Ambient Coffee Cup

One of the VPs at work noted to me the other day, as he veered away from the coffee line, that it was the third time that day he'd skipped the line because it was so long. I feel this screams out for an invention that would save considerable time and money at my place of employment, an ambient coffee cup. Just mount a camera near the corporate Caribou that's capable of recognizing individuals in a line and tie it to a web service that delivers the count. Have a coffee cup capable of hooking into the local network to retrieve the results, and the ability to fine tune the thresholds on line to your own personal preferences. Finally give the cup a light, just like an ambient orb, and problem solved. Never go near Cafe.com again if you cup is showing anything other than a healthy green (or perhaps the cup only lights up if the line is long - that would save the battery charge).

If you think I'm crazy, check out the Yuno PC or The Cup (with truly atrocious design details - echoism?) in the Next Gen PC Design competition, endorsed by Microsoft. If you can put a whole iPhone style interface on a coffee cup, simply giving it an ambient wrapper should be simple beans.