We featured the Snapit Screw story here in December and are delighted to welcome them to the Tampa Bay Mini Maker Faire as a Commercial Maker. They’ll be selling their eyeglass repair kit and sharing inventor Nancy Tedeschi ’s inventive journey at our event.
Welcome,SnapIt!
A couple of years ago, when he was just 16 years old, Hunter Morera developed his then patent pending Select-a-Wrench, a sort of Swiss Army bunch-a-wrenches in one tool. Over the ensuing two years, Morera, of Lutz, has appeared on the Discovery Channel’s Pitchmen, and his Select-a-Wrench tool is now being sold in Walmart and other stores.
Tomorrow, Feb. 4, you can meet Hunter, and pitchman Anthony Sullivan, at MOSI from 11 AM to noon, where Hunter will share his story on “creating an innovative product while overcoming personal challenges” Hunter’s personal challenges – he was born with a heart defect that’s required five open heart surgeries. Details are on the MOSI calendar. Go get inspired!
In celebration of tinkering!
Posted in Craftspeople, DIY, DIY Fun, Entrepreneurs, Hobbysts, Inventions, Makers
Tagged hackers, hacking, inventors, Rolf Hut, TEDxDelft, Tinkering
Less shark tank and more koi pond, Walmart’s new inventor’s contest, Get on the Shelf, invites anyone in the U.S. to submit a video of a self-developed product between now and February 22 for a chance to “Get on the Shelf” , at Walmart – at least an online shelf , and in some select stores. Winners will be chosen by popular vote at the website starting March 7.
According to the Huffington Post, “The initiative is headed by @WalmartLabs, the company’s e-commerce and social development platform. “We know there are some great undiscovered products that have not yet reached our shelves,” Venky Harinarayan, senior VP of global e-commerce and co-head of @WalmartLabs, said in a statement. “We are removing these barriers by giving anyone a chance to launch their product at Walmart and reach millions of shoppers nationwide.”"
Want to be the next hot Walmart item? Get your “must have” creation on video and head over to http://www.getontheshelf.com/
Posted in Contests, Entrepreneurs, Inventions, Makers, New technology
Tagged Get on the Shelf, inventors, Walmart contest
Artstarkraft, Inc, a Sarasota company, just announced the launch of a new household safety device called “Doctor Door Stop,” developed by local inventor John Doyle, after his own 7 year old daughter was injured when a door slammed on her fingers.
“My daughter was screaming, I was crying, and so were the ER nurses. Her injury required nine painful stitches and weeks of recovery,” said Doyle, in a recent PRWeb news release about his product.
Billed as ”the only automatic door holder you just set and forget,” the device requires no installation. It’s simply placed anywhere on top of a door frame and “the safety arm automatically drops into place, holding the door open to your desired width. When you want the door closed, simply pull the cord and raise the arm. Re-open the door and the arm drops back into place. “
According to Doctor Door Stop, over 300,000 door related injuries require emergency room visits annually. This simple solution could potentially lower those numbers significantly.
Want to be a Maker at the Tampa Bay Mini Maker Faire? If you’re just demoing, it’s free! We welcome crafts, engineering, music, robots, workshop digital fabrication, energy, demonstrations, performances, projects and anything home made, innovative, instructive, artistic and interesting!
Our Tampa Bay Mini Maker application is now live, and we’ll accept applications through the end of January!
Applying
The first step to participating in our Mini Maker Faire is to submit an entry that tells us about yourself and your project. Entries can be submitted from individuals as well as from groups such as hobbyist clubs and schools. We’ll want a short description of what you make and what you will actually bring to Maker Faire, along with links to photographs or videos of what you make. We particularly encourage exhibits that are interactive and that highlight the process of making things. Here’s some of what we’re looking for:
Types of Makers
Makers: Individuals, groups, schools and organizations that would like to demonstrate what they make and/or how it works in an interactive environment. For Maker groups, schools & organizations, we ask that you have one point person to coordinate your group efforts. Makers do not pay a fee to exhibit at Maker Faire for non-commercial exhibits.
Commercial Makers: Individuals who would like to sell products along with demonstrating what they make at their Mini-Maker exhibit. If you are a Maker with a product that you would like to sell at Tampa Bay Mini Maker Faire, please let us know us that you are a Commercial Maker on your application. There is a $75 fee for commercial makers.
Please note, companies or commercial entities do not qualify as Commercial Makers. If you are a company or commercial entity, please see our Sponsor page.
Agsort founder and veteran potato farmer Greg Jones, of St. Augustine, at one time laid claim to being the largest, daily-volume, chip potato shipper in North America, harvesting, washing, sorting, and loading as many as 4,600,000 pounds of potatoes per day, enough to fill 92 tractor-trailer loads.
These days he’s shipping out high-tech farming equipment, principally his potato sorting invention called the E-sorter, which he debuted at the 2012 Potato Expo in Orlando earlier this month (yes, farmers have expos, too!)
Jones created the E-Sorter, he told the trade magazine, The Packer, because he wanted to give growers a better option at a better price, noting that there many of the current high-tech sorting and grading machines are designed with the process in mind, but not the grower.
“If the growers can’t afford to buy the machine, it’s no good to anyone,” he told the Packer.
“I started working on this idea while I was still farming,” Jones said at his booth on the Potato Expo trade show floor. “I worked on it for three years then and another five after I got out of growing.”
According to the Agsorter website, “The core of the system is the scanner module. The sealed enclosure of this is approximately the size of a short file drawer and installs/uninstalls in the same way. Inside there is a clear plastic tube, fastened in a vertical position to the top and bottom of the enclosure, with matching holes to allowing the product to pass through, falling straight down from top to bottom. This is where the scanning takes place.”
The machine uses nearly 1,500 infra-red, red, green, and blue LEDs which flash on and off independently 100,000 times per second, enabling it to sort 8-9 potatoes per second per lane – about a large truckload every 30 minutes.
You can see the E-sorter in action in the rather mesmerizing video below.
Posted in Entrepreneurs, Florida Inventors, Inventions, New technology
Tagged Agsorter, E-sorter, Florida Inventors, Greg Jones, inventors, Potato Expo, potato sorter
Miami inventor, Ruddy Ugarte, with his partner Joaquin Antonio, has added a new level of usefulness to the plastic screen protector used to cover iPhone and similar products – a raised keyboard.
His invention, called Touch My Keys is a screen protector for the iPhone 4S that doubles as a transparent keyboard, that allows users to feel real buttons.
”Its both, the lack of a physical keyboard and that God forsaken autocorrect that at times causes those embarrassing or awkward text messages.” said Mr. Ugarte in his press release.
Touch My Keys features precision laser cuts of the iPhone’s QWERTY keyboard with just enough texture that users feel real buttons. Check it out in the video below.
Posted in Entrepreneurs, Florida Inventors, Inventions
Tagged Florida Inventors, inventors, Ruddy Ugarte, Touch My Keys
Tampa Bay Mini Maker Faire will be a family-friendly event showcasing both established and emerging local “Makers” – including some creative food makers who are part of the growing Tampa Bay Food Truck scene!
Our Tampa Bay Mini Maker Faire Food Truck Rally will include:
Michelle Faedo’s On The Go, whose offerings are “an interpretation of oldschool and modern cuisine”, with Tampa devil crab their specialty!
Kona Ice Tampa Bay serving ”light and fluffy tropical shaved ice out of the
“coolest” trucks and trailers that you’ve ever seen!” The highlight of the Kona Experience is the Flavorwave, their Trademarked, self-service area where guests put their favorite flavors on their Kona Ices.
Coconut Bo’s, who goal is to “feed hungry people delicious tropical faire one curbside stop at a time.”
BurgerCulture , “where burger meets sandwich”, and
Jerk Hut Jamaican Grill and Catering, with their 
“authentic island cuisine.”
We’re delighted to have these purveyors of fine Food Truck eats showcasing their inventive cuisine at the Tampa Bay Mini Maker Faire. Tampa Bay Mini Maker Fair Food Truck Rally vendors will also be donating a portion of their proceeds from the day to the University Area Community Center Complex.
The Cade Museum Prize is an incentive competition for early-stage inventors and entrepreneurs in Florida. The primary goal of the Prize is to provide seed capital for projects that are moving in the direction of a product or service that has a practical application. While we accept all types of entries, the most competitive are those in the early stages that are developing a truly innovative idea. We also believe in the power of a team and favor ideas with a multi-disciplinary team (or company) formed for the purpose of advancing the idea.
The Prize is open to all Florida residents or Florida-based companies. At least one of your team members must be a full-time Florida resident or your company headquarters must be in Florida. The deadline to submit an entry is January 13, 2012.
The Early Bird entry fee of $35 is valid until December 23. ( After December 23 the fee will increase to $50). Once you click Submit you will be redirected to the payment page. The entry will not be complete until you complete your payment.
Please e-mail all questions to cadeprize@cademuseum.org
Visit http://www.cademuseumprize.org/ for more details and to access the online registration form. And learn about the Cade Museum here .
Posted in Entrepreneurs, Florida Inventors, Inventions
Tagged Cade Museum, Cade Museum Prize, inventors, new technology
