Ric Richardson

I seem to be seeing a lot of people questioning the value of BitCoin as a legitimate currency. The proponents of the currency don't seem to be doing a good job of explaining it... now I'm no economist but for some reason its pretty obvious to me how it works... Here goes... All trading standards resolve back to the basic principle of scarcity. Wheat is not as highly valued as gold due to scarcity. Scarcity is the result of demand exceeding availability. If Gold was as plentiful as grass it wouldn't be used as the basis of trade. All trading mediums are a surrogate for a much larger set of traded goods and services. A days work gets 500 pieces of paper called a dollar. That five hundred pieces of paper buys a few days rent and some groceries. With BitCoin the scarcity is defined by the limited number of coins that are in circulation. The fact that there is a community that is willing to trade in what amounts to unique numbers is no different than a community that wants t

Some interesting concepts here... especially the use of a touch surface for remote screen control... allows a small hand space to be used to navigate a large screen area. Kind of touch-pad-ish but with smart apps running under your fingers... and the digital ink/ paper at the end... that seems to have stalled of late... wonder what the roadblocks are...

I actually like this idea more than a watch... it seems easier than having to use your other arm to answer calls interact as you would with a watch... well done guys... I hope you get the $40k you are needing.

What does the future of tech hold? Here are Ric's top 5 predictions for big technology breakthroughs in the next few years: Healthcare tech - especially carer centric healthcare technology Wearable computing - especially head gear like Google Glass 3D Printers - they will change everything The localisation of the Internet Personal Information management and Privacy These are the technologies I see coming fast down the pipe and going to influence our lives. There are others that I am looking at strategically or personally but I thought these were worth sticking my neck out over. So here are the details: Carer-Centric Healthcare Healthcare is the buzzword for technology focus in the next few years as the generations of the 50's and 60's start to hit later life and the world's population starts to age.     Advances in healthcare are reaching a critical storm as sensors and Internet enabled devices match with advanced software to enable people facing old

For those of you who came to the Innovation Pipeline event, Id just like to let you know that the web site we talked about is up and running.. every person from the event has their own web page, plus a page to ask for help and to offer to help others... Kind of a Craig's list for helping each other... The site uses the same software as Wikipedia so it takes a bit of getting use to, but its really powerful... if you didn't get to the event but want to join the Hub Community, send me an email and I'll set you up. Hope you can join us.

Yes I turned up.. but it was everyone else that made the event the success it was.. I have yet to send personal thank yous to the speakers or to Donna, Lynne and Katrina from the RDA or the Craig Jenkins and his team at NSW Trade and Investment.. but the bottom line is... it did more than I ever could have expected... Well whats next... Had a lot of requests for a session on Crowdfunding for inventors... and lots of volunteers offering help with the Byron Hub and the first stage of the pipeline that I'm concocting... some stuff to keep me intrigued over the holiday break... So please comment below if you agree and want to comment on the event... Thank you everybody. Ric

Sorry everyone but we officially ran out of seats earlier today... we severely underestimated the interest and apologise to those that are missing out... There are one or two who have yet to pay but they have registered so unfortunately if you haven't got in then we will have to get to you next time... George Lewin is coming For any of you that don't know George, he is a nationally recognized inventor and entrepreneur who calls the Shire his home and he will be coming to participate and has some interesting things to add. But please be warned, we will be at capacity so please be patient as we work out how to look oafter everyone... we originally wanted to cater to 80 but 100 have booked and we are turning back people now... :-) Thursday here we come. Ric

Just confirmed our 71st seat/ booking for the event... seems I know almost everyone who is coming... this will be so positive and hopefully will end up being very constructive in trying to get some idea of how to systematize success for Australia... If you feel you may miss out we have provision to add up to another 20 seats over the 80 we have booked for so if you really want to come just sign up and we'll make room for you... but 100 is our maximum limit for the facility so please jump in soon if you really want to make sure you get there... Thanks everyone for showing interest in this important process... I hope we make it all worthwhile for everyone. Ric

I just spoke to Phillip Spann who is Asst GM and Deputy Commissioner at IP Australia (ie Australia's Patent Office)... he will be coming with Liz Drummond from IP Australia's communications office to contribute to the day long think fest. I feel privileged to have such a senior person coming and look forward to the interchange that will happen in just over a week. On the phone I asked Phil about the success of self filing inventors he has seen and also warned him that issues such as software and business model patents will come up on the day and he answered my questions with calm clear thinking reason so we will be able to delve into some really important issues during the IP Australia section of the day... Liz is looking to interview inventors and innovators on the day for the IP Australia site so please feel free to look her up and tell her your story on the day.. This is looking like fun.

Its now 10 days before the Innovation Pipeline event in Byron Bay on the 31st October. Everyone is booked in to speak and the anticipation is rising... we have Peter Davison an Aussie who was an original investor in Paypal, Andrew Stead a co-founder of Sydney Angels and Doron Ben Meir (the CEO of Commercialisation Australia) all coming to weigh in on the subject of working out how to get Australia's technology development process working for Aussies so that we take advantage of our strengths and work through our weaknesses. Here is a link to more information: http://rdanorthernrivers.org.au/news-and-events/inventors/ A few of you have mentioned to me that they need to pay with a credit card in order to come and the RDA (the sponsors of the event) do not have credit card facility. Well I do! So if its ok with you I will collect the card proceeds and send them on to the RDA for you... please make sure to include your email so I can send you questions to answer for the day.

Some well known panelists, some reactionary views, some embracing of the mobile future faith. Really worth the 4 minutes. But here is my prediction. For those who have used Google Glass and really KNOW what its all about, I think a heads up display is inevitably in every persons future. Critical to that future is centralized, personalized, intelligent and balanced notification...(ie controlling what information is pushed to me across multiple applications and across all my communication mediums). Some of the panel members above are saying the same thing by awkwardly encouraging people to shut off their devices to engage as humans... well sorry, a smart device should learn when to not interrupt you and should adapt to your notification or pushed information tolerances and comfort zones... Personally I am focusing on what I am calling my "Personal  Server". It compiles the information I want and presents it in the format I want with a prioritization that I set... It com

Simple thought for the day... In my experience the two go hand in hand. Strategy is having the wisdom and insight on picking the best path from A to B before starting out and at key milestones during the journey. Having foresight helps you chose a realistic and inspirational end result "your B location". Execution is getting there once the route has been chosen and getting around roadblocks and hurdles... the tactical side... Execution is NOT everything... but Strategy without execution is means you go nowhere.

Hi there friends and followers. For those interested I just wanted to let you know  I'm coming out of hibernation .    I have three pretty large projects approaching the kickoff point and waiting for the final pieces to fall into place to see which one I work on for the next 6-18 months. The projects are in the  energy, physics, transportation and internet tech space . If you are interested in being involved in a project I work on, be it investing or working in it, please feel free to reply and I'll fill you in. In the next few weeks before things get going I wanted to offer my help to any small to medium size businesses out there  who need a part time adviser  to help put together a patent portfolio or manage the very early stages of a tech business... I am not willing to work probono as Id be working on my normal work days but Im happy to give a big discount to people who really need my help and who have interesting projects to work on... for example just recently I did about

Sketch from Ric's notebook looking at key issues ie area that needs to be fog free (75m before strip starts) and possible solutions to look at It is now 1.5 hours since we were meant to board for a flight to Sydney from Coolangatta and I'm brainstorming how to fix the fog problem at airports... when I asked the pilot what area needs to be fog free he explained that planes in Australia are rated to land with only 75 metres of visibility which means that the runway must be visible from 75 metres in front of the runway. This means that a relatively small area of less than 10,000 square meteres could be cleared of fog to allow most planes to land in even the heaviest atmospheric fog. As shown above a small area like this is commonly cleared of water using flood fans and heaters in buildings so the idea of dispersing fog with wind turbines, burners or magnetic fields is not out of the question... lets see where this idea takes us...

Google Glass with privacy shutter that only opens when filming or taking pictures Ever since the ruckus over Google Glass privacy went into overdrive Ric has been wondering what all the commotion is about. All you need is a retractable cover or what he calls a "privacy shutter" that makes it easily discernible when the camera is being used. "It's such an easy fix, I assumed Google would have solved it on the spot... but weeks went by and I decided to fix the problem myself" said Mr Richardson. His patent also covers the use of audio by Glass as a privacy concern. "I think the Glass concept is so important it would be a shame to see it crippled by social concerns when they can be so easily addressed by a technology fix. I want to use Glass in a theater, to get access to heads up ancillary information while watching a movie, without being questioned as to whether I am secretly pirating the film." Ric plans to hand his work off to businessmen

From time to time Di and I catch up. Her Uncle and I were deep long time friends and I couldn't help but be adopted into the family as a kind of distant cousin. Even though Di is a popular author with no reputation as a technologist she is always exploring interesting issues and one she keeps coming back to is the NBN. Way back when I first came home she introduced me to Janelle Saffin (an MP from the Page/ Lismore area) to weigh in as a technologist on the value of the NBN. Janelle kindly introduced me to Stephen Conroy in an attempt to help him sell full motion full screen video conferencing as the NBN's killer app... as anyone who has experienced it knows, once you've used it you never want to go back... but that was 2009 and the killer app is still not being explained... But back to Di. I have always encouraged her to expose her scenic and insightful Australian bent on writing popular novels (especially with the ladies... my wife loved Barra Creek) to the American

What a great design. A modular vehicle (see article ) that allows multiple pods (or Ants as Cherry Automotive of China calls them) that can fit together in transit to make city driving more efficient...  But who did it first?  Probably not me but here is my design from 2010 .(click to read article)

Management of wild and pest animals that compete with Livestock for water and pasture is a constant problem in much of Australia. Eco sensitive land management supporters have found that when naturally arid properties (ie very little naturally occurring surface water) are allowed to dry out (by temporary de-stocking and plugging of bore water) the numbers of wild and pest animal populations also decrease.  The system devised by Ric Richardson takes advantage of this phenomena with a smart bore water trough that does visual animal recognition and only allows livestock to access water. The trough has a grid that is removed when livestock approaches but is replaced and stays in place when other unrecognized animals approach. This process allows the normal attrition that occurs in nature, to regulate wild or pest category animals while allowing livestock to thrive using a more efficient water management system. The grate swivels out of the way on animal approach using a so

Is this poll proof that the time for software patents is over? No. Its proof that Software games supporters are  rabidly loyal and that most people don't understand the real issues. First some facts. This poll was taken during the heat of the anti-Uniloc publicity peak when they first sued Mojang over their game Minecraft. We had thousands of visitors each day, most of them indignant gamers. So this is what they said: 30% said patents are no good get rid of them  55% said just Software patents should go 6% said everything should be free (unless it affects my job no doubt) and; 8% said patents are good... I wonder if you asked the same crowd about drink driving or about the decriminalization of heroin whether you'd get a similar response. Software patents are about things like: Do you think the inventor of the worldwide web should be compensated for providing such a wonderful thing? Do you think that anyone should be able to make their ow

Just heard my interview with Ross Greenwood this morning... what a dynamic guy.. I don't know how he does it day in day out... I've had 30 people visit the site since the story aired and its been really interesting to see how many people are listening to the radio on a Sunday... In case you missed it we discussed: Voice Controlled TV Mute http://ricrichardson.blogspot.com.au/2013/03/simple-voice-controlled-tv-mute-for.html Flat Tire Alarm http://ricrichardson.blogspot.com.au/2013/02/flat-tire-alarm-invention-up-for-sale.html Voice Control Siri Badge for iPhone http://ricrichardson.blogspot.com.au/2013/03/denied-siri-communicator-badge-already.html Sadly in the short time between recording the Interview and publishing I found a California Mob who are already doing it... but its interesting to see what they have come up with... Ross Also talked about my help for Inventors.. so if you want some feel free to sign up for my mail list where I inform everyone when there

Ric tries to consistently make time available to help fellow inventors get their projects moving along. From time to time he provides a morning a week to talk on the phone or face to face with people who need his help Here is what is booked and available for the next few weeks: Tuesday 12 th   March from 4pm-5:30pm Neil Wallace -2.30pm-4pm - Face to Face - Confirmed Paul Vance - 4pm-5.30pm Face to Face - Confirmed Monday 18 th   March from 3pm-5.30pm Jeff Haseldon - 3pm-4.30pm - Face to Face - unconfirmed Zen Player - 4.30-6pm Face to Face - unconfirmed Friday 29 th   March from 9am -12 noon Ali McQuillan - 9:30-11am - Face to Face Slot - unconfirmed Helen Davenport - 11am-12.30pm - Face to Face Slot - unconfirmed Friday April 5 th   from 9am – 12 noon Jaye Bolger 9am-9:20am - Over the phone session - unconfirmed Bryce Murray 9:30-11am - Face to Face session - unconfirmed More slots will be added in a few weeks Please note: Face to Face Sessions will take place i

My brother and I were sitting in the Iron Man 2 movie at the North Ryde Gold Club theater when we saw Tony Stark walk in a room and say "Mute" to turn off the volume of a TV... I though "I've got to get me one of those" but after when we discussed it we realised the reason that it was so cool was the fact that no one has done that... yet. Amazingly, there are hi tech TV remotes out there that actually do feature voice control, but they are complicated expensive things ($400 or over) that require training and all kinds of tweaking... so I set about inventing my own simple TV Mute... it responds to just two commands... "Mute" and "unmute"... Also I've been working on a prototype with a fellow Byronian wiz that will conceivably bring the cost price of the materials and components to under $20. So it is conceivable that you could see it in the stores for $50 ... So if this invention is something you would like to own and turn into a

Sometimes a great idea that youve been working on is allready DONE. Ive been tinkering with the idea of a bluetooth headset that sits on your chest and is activated like the Star Trek Command Badge (ie you tap a badge on your chest to communicate). Worked on the noise cancelling and the limiting of the speaker so it doesnt send your conversations out all over the room you are in... but... turns out someone beat me to it.. and filed a patent no less.... Here it is.... Not quite what I had in mind but close enough... I had more of a disk shape in mind with a speaker and mic that projected sideways out the edge of the device... Oh well back to the drawing board... another prototype bites the dust.

Ever found it irritating that you may want to sell a car or something else big and expensive like that but you didn't want someone trying to put it on their credit card? The other extreme is to have someone go through the rigmarole of doing a bank transfer when they need to look at your car before they buy? Well this concept is designed to fill that need. It enables people to make a deposit on a large item, to place it on hold until they can inspect the item and complete the transaction . This is especially important for big or expensive items. It's great for the seller too because it shows them that the buyer is serious. How would it work? The seller places the ad on their web site advertising the item for sale and its full price. The seller places a "Pay Deposit" button on the site. When the buyer decides they want to place the item on hold with a deposit they click on the "Pay Deposit" button. A screen appears floating above the sellers sa

The original version of this invention came to life after a friend of mine and former neighbor Herb Elliott (the famous runner and business man) asked me how I invent... I said you just solve problems and so he asked his wife for a problem to solve and voila. This is what appeared after some fun brainstorming the problem. As the tire rotates the arm (see number 32) hits the inside of the tire as it starts to deflate and triggers a noise maker (number 34) to make a noise that can be heard inside the cabin. Put simply, the idea relies on the simple fact that the space between the hub and the inside of the tire becomes  smaller as a tire deflates. The most simple version of the invention is to just stick something in their that makes a noise when the tire starts to go flat. I also tried to make sure the noise maker was not dependent on electronics but the patent covers using something like a smoke detector beeper to let you know the tire is getting flat... At the moment t

Over the last year or so the number of really cool transaction technologies has started to get going. The ability to trade with visitors to your site is becoming simpler, faster and more friction-less. This technology is an extension of what we are seeing in that it take the best of what is out there and builds extended selling capabilities such as the auction process into the same easy embedded approach allowing visitors to your site to bid in an auction without having to go to another site or interact with a third party. If you are interested or know someone who may want to take over this patent please email me at ricricho at gmail dot com. There is also a significant finders fee available to anyone that introduces me to the eventual buyer, just ask me about it. Patent : Auction Button Patent Type : Provisional Patent Included : Prior art search (by me), Implementation strategy notes and an FAQ regarding the tech. Price: $16,000 AUD Key features: Ability to conduct

Don’t assume that selling patents with Ric is only for the big timers. Many of Ric’s patents are quite low priced so that everyday people can buy them and make a business out of them. The last 5 patents Ric has sold are in the $16,000-$45,000 range and a few of them involved a broker’s fee where someone helped Ric find a home for the patent. The patents are usually first advertised here on this blog so you can see what the sale includes and you have everything you need to help find someone you know or do business with who would benefit from having a Ric Richardson invention and patent. The way it works is this: You register your interest in the form below in working with me as a broker and then Look at the list of patents currently available for sale on the tab above that says " Patents for Sale " and see if you have ideas for any of them... there are over 40 available so tell me your field of interest in the form below and ill try and find a good fit for y

It seems no one has worked out the reason why Gmail canned responses seem to vanish from time to time. Canned responses are really helpful when you get lots of enquiries and want to send the same info to lots of people simply. The problem has been that you spend a lot of time crafting a good all purposes response and then for some reason it vanishes and is no longer available to use in your replies...  The answer?  Check your draft folder! It looks like Gmail stores the canned response templates as draft emails in your draft folder... so when you go through it cleaning up old and unsent emails you will more often than not miss the fact that the draft emails also contain templates for your canned email responses... Here is a tip.... Since the canned responses do not use the subject field but keep the original subject you are replying to you can name the subject field of the canned response anything you like... I use something like DO NOT DELETE - Canned response template for

The Inventors Association of Australia very kindly hosted me to speak to a roomfull of eager inventors in Brisbane last Wed night. A couple of ladies even came down from Cairns just for the evening so the pressure was on to make it all worthwhile....  the big idea for the night was the idea of segregating yourself into different roles and looking objectively at yourself regarding your value as a entrepreneur versus an inventor versus a manager and getting realistic about what help you need to get your invention out there... How to fight the tendency to think that as the inventor we are by default the person that must get the project going... and started talking about how to get people with the respective special skills to work with you rather than try and do it yourself... it was a long discussion with a lot of people continuing to ask me about business related problems when my gut instinct was telling me that they really should not have been doing the business but rather finding

The simple answer is: if you feel you have to keep your idea secret because you've never seen it done before it is more than probably worth a provisional patent which costs $110. Once you've got a provisional you can do a more thorough search of the internet and the patent databases, but that takes time and I prefer to risk the $110 provisional filing fee than sit around trying to see if there is something out there already. It is a bit of a problem asking other people if they think your idea is patentable because most of them are weighin the question against the 5-10k you need to spend to get your full patent application filed... but that is a long way off... If you file your own provisional patent you have 12 months of protection to work out whether its worth proceeding with a full patent... so at about the 10 month mark is when you need to start putting big chunks of money together to get the patent attorney to file your formal applications depending on which countries

This patent and Technology has been sold as of Mar 1st 2013. This invention for a system that allows a localized search result to be shown along with a general search result has been cooking for over 3 or 4 years when I first saw Evernote embed its search results for your own documents with a general Google search result. I thought "wouldn't it be cool to know if there were search results in a quick driving range for stuff that I was searching the whole net for?" And voila this is it... Basically it is a means of overlaying the search results of a search engine that ONLY displays close by results was so that it appears below the main search results. A cool way to implement this is to change the search engine of choice in your browser to the local search engine talked about in the patent and then have your main search results also displayed by choosing Google or Yahoo etc as your secondary search engine. The above rough drawing is actually from th

Today I filed a patent for an application of Sonar that I think is very promising.. Yes Sonar, like the way bats navigate, but different in that my technique does not use echoes. Basically the idea is more like GPS. With GPS, the ID of the satellite and the time stamp from each satellite along with the satellites location above the earth is sent out for people to navigate by. Since all the satellites use the same time reference, the device you are using simply measures the time it takes for each time signal to get to your device at the speed of light and using triangulation principles to know pretty accurately where you are on the earth’s surface. A really good explanation of the principle can be seen at Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Positioning_System#Basic_concept_of_GPS About 14 months ago I started working on the idea of using a similar system but using sound waves instead of line-of-sight radio waves for triangulation in smaller spaces...