirs, contact info (and a confirmation text or email) on the ipad. once the information is entered, the door will open and then be able to be closed for the night.  Perhaps automated feeders and waterers will give a small portion of animal appropriate food.  The morning manager will process the intake.  the cages could have several scanners that look for those dog and cat implants so if the animal moves around the cage and gets close enough, it reads the info off the tag.  Maybe even send out an alert to the person listed on the implant that their dog has been found and where it is.  They can get a code to retrieve it immediately or go in the morning to talk to the supervisor to get it out.

A kayak sharing service for a fleet or by privately owned kayaks. On a lake so they can be returned to the same spot.

Stadiums and music venues along major public transportation routes should be incentivized to provide an option at checkout to purchase bus/train tickets for the day of the event.  The receipt will print out a barcode that can be read by the bus/trains or police enforcement.  Bus stops and trains should add a barcode system to their payment process similar to the airline's online checkin that people use their phone at TSA and the gate. 

NFL tabletop game.  You draw a card from each position (QB, 2xRB, 2xWR, TE and then 2xDB 2xCB DE and S.  You line up your players left to right WR RB QB RB WR and TE are wild spots.  The players get state points based on the former years production.  There are different values on the QB for throwing, handing off, or running himself.  You select his maneuver.  Then you roll a die for the maneuver strength. So, lets say QB Throw (his throwing value is 83) to WR 2 whose catching ability is 77.  Before the offense has declare their move, the defense lines up and chooses which of their defensemen is going to cover each offensive player.  When the offense announces their play, the defense counts the defensive players that match up to each player used.  If the safety is covering the QB and the CB is covering the WR, then add up their scores. The offense rolls, then the defense.  The combination of skill value and die points will tel...

A battery powered warming dome plate cover.

Self driving pallet movers that can bring a pallet across town from the distribution center to the store.

Public high schools should create a work from home online course from December 15 - January 15.  The students could learn something like coding every year during this J term.  Schools in the northern United States would benefit because the snow makes transportation difficult.  Students would be able to work on this project, even if they were traveling. The program could be developed and rolled out statewide.  The grading would be based on completion of critical coding tasks so there would not be much work for teachers to do.  The grade would be automatic and the students would be able to see their rank in the state. This would help the state encourage every graduate to understand a little bit about coding and hopefully foster a tech hub in the area.

An app for people that love jigsaws to trade their puzzles with each other when they're finished.  Maybe connect broken puzzles for extra pieces for scrap.  The app itself would have digital jigsaw puzzles for when they're on the go (or maybe even digital versions of the ones they own).

A gym company like Snap fitness should add locations in airports so travelers that arrive two hours ahead of time have something to do.  Travelers would feel more refreshed and better about sitting for a few hours if they just finished a run on a treadmill.  The gym doesn't need windows so it can be in the inside of the airport but ideally it would be on the second or third level so there are beautiful views.  Snap would see more business clients and would probably get people from other gyms that don't have airport locations.  Some people may want a membership just for the showers to feel refreshed during a long layover.

States should add a wage level for high school graduates to encourage students to graduate high school.  It's nearly a tangible benefit.  It would increase the education gap for minority students faster than any other program.  Just make sure that there are programs and support so that students can graduate if they want to.

Cities with bikeshares should have different types of bikes like nice mountain bikes available for rent by a mountain bike trail.  Then people can try out super nice bikes and take them on the course for a small fee and deposit.

States that govern lawyers should create a new ICANN suffix for law firms, such as .MNLaw and only law firms can use the suffix.  Anyone caught sending an email from a .MNLaw email that does not work for a law firm may be charged with unauthorized practice of law.

Bath mats with built in scales that work wirelessly with smart mirrors in a bathroom to give people an update on their weight over a long period of time (see a graph of weight gain or loss).

Uber/Lyft should pay for their drivers to become certified notaries.  Then from the uber app, anyone can order and pay via the app for a nearby notary.

Businesses should heavily invest in gamification.  Employees that complete a task will get a good job dialog box and stars that pop like fireworks.  They can level up and acheive badges for completed tasks and completion sprees.  This is commonly referred to as gamification. The addictive portion of cell phone games could be applied to keep workers engaged on their projects. 

States should create an optional hello fresh style nutritional assistance program.  the program works like WIC or "food stamps" but the participants get a box of fresh produce and instructions for them to create a family's healthy week of food. The food is locally sourced so it helps local farmers and businesses.  Ethnic groceries can utilize the service to reach customers that want to receive food from that ethnicity as well so it's more adaptable to cultural cuisines.  the customer would order online like hello fresh where they're able to adapt their meal plan.  The state would get a list of their children and ages to make recommendations for macros to keep their children growing strong.

Cities should install cameras on a post with a viewing screen. The camera is set up to catch a local attraction in the frame. The camera lenses are really nice but secured from theft.  Anyone can walk up to the screen with their social media account and scan their username.  This would allow them to have the photo that's taken be posted to their account or to the cities account with them tagged in the photo.  This will give the person a nice photo of them at a landmark from a nice distance away, and it will give the city more exposure for their landmarks and publicity for people to get out and see the sights.  This could increase tourist traffic to certain areas which would help businesses, communities, and the arts.

The US should create an Airport to Airport bullet train. The owners of the airports would be less likely to fight train travel if they were part of the profit.  It would be easier for travelers to make large moves on the planes and smaller distances on bullet trains.  The flight priority could be changed so that the smaller airport could take the regional flights so the larger airport has more gates open for coveted international non-stop flights. Some may balk at the increased role of TSA, but it would create a uniform safety standard for the two forms of travel.  Again, bringing in more partners may prevent obstacles. Let's use Minneapolis to Rochester, MN as an example. Many people fly into Minneapolis to go to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester.  It would be easy to catch a connecting train from Minneapolis to Rochester for that reason.  Rochester would take the flights to places like Omaha, NE or Pierre, SD.  Minneapolis would have more gates open to pu...

The US should change the name for which we refer to another country to the pronounciation in their own culture or language.  We can start with easy ones like changing Spain to Espana and Japan to Nippon.  It doesn't have to use their language's characters, but atleast the way that the words are used in spoken language would sound the same.

Every single traffic stop should be documented whether with a full or warning ticket.  A warning ticket is just a requirement to watch a youtube video on why your alleged action could be dangerous.  Data analysts would be able to use the warning ticket information from who was stopped to help police departments utilize their force appropriately to reduce criminal impact.