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    Posted May 29, 2012 by
    theuia
    Location
    Washington, District of Columbia
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    This iReport is part of an assignment:
    What's your big idea?

    Inventors Lose Millions of Dollars

     
    As the economy softens, the jobs dry up and unemployment or early retirement won’t make ends meet anymore – people are turning to other ways they can make a living or augment the living they have.

    One such way is Inventing – yep, you heard it right – Inventing, as in – I have a great idea!

    Inventing obviously isn’t new – reference: fire, the wheel, fish tacos, and of course more consumer products than we could ever count. In fact, Inventing has been around since cavemen, and will likely be around for many more millennium.

    What is new though is the increase in people diving into the pool of inventing. From Moms and Dads to retirees, school teachers, firemen, and fast food workers it’s like the entire world has now come to see the development of that great idea as a quick easy way to turn a new buck.

    After all – everyone who has ever taken a shower has had a great idea – it’s what we do as humans, we dream, we think, and often we spend many hours thinking of ways to do things better or easier.

    Sometimes we’re motivated by a chance to help others, sometimes by money, and sometimes it’s simply because we’re lazy and we just know there is an easier way to do something we dread.

    As Sir Isaac Newton tells us for every action there is an opposite and equal reaction. In this case it’s the downside to a hope filled dream of making millions.

    Inventing is a business of failure – that’s right, about 99% of all ideas turned inventions will fail according to the United Inventors Association of America, a non-profit Educational Foundation. Even among professional inventors and companies with every advantage of knowledge and experience the success rate is only about 10%.

    In fact, the United Inventors Association calculates that those 99/100 inventors who go charging down the road to inventing often lose as much as $75,000.00 before they throw in the towel on that great idea. The sad part is it’s rarely ever their money.

    The money can come from almost anyplace, but it’s most likely to come from a 401K, the kid’s college fund, a second mortgage, or a loan from family and friends. Several inventors who have come to the United Inventors Association for advice had already spend over a million dollars developing products that failed in the marketplace.

    “Often this failure has little to do with the product or idea, and much more to do with the “inventor” and the overload of emotion that keeps them from making good decisions” says Mark Reyland, Executive Director of the United Inventors Association and a professional inventor himself.

    These people are in overdrive with visions of riches and a chance to take back control of their life and their future says Reyland. It can be a great ride, and you can have great success, but like any other venture you have to earn it, and that means educating yourself on the process and the risks.

    The United Inventors Association of America
    1025 Connecticut Ave Suite 1000
    Washington, DC 20036
    www.uiausa.org

    inventing, the uia, mark reyland, inventors, the process of inventing
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