"Pick my gadget for TV! Show would help inventors with their next steps."

February 18, 2008

KIM VO 

Some inventors revolutionize the world, changing the way people think, move, heal and talk. And then there are those who just ease daily life, gadget by gadget.

About 700 of the latter packed the San Jose McEnery Convention Center on Saturday at a casting call for the reality show "Everyday Edisons," which airs on PBS. They arrived before dawn for a shot at transforming their ideas into actual products.

These weren't the type of inventions that put Silicon Valley on the map. Rather, anonymous go-getters hauled in their home-tinkered ant repellents, tree trimmers and contraptions that featured a paint brush on one end and a paint can opener on the other. They made you slap your forehead and ask, "Why didn't I think of that?"

Think egg slicers instead of eBay.

Show hosts were surprised that Silicon Valley - with its high rate of patent holders per capita - didn't pitch more distinctive ideas than what they see everywhere else in the country.

"Thought we'd get more tech things," noted show host Michael Kable. "Nope."

Perhaps that's because such creators are already surrounded by R&D labs and venture capitalists, allowing them to bypass morning cattle calls. Instead, many of the folks who flocked to San Jose on Saturday - coming from as far as Hawaii - had been burnishing their ideas for years but were stymied about what to do next.

Some inventors hauled along elaborate prototypes. Others carried paper sketches. One man waved his logo design, drawn on a white sheet, the ragged fringe still hanging from where he tore it out of a spiral notebook.

Mostly, these weren't professional inventors - though one man did have business cards reading "Mark Anthony Anaya: Sacramento area inventor."

Instead, they were office workers and moms and landscapers blessed with a can-do mentality: They stumbled across a problem and figured they could fix it.

Limo driver Lucacio Simoes designed a spill-proof cup after noticing people sloshing their drinks in his cars. Donastine Smith fashioned a shoulder rest for cordless phones after a two-hour call led to numb fingers and stiff neck. Bill Nguyen made a device that attaches to circuit breakers and shuts down a house's electricity after an earthquake.

Pedro Zamora, partially paralyzed during a 1995 car accident, created an easily portable bath chair because he tired of calling his sister every time he needed to shower. The traditional chairs were too difficult for a wheelchair user to lug.

"I thought there had be something better out there," said Zamora, who drove from Los Angeles. It took years to refine the chair, he said, testing materials that were light and sturdy but waterproof. It's such a hit in his house, his sister now uses the chair while shaving her legs.

He needs help not just manufacturing it, he said, but getting insurance companies to accept it as a medical expense.

That's where the show might come in. "Everyday Edisons" shepherds contestants through the invention process, securing patents and pairing inventors with industrial designers and marketing experts to get the creations on store shelves. Inventors then get 5 to 10 percent of the net receipts.

It's stiff competition, though. Of the thousands who came, only about 40 passed the day's final competition. Their ideas will be weighed against contenders throughout the nation. Show officials will tell people this summer whether they'll be one of the final dozen featured in season 3.

Sheila Hatfield got the word early - her reference book for scrap bookers to catalog their markers, inks and r