“What are you doing?” Who in the world would have thought that giving people 140 characters to share some boring, sordid, funny or exciting moment of their lives with millions of total strangers would become a world wide phenomenon? Not only recreational, Twitter is now also an immediate source of breaking news around the world. Can you just hear the developer telling people about his idea? How would you have responded to it? I bet 99% of us would have thought it was a dumb idea. Kind of reminds me of the Seinfeld premise of a show about nothing – another seemingly dumb idea that is legendary.

How do people recognize good “dumb” ideas? What gave some store owner the courage or wisdom to place the first order for Pet Rocks – the craziest idea ever? Even I made money with it by selling mine on eBay last year for $15!!! What about Cabbage Patch dolls – remember those? People made money off of them in bizarre ways. I remember one business that provided summer camp for your doll. You actually sent the doll to them and they took pictures of it on a horse and in a boat etc. and returned it to you with the pictures and souvenirs! I had what I thought was a great idea for a spinoff business. As you might recall, you didn’t buy a Cabbage Patch doll, you “adopted” it. So I was going to help Cabbage Patch dolls find their “real” parents. I know – dark, but you gotta admit, funny. My son was a teenager at the time and threatened to go live with his father if I did it. I still think I would have made money on it – there are other dark humored people out there – but I liked having my son around. (If you are too young to remember Pet Rocks or Cabbage Patch dolls, go ask about them on Twitter!)

I think we all have “dumb” ideas from time to time but we don’t act on them or we let other talk us out of them – of course sometimes rightfully. But what if it really is a good “dumb” idea? How do you go about making it happen. I have an idea right now but I need a web application developer to do it – and I can’t pay one, so I am just sure that someone else with resources will have the same idea and I will be kicking myself.

So are you stifling an idea because you think it isn’t good enough, or you don’t have the resources? There is a great show on television now called Shark Tank. Would be inventors and product designers appear before a panel of venture capitalists and pitch their ideas to get money and partnering. It is a great learning experience and I highly recommend you watch it if you have an idea you want to develop.

As for me, all my friends know that I go berserk whenever I see a Shred-it truck on the road – stick a shredder in a truck and go place to place and shred people’s paper. A GREAT dumb idea! GOD why didn’t I think of that!!