Men of Ideas

I have often found that doing a repetitive job is very relaxing. Physical work that doesn't require too much concentration or working out gives you plenty of time for contemplation. For example bricklayers appear to be a fairly lighthearted bunch. They have plenty of time to day dream when they are laying bricks to the line but waht do they dream about? You might suppose it is Page 3 models and you may well be right but I can tell you that many are also busy inventing things.

The reason I know this is because, over the years, I have met a regular stream of bricklayers who have brought me inventions to look at. They aren't always inventions for laying bricks (that seems to have remained the same for more than 3,000 years) but brick layers tend to spend time looking at other people's jobs and thinking of ways in which they could be done better.

That isn't always a recipe for success because until you have done the job you don't always know why it is done in a certain way. But it is in the nature of inventions that people keep them secret until they have secured patents, so they aren't always that well researched. Several thousand pounds later they reveal their idea and go looking for a manufacturer. Sometimes it makes a fortune but often they find that their invention isn't quite as ground-breaking as they imagined.

For every successful invention there are probably ten thousand that consume a vast fortune in patents, marketing and manufacturing before they disappear without trace. Some even come back every few years like the beast that wouldn't die.
I have also seen inventors clinging to their idea like the wreckage of a sinking ship while everyone around them is in the lifeboat begging them to swim to safety.
I have met inventors who have lost their house and their wife because they just wouldn't leave their idea alone and go back to their day job.

The ones that have been successful have either given the idea to someone else to develop and just taken a royalty or had the drive and good judgement to tackle all aspects of the route to market without being mugged on the way.

I must confess that I have had a few ideas myself, that may or may not see the light of day. Every time I think I might do something with them I remember that lonely bricklayer in his suit, trudging the halls of Interbuild with his prototype and a briefcase looking for anyone who will give him five minutes.


Roger Bisby
www.selfbuilder.net