Creative Innovative money making ideas can often be disarmingly low tech, study finds

WHY IS it that clever ideas also seem to be simple ideas and that being innovative doesn’t necessarily equate to high tech? Innovative, money-making ideas can often be disarmingly low tech and yet enjoy substantial financial returns.

I ask this in light of the launch last month by President Mary McAleese of the “Your Country Your Call” competition. Major money is on offer, two prizes of €100,000 and a combined €1 million worth of business development support and all you have to do is be innovative, come up with a way to create prosperity and jobs.

You could do worse while in pursuit of that money than take a leaf out of Walter Frederick Morrison’s book. He came up with an amazing yet simple idea that has delivered millions of euros in sales – the frisbee. This simple plastic “flying saucer” has sold an estimated 200 million units around the world, an achievement that if duplicated here would deliver all the prosperity and jobs required to win the Your Country Your Call prize.

Morrison died last month, in the process sparking a flurry of news stories and features that lamented his passing while celebrating his simple achievement. Yet the man was no overnight success. His flying disc needed an amount of work to make it happen even though it seems so ridiculously simple.

There are several web versions of his history, one claiming he developed his idea while throwing about an old tin lid with his future father-in-law in 1937, the other that it arose in 1948 after the war while tossing an inverted pie tin. The later story also suggests how the product, originally the Flyin-Saucer and then the Pluto Platter, was named. It was a trademark-dodging version of the pie tin’s owner, the Frisbie Pie Co.

Morrison modified his platter a number of times before being bought out by a company that is a by-word for innovation, Wham-O. The company made iconic products that every American kid would have known from the 1960s through today, like the SuperBall and the Slip’n Slide or that international favourite, the HulaHoop. Simple bits of plastic that sold millions. If only I had thought of it first.

Not one of them has a microchip or a battery or needs to be charged before use. They are just good ideas that somebody had the vision to support. Similar uncluttered thinking allowed the Victorians, wealthy ones anyway, to grow and enjoy their own fresh oranges in Orangeries. Large, elegant lean-to glass houses were built onto the south facing side of some grand homes, including plenty in Ireland, in order to provide a supply of oranges.

The clouds were a bother, but cheap heating was no problem. One heating system featured piping running along the base of a long trough. The trough would be filled to the brim with fresh manure and allowed to rot, in the process giving off significant heat that was carried away in the pipework as warm water. The water kept the glass house warm and the manure when rotted could be tossed out into the flower beds. Win, win.

And what about a remarkable central air conditioning system I once spotted on a former mansion outside Philadelphia. A metal frame had been bolted onto the back of the four-storey house and onto this was mounted a thin metal mesh like a screen. Pipes fed water onto the screen at the top of the building and this trickled down the mesh to run into a tank at the bottom.

A hot summer’s day in Philly would see the water evaporate rapidly, chilling it due to evaporative cooling. This cool water in turn could be piped into the house to bring down the temperature inside. Simple. No moving parts but for a small pump. How innovative can you get.

We have a tendency these days to go with a heavy technological fix when presented with problems, but none of these innovations relied on complex technology. They are just good ideas that had a chance to flourish.

Let’s hope that Your Country Your Call can turn up a few more, ideas that will help create jobs and maybe make someone wealthy. We could all do with a bit of cheering up given the state of things. It isn’t exactly the knowledge economy as espoused by the Government but it is certainly the smart economy.

Lottery Winner Dead. Missing Lottery Winner's Body Found in Florida

The family of Florida lottery winner Abraham Shakespeare has probably been dreading this day since they reported him missing last November.

The Hillsborough County Sheriff's office confirmed Friday that remains found a day earlier were those of Shakespeare. Police used fingerprints to identify the 43-year-old truck driver's assistant who won a $31 million lottery jackpot in 2006.

The body was found in Plant City, about 25 miles northeast of Tampa, at a home connected to Dorice Moore, a woman who had befriended him and now lives in the $1 million home he bought with his winnings.

Police have named Moore a "person of interest" in Shakespeare's disappearance but she has not been charged.

In 2006, Shakespeare opted for a lump sum payment of nearly $17 million. He had been missing since April 2009, but his family didn't report it until November.

Lotteries: Germans fly to Italy to buy lotto tickets

Germans, Austrians and other foreigners are heading into Italy to play the lottery ahead of a record euro131.5 ($186 million) jackpot, including some who flew into Milan for a few hours just for a chance to win Thursday night.

Germany's top-selling Bild newspaper said 140 passengers aboard a chartered Air Berlin jet won a phone-in contest for free airline tickets aboard an early afternoon flight from Berlin to Milan's Malpensa airport.

Besides the free seats, the winners were being treated to a heaping plateful of pasta, a cup of espresso and the opportunity to buy Superenalotto tickets at a smoke shop at the Milan airport.

Later in the afternoon, without ever leaving the airport, the passengers were flying back to Berlin, "just in time for dinner and to find out if they've won," said Italy private Canale 5 TV.

French visitors have also been driving into neighboring northwest Italy for a chance to play the numbers lotto, many Germans have been sighted in resort towns of Lake Maggiore buying tickets, and Superenalotto tickets appeared to be as popular as postcards in many Venice souvenir shops.

Other foreigners catching lotto fever were enjoying already planned vacations in Italy. Nicola and Peter Minchella came from Edinburgh, Scotland.

"I never thought to play in another country before, but since it's making headlines, we'll probably buy a ticket," said Nicola Minchella, as the pair dipped into gelato and sipped coffee at Castellino's, an outside cafe at Piazza Venezia in the heart of Rome.

At a counter inside the cafe, customers waited in line to buy lotto tickets. What if Peter Minchella picked the winning numbers?

"I'd travel the world and keep buying lottery tickets," he said, smiling.

The cost is euro1 ($1.42) for the chance to choose two combinations of six winning numbers.

In places like Naples, where a favorite pastime is interpreting dreams in terms of numbers, many people prefer to choose their own. But players can also purchase tickets with two random sets of numbers already printed on them.

With many smoke shops closed in Italy for vacations, those open bustled with players. At Castellino, one customer spent euro2,000 (some $2,800), a drop in the bucket against the 1 in 622 million odds, said manager Stefano Menchetti.

Not all have dreams of riches only for themselves.

The mayor and some of his employees in one small town in northeast Italy have chipped in to buy tickets, pledging to use any winnings to build a theater for Ceneselli's 1,900 citizens.

"We've played our ages, our birth dates" as the lucky numbers, said Mayor Marco Trombini in a telephone interview. "There's no logic in luck anyway."