Total: 31 ideas, 29 facts, or 60 combined. I estimate that I captured approximately 75% of my inflow (at this particular threshold), so all in all I hit: 39 ideas, 36 facts, or 75 combined.

I spent at least 1,000 hours of strategically diffuse study, so it cost me 13.3 hours for each mini-aha moment.

My major takeaway was that most of my learning wasn’t time-effective and that I, and likely many others, overvalued learning in general. Domain-specific learning might still be very useful, but in less cases than I originally thought.

Note: I have always been in the likely ~98th percentile for curiosity and I’ve already spent more than a decade of intense study. I’ve reached some deep diminishing returns on my time. So the takeaway may not apply to everyone.

Ideas

A font that isn’t solid. It’s made up of tiny circles which reduces ink usage 20%.
http://www.ecofont.eu/english.html

Zombie dating site. Self-satirical advertising.
http://mingle2.com/zombieharmony/free-dating-sites

Objective nutritional rating system (scores are 1-100).
http://www.nuval.com/

Mobile phone based, GPS-enabled stalking of your friends.
http://www.loopt.com/

Random act of kindness branded clothing. Wearing shirt = reminder to do good deed.
http://www.arkchangeyourworld.com/

Trial-sized wine samples.
http://www.wineside.fr/

Portable, premium, disposable toilet seat covers.
http://www.toletta.com/

Pay money to smash stuff.
http://www.smashshack.com/

Never sign a EULA (legal agreement) again. Have your cat do it.
http://www.ohesso.com/essays/essay006.htm

Text message notification when your table is ready.
http://www.readyping.com/

Easy way to compare your votes on legislative bills with how your representatives vote.
http://www.polco.us/

White board from a roll that statically clings to any hard surface.
http://www.magicwhiteboard.co.uk/

Wolfram|Alpha makes all data computable.
http://www.wolframalpha.com/

Slow Cow is an anti-energy drink.
http://www.slowcowdrink.com/english.asp?no=121

Life on Earth might have begun several times.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32403430/ns/technology_and_science-space/

Donate your idle computer time (i.e., distributive computing) for charity.
http://superdonate.com/

Sell raffle tickets to brothel customers to “win” the prostitute voted as the most popular after each sings and/or dances.
Miss Saigon musical

Focus on preventative maintenance to reliably transport healthcare workers to patients in Africa.
http://www.riders.org/faq.aspx

Automatically track fitness metrics.
http://www.fitbit.com/

Use a heat map to visually display where people like to be touched.
http://www.fleshmap.com/touch/skintoskin.html

Pie charts are evil (i.e., they don’t display data well).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Piecharts.svg

Automatically donate to a specific action (e.g., planting a tree) with every purchase.
http://b1g1.com/

Create a bank account for every citizen to streamline financial transactions with the government.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p1ARvwGsCW8

Personally request celebrity support for an initiative via YouTube video.
http://www.oprah.com/article/oprahshow/20090430-tows-bernard-lachance/4

Encourage interaction with people on street (e.g., to sell tickets) by allowing them to write on your t-shirt.
http://www.oprah.com/article/oprahshow/20090430-tows-bernard-lachance/4 (I had this idea before too!)

Hold meeting underwater in scuba gear to raise awareness of climate change.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/6356036/Maldives-government-holds-underwater-cabinet-meeting.html

Make a whiteboard out of any paintable surface.
http://www.ideapaint.com/

Chinese students learn math faster because their numbers are easier to remember.
http://www.gladwell.com/outliers/outliers_excerpt3.html

GPS-enable your dog.
http://www.spotlightgps.com/home.aspx

3D mirror world based on real cities and real people.
http://www.twinity.com/en

Measure the ecological efficiency with which human well-being is delivered around the world.
http://www.happyplanetindex.org/learn/

Facts

The average person has 300 negative thoughts per day.
http://www.stresscenter.com/program/

It takes 4,200 gallons of water a day to feed omnivores. Only 1,200 to feed a vegetarian. Only 300 to feed a vegan.
http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2007/9/17/16200/7809

The World Bank recently reported that 90 percent of all Amazon rainforest land cleared since 1970 is used for meat production.
http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2007/9/17/16200/7809

It’s exponentially more efficient to eat grains, soy, or oats directly rather than feed them to farmed animals so that humans can eat those animals. It’s like tossing more than 10 plates of spaghetti into the trash for every one plate you eat.
http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2007/9/17/16200/7809

For medical care, 95 cents of every dollar is spent to treat disease after it had already occurred.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123146318996466585.html?mod=djemWMP

75% of these costs (see above) were spent on treating chronic diseases, such as heart disease and diabetes, that are preventable or even reversible.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123146318996466585.html?mod=djemWMP

Wine has 400 flavor indicators. Coffee has 800.
Source: Matthew Roper

1908 Olympic gold medalist marathon runner = 20 minutes slower than the best high school kid today
“Talent is Overrated: What Really Separates World-Class Performers from Everyone Else” p. 9

1908 Olympics 200-meter winner: 22.6 seconds. Today’s high school kid’s record: 20.6 seconds.
“Talent is Overrated: What Really Separates World-Class Performers from Everyone Else” p. 9

The levels of stress hormones [in simulated torture scenarios] are sufficient to turn off the immune system and to produce a catabolic state, in which the body begins to break down and feed on itself. The average weight loss in three days is 22 pounds.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/184156/output/print

It turns out that the best survivors don’t have a lot of heart-rate variability. Instead, they’ve got “metronomic heartbeats”—their hearts thump steadily like metronomes—with almost no variability between beats.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/184156/output/print

For every standard deviation of increase in Type-A traits, the probability of having kids rose 11% in men and 19% in women.
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1888608,00.html

The higher your intelligence, the less sex you tend to have.
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1888608,00.html

Heart attacks peak every week on Monday morning.
Raj Sisodia, Conscious Capitalism talk

The rate of mergers among non-profits with budgets over $50 million (which is one measure of viability and growth potential) has been 1/10 of the rate of for-profit entities.
Chronicle of Philanthropy

According to WTO, the average person uses the toilet 2,200 times a year, approximately 6 times a day. In fact, across a lifespan, three years of one’s life are spent in the toilet. Due to biological differences, women spend three times longer in toilets than men.
http://schwabfound.weforum.org/sf/SocialEntrepreneurs/Profiles/index.htm?sname=171246&sorganization=0&sarea=0&ssector=0&stype=0

All told, the odds of a white high-schooler in America having a best friend of another race is only 8 percent. Those odds barely improve for the second-best friend, or the third-best, or the fifth. For blacks, the odds aren’t much better: 85 percent of black kids’ best friends are also black.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/214989/page/4

Roman legions completed more than one-and-a-half marathons a day carrying more than half their body weight in equipment.
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE59D0BR20091014?pageNumber=2&virtualBrandChannel=11604

Australian aboriginals threw a hardwood spear 110 meters or more (the current world javelin record is 98.48).
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE59D0BR20091014?pageNumber=2&virtualBrandChannel=11604

60% of the world’s calories are based on three grasses: corn, wheat, and rice.
http://www.greenkampong.com/green_reporter/environmental-hero-willie-smits/

Sweden has among the most multinational corporations per capita in the world, despite having a population of only nine million and among the shortest working hours in the world.
Dr. Mike Teng, Chartered Management Institute’s August 2009 newsletter

Occupational prestige has little impact on overall life satisfaction.
Robert Rice, SUNY Buffalo

1. Capital Campaign/Major Gifts: $0.05 to $0.10 per dollar raised.
2. Corporations and Foundations (Grant Writing): $0.20 per dollar raised.
3. Direct Mail Renewal: $0.20 per dollar raised.
4. Planned Giving: $0.25 per dollar raised.
5. Benefit/Special Events: $0.50 of gross proceeds.
6. Direct Mail Acquisition: $1.00 to $1.25 per dollar raised.
7. National Average: $0.20
James Greenfield, Fund-Raising: Evaluating and Managing the Fund Development Process (1999)

The major New York law firms spend more on keeping their staff and than on recruitment.
“The Art of Happiness at Work” p. 63

Barack Obama receives 65,000 letters, 100,000 emails, 1,000 faxes, 2,500-3,500 calls per day.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/video/Inside-the-White-House-Letters-to-the-President

A study of the top fifty game-changing innovations over a hundred-year period showed that nearly 80 percent of those innovations were sparked by someone whose primary expertise was outside the field in which the innovation breakthrough took place.
http://www.seenewnow.com/

A chess grand master burns 6,000-7,000 calories per day just thinking during a tournament.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hrCVu25wQ5s

75,380,201,500 cans of Coca Cola are sold every year.
http://gizmodo.com/5408251/the-paint+less-coca+cola-would-save-earth-one-can-at-a-time

Our ability to think creatively comes 1/3 from genetics and 2/3 from learning the appropriate innovation skill set.
The Innovator’s DNA, Harvard Business Review December 2009

Disclaimer: limited source checking.