Inventor Night

[cjsmith]

Geek party idea: get a bunch of wacky creative people together, hand them a lot of scratch paper, and give them an inventor challenge. Instead of having a games night, you have an Inventor Night. At the end of it you wind up with six or seven designs for Self-Ironing Shirts, or a sturdy Homemade Pogo Stick Shoe, or an Inexpensive One-Use Emergency Insulin Refrigerator.

If you can snag some people with specialized domain knowledge that'd be handy. Otherwise keep a computer with a 'net connection nearby. Just saying "Oh, there would be some electronics to take care of that part" is nowhere near as effective as sketching the circuit or writing pseudo-microcode. Even better if, for the simpler challenges, there are some materials and guests can try some things. (Reality TV rights optional.)

Staying on-topic isn't strictly necessary. It's fun to start out with one challenge, but maybe everyone will get off-topic and you'll wind up with a Solar-Powered Hovercraft and an Automated Dice Roller. Who knows? :-)

Comments

[cheshyre]

Just seen in the preliminary panel ideas for Arisia:

MacGyver-O-Matic!
This event pits teams of improvisational engineers against each other and the clock to build an earth-shattering device out of discarded materials, duct tape and a Swiss Army knife. This year, compete to build an earth-smashing device.
This is an event to make flashy things and explain what they do with lots of verve, not Junkyard Wars where it has to actually do the job. Imagine the Illudium Q-36 Space Modulator from Duck Dodgers.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Most excellent! 8-)