Ancestry Press -Bringing family stories to life
From Springwise, Ancestry books and family tree posters
Genealogy buffs can now pull together the fruits of their hard work and research into handsomely bound self-published books and family tree posters thanks to Ancestry Press, a new venture recently launched by Ancestry.com. Customers who already have their pedigree information archived on Ancestry.com can easily transfer their family trees, facts, photos, stories, historical documents, recipes and more to formatted templates—or blank pages they can design from scratch—for printing. And those who aren't yet Ancestry.com users can set up accounts quickly and easily.
Books are hand-bound and printed on 100-pound gloss, acid-free, archival paper with hard leatherette covers that can be stamped with custom two-line titles in gold foil. Pricing is currently at USD 29.95 for a 24-page book. Customers can add extra pages for just 39 cents each up to a total of 100 pages. 18-by-24-inch family tree posters (additional sizes coming soon) are available at an introductory rate of USD 19.95 and can feature up to six generations.
Health Care Advocate
A new profession is being born to help people navigate the health care maze.
Private health care advocacy is a new and growing field emerging at a time when an increasing number of Americans find themselves dealing with a chronic disease, aging family members or the bureaucracy of health insurance.
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Sarah Lawrence College in New York in 1980 established the first - and still the only - master's degree program in health advocacy and caters to all forms of the practice. Other universities have credentialing programs, but requirements vary. Still, no state has an official licensing process.
Health Vault
Microsoft debuts a new web site Health Vault
The tagline Be well. Protected.
Web site stores medical data privately.
Microsoft Corp. today introduced a Web site designed to enable people to manage and keep track of personal medical information while guaranteeing consumers' privacy.
Microsoft's HealthVault is a free site connected to a health-information search engine the company premiered last month. Users have access to a repository of health-related information and their medical histories, such as immunizations and records from doctor and hospital visits.
"Our focus is simple: to empower people to lead healthy lives," said Peter Neupert, corporate vice president of the Health Solutions Group at Microsoft.
The site targets both consumers and health care organizations, such as hospitals and insurance companies, some of which have been slow adopters of new health-information technology such as HealthVault. The goal of the Web site is to connect the entire health care system over the Internet.
Mixers for Moms and Babysitters
I love this idea for Mixers for Moms and Babysitters from Springwise. It's a wonderful niche that can be duplicated elsewhere
10 Brilliant Ideas
The Top Ten Brillant Ideas That Found a Welcome in 2006.
1. The Flash-Drive Fuel Gauge
2. The Magnetic Power Cord
3. The Two-Stage Flash
4. A Record Radio Button
5. Music Beaming
6. The Video-Game Workout
7. The TrackPearl
8.The Face Finder
9. Point Without Pointing
10. The Uncomplicated Cellphone
My Death Space
My Death Space is a new website for obituaries of MySpace members.
Clearly, the appeal is to a younger demographic with ads for Hot Girls and Sexy Singles.
Designer Garages
Does your garage look like this?
Founder Chad Haas couldn't find anything suitable on the market when he wanted to spruce up his garage. So he started a company.
Via Springwise.
Blue and Brown
New to me is the Blue Ocean Strategy. "Don't Compete with Rivals - Make Them Irrelevant" by creating "blue oceans" of uncontested market space ripe for growth.
One company that is doing just that is Brown Paper Tickets which according to The Business Innovation Insider is fast becoming a consumer and vendor-friendly alternative to Ticketmaster. And it's not just for concerts. Even a small charity luncheon can use Brown Paper Tickets for ticketing and distribution.
Playpumps
Bringing water to over a million people in South Africa are Playpumps, a water pump that's also a children's merry-go-round.
At over 700 playpumps, as children laugh and play, clean water is being pumped for hundreds of thousands of families. More please
Scrapbooking industry more than $2.5 billion
Women make general family albums and special albums as gifts on special occasions. Scrapbooking is the third most popular craft hobby in the nation amounting to $2.55 billion in 2004, up 28% over 2001.
Here's the profile of scrapbookers from a survey conducted by Simple Scrapbooks magazine.
Thirty-nine percent of scrapbookers have been involved in the hobby for five years or more.
Scrapbook enthusiasts are most likely to be females between the ages of 30 and 50. Eighty-two percent have a college education and nearly 50 percent are employed full-time.
Scrapbooking expenditures have increased significantly over the last three years. Now, about 75 percent of scrapbookers spend at least $25 on supplies in a month. On average, scrapbook enthusiasts own scrapbooking supplies valued at approximately $1,853, an 81 percent increase since 2001.
About three-quarters of scrapbookers have a room or space in their home dedicated to the hobby.
Hand Steady
Chris Peacock, a graduate from the Royal College of Arts' design school has invented the Hand Steady.
About 5% of the world, some 300 million people have hand tremors that make it difficult to drink in public
By holding drinks in a rubber grip that rotates, the device keeps the cup steady while people are drinking.
Peacock won the Design for Disability Award, applied for a patent and is looking for businesses that want to produce it.
