Word: inventor
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Your TV, Anywhere Inventor: Blake Krikorian Availability: Now, $250 To Learn More: slingmedia.com Every so often, a handy gadget comes along and changes our TV habits. In the 1990s WebTV married the Net with the tube, and TiVo famously began freeing us from network schedules. Now comes a new appliance to shift not when you watch your TV but where. Slingbox hooks up to your home set and beams whatever is onscreen to any Web-enabled device loaded with special software. Waiting for a plane in Paris? Use your laptop and the airport's wireless network to watch the local...
Squeegee Clean Inventor: Blake Krikorian Availability: Now, $400 To Learn More: irobot.com Scooba, iRobot's follow-up to Roomba, the robotic vacuum, steals a few tricks from its predecessor to tackle a different chore: mopping tile, linoleum or sealed hardwood floors. With each pass, Scooba completes four tasks: it sweeps loose debris, sprays a special Clorox cleaning solution onto the floor, scrubs the surface with a brush and then uses a "squeegee-vac" to suck up the dirty water. Like Roomba, Scooba works around obstacles and has "cliff" sensors that prevent it from falling down stairs. Different sensors keep Scooba...
Tunnel Vision Inventor: Fascinations Availability: Now, $20, plus $3 for 25 live ants To Learn More: fascinations.com Want a low-maintenance pet that won't scratch, shed or sleep all day? AntWorks is a new kind of ant farm that replaces dirt or sand with a clear, seaweed-based gel that is packed with all the tasty sugar, water and nutrients that ants need to survive. Just pop in some ants, close the lid, and watch the insects start tunneling through the blue-tinted goop. A magnifying glass, included, lets you see the ants' surprisingly sharp claws and even...
Roll and Rock Inventor: Yamano Music Availability: Soon, about $160 To Learn More: www.yamano-music.com Traveling musicians, rejoice! With keys just an eighth of an inch thick, the 2-lb., 61-key Hand Roll Piano rolls up like a blanket and spreads out to about 3 ft. in length. Incorporating technology used in remote-control buttons and touch panels, the silicone-rubber keyboard, which has a built-in speaker, can be played for up to 15 hours on four AA batteries. But it's no lightweight. The Hand Roll comes with a set of 128 tones (from acoustic piano to bird...
...Being an inventor has never been easy -- just ask anyone who's spent a lifetime chasing the next great brainstorm. But when you dream up something truly grand, it can make all the false starts and trial runs worth the trouble. For proof of that, you need merely ask the creators of the 40 examples of inventive genius featured in this week's issue. TIME has spent more than six months surveying fields as diverse as electronics, aeronautics, medical technology, sports equipment, toys, clothing and food looking for the newest--and most inspired--ideas of the year...