The inventor of the world’s first permanently-tied shoelace has received acclaim from a unique source – the British Cheerleading Asssociation according to a story in The Ealing Gazette.

Father-of-three Peter Greedy, who lives in Hanwell, got plaudits from the BCA for inventing the Greeper, the shoelace which never comes undone.

Mr Greedy said he had his ‘eureka’ moment while driving down the motorway in 2001. He was, like many parents frustrated about the constant state of his young children’s laces – regularly undone, frayed and tatty.

Not convinced that ‘non-lace’ options were the answer he set out to devise an alternative to traditional lace-up shoes when he had an image of what would become the Greeper shoelace system.

After six years or research and development, he finally came up with the revolutionary design and it was patented soon after.

He said: “The sports market has responded extremely positively to Greeper laces because of the obvious health and safety benefits, where people cannot ever trip on their undone laces.”

Photo by Greeper.

From Business Opportunities Weblog.

Source: Inventor Of The World’s First Permanently-Tied Shoelace

Presented here with permission by the very gracious Dane Carlson from the Business Opportunities Weblog.

Our notions of brainpower are radically changing. We are on the threshold of a new age of intelligence, reports The Times.

Earlier this year, it was declared that we are in the age of intelligence: 2,000 delegates at the 14th International Conference of Thinking in Kuala Lumpur embraced the fact that instead of thinking agriculturally, informationally or technologically, we will finally think intelligently.

And as the year draws to an end, it seems that they were on to something. Everywhere in the world, intellectual capital has become the new buzz phrase ; people are realising that the brain is now the prime resource and the main currency is intelligence.

So what does it mean to be intelligent today? The notion was born at the turn of the 20th century, designed to test reading, verbal and numerical abilities. Today, people denigrate IQ test but it was only 100 years ago that we made these huge steps, to be able to determine an individuals’ intelligence quotient by the level of their verbal and numerical abilities.

Continue Reading: “You Are Cleverer Than You Think”

Photo by Photofunia.

From Business Opportunities Weblog.

Source: You Are Cleverer Than You Think

Presented here with permission by the very gracious Dane Carlson from the Business Opportunities Weblog.

Treehugger has an interesting story about a company that rents out goats to clear brush.

Goats have many advantages:
• They have a low impact on the environment due to their cloven hooves.
• They are natural climbers and love steep slopes and uneven terrain.
• They can go where machinery and other modes of brush removal are not allowed to go.
• They are cost effective in many situations.
• They are walking fertilizer factories.
• People love the goats! They bring communities together and make people happy.

Also, “Goats are becoming very popular with construction companies. They are finding that it’s a win/win for everyone. Many companies use the goats to clear brush so surveys can be done. They have also found it can be very cost-effective when considering how much it is to clear the land, then haul the debris and dispose of it.

Plus, permits are not needed for the goats to clear which saves time and money. And it also improves communities by bringing people together to see the goats, not to mention the lack of noise that heavy machinery generates.”

Photo by rent-a-ruminant.

From Business Opportunities Weblog.

Source: Niche Biz: Rent-a-Goat

Presented here with permission by the very gracious Dane Carlson from the Business Opportunities Weblog.

Susan Baida at the Current Mom blog discusses her becoming an accidental entrepreneur.

I wasn’t someone who always dreamed of being an entrepreneur. I was content in corporate America, building upon a 17-year career in brand marketing. I had an impressive resume including world-renowned companies such as Avon, Estee Lauder and Starwood Hotels. I enjoyed rising the corporate ladder, jumping from director to executive director and finally to vice president, a career-long aspiration.

I was on a roll until it all came to a crashing halt when the economy took a nose dive in the third quarter of 2007. I was at Starwood Hotels, which happened to be in one of the hardest hit industries.

The light bulb finally went on. I needed to let go of the world I knew, leap forward into the uncharted world of entrepreneurship and join forces with John on this amazing business venture. I took the leap and have found unimaginable fulfillment.

What I have gained as a startup entrepreneur more than makes up for what I might have missed out on in corporate life.

If you are contemplating becoming an entrepreneur, my advice is to weigh the pros and cons, obtain feedback about your venture from friends and experts in the field. If it’s positive, then you might have a viable concept in hand; be in tune with the forces of nature. Don’t force a square peg into a round hole, like I did in pursuing my old career when a new one was obviously calling, and; timing is everything. You’ll know when to take the leap. Trust your gut.

Photo by CareDiary.

From Business Opportunities Weblog.

Source: Becoming An Accidental Entrepreneur

Presented here with permission by the very gracious Dane Carlson from the Business Opportunities Weblog.

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Three Simple Steps to Wean Off One-On-One Clients and Create Leveraged Income

Yes, you love your clients but honestly, too much one-on-one work can leave you feeling exhausted and strapped for time, plus it can limit how much you can make. You end up not only feeling burnt out but feeling broke, even though you’re working plenty hard. When it comes to money and marketing…..

Continued in BIZNESS! Newsletter Issue 93 >>>

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- Step on It – The Foot Flush
- Olympics Medals from Circuit Boards
- SmartSponge

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- Enjoying Life: How Discovering Your Natural Skills Can Keep Things Looking Up
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Continue reading these top stories in the BIZNESS! Newsletter >>>

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Free 28-pages PDF report (worth $38) - “Cool Business Ideas in 2009″ - included with your subscription. Learn more here.

Source: BIZNESS! Newsletter Issue 93

Used with permission and contributed by the kind people at:

Give Your Opinion. Rate This Idea Now.

CoolBuzz: The Ora watch surpasses all watches on innovative designing, intricacy and finesse in haute horology. The sight of this watch is such a novel experience that you won’t be able to inhibit the mesmerization it causes subtly. There is nothing very flashy about Ora. It has three tapes running in three different directions to keep the time, which at first may appear discrete, but are, in fact, one unit cohered together by time. All its appeal lies in the unprecedented design concept by Alexandros Stasinopoulos and the ease and elegance with which it embraces within itself such a marvel of complicate craftsmanship. The uppermost tape measures time in minutes, overlapping two smaller tapes that display hours and the current day of the week, respectively.

Ora watch epitomizes the term ‘measuring time’ [CoolBuzz]

Source: Cool Ora Watch

Used with permission and contributed by the kind people at:

Give Your Opinion. Rate This Idea Now.

TechCrunch reviews the website Infectious which you could use to start your own microbusiness.

Infectious, a startup that makes high quality decals and skins that let you customize the look of your iPhone, car, laptop, skateboards, and more, is launching a new feature: one off prints of your own custom designs.

Users will be able to use an integrated Flex app to upload their own images, which they can then have printed out on high quality adhesive stickers (or decks, in the case of skateboards).

Until now, customers could only choose from the Infectious catalog of art work. That offers a pretty good selection, but obviously being able to craft your own design is going to make the service appealing to a much broader customer base.

Users who want to put their own artwork on their items will have the chance to do so, and businesses could potentially create their own branded skins (perhaps to give away in promotions).

Photo by Infectious.

From Business Opportunities Weblog.

Source: Biz Idea: Print Your Own Designs

Presented here with permission by the very gracious Dane Carlson from the Business Opportunities Weblog.

The biggest hassle with business cards is getting the contact information into your address book as fast as possible — that’s where Business Card Reader for the iPhone comes in, reports TechCrunch.

Business Card Reader scans and “reads” the picture using ABBYY’s text recognition technology and enters the data into the iPhone or iPod touch address book.

Basically, you open the application, and choose either to take a new picture of a business card, or if you’ve already taken a picture, you can upload that as well.

After you take a picture, or upload a picture, the application scans the business card, and after about 15 seconds, you get the address book field to edit the scanned information if there are errors.

Once that’s all done, it adds the new contact into your address book. It’s really that easy.

Photo by Shape Services.

From Business Opportunities Weblog.

Source: Scan Your Biz Cards On The Go

Presented here with permission by the very gracious Dane Carlson from the Business Opportunities Weblog.

There are plenty of Web apps that can help you make to-do lists, help you organize your tasks and personal projects, or help you build shopping lists, but not all of them give you the freedom to just start brainstorming and jotting down ideas as they come to you.

AppScout reports that Wridea is a perfect brainstorming tool: It’s simple enough that its features aren’t a barrier to use, but it also has the ability to bounce your ideas off other members and friends, add details and steps, and organize your ideas by topic.

Wridea isn’t for everyone; clearly the developers wanted to give people almost a whiteboard for brainstorming and a place they could jot down the ideas running around their heads without having to click a half-dozen times to get to a text prompt.

On the other hand, that also means you don’t get a lot of the features you would expect from some to-do list apps and personal organization Web sites like due-dates, e-mail alerts, and ways to indicate how far along you are on a task.

Wridea also provides a way to visualize your ideas called “Idea Rain,” where your ideas cascade from the top of the screen to the bottom in random order. The idea is to provide a way for you to find inspiration by looking at your own ideas in a random manner, but I’m not entirely sure how useful it is as a tool to stay motivated.

Photo by Wridea.

From Business Opportunities Weblog.

Source: Biz App: Wridea

Presented here with permission by the very gracious Dane Carlson from the Business Opportunities Weblog.

Proving that microloans can help to change the world one little bit at a time, Kiva.org hit a major milestone, TechCrunch reports.

Since it’s founding four years ago, it has now made possible $100 million in microloans between individual lenders and entrepreneurs all around the world. The company has brought together 573,000 lenders (people like you and me putting in $25 or more towards a specific project), and 239,000 entrepreneurs.

Most of the entrepreneurs who benefit are in developing countries, but Kiva opened up its service to needy U.S. entrepreneurs last summer. It also has APIs for other developers to build on its data set.

Kiva creates a personal connection between lenders and recipients. Each entrepreneur has a profile page with a picture and description of what they plan to do with the loan. Then every month you get an update on how much of the loan has been repaid.

Photo by Kiva.

From Business Opportunities Weblog.

Source: Kiva Hits $100 Million In Microloans

Presented here with permission by the very gracious Dane Carlson from the Business Opportunities Weblog.