* This might seem like an odd question to ask of the general public, but a surprising percentage of important inventions have been created by people modifying objects for their own use. One of my favorite examples is from 1911, when Ray Harroun decided to drive alone in the first Indianapolis 500 rather than with a racing mechanic. This decision required him to devise a way to monitor the cars behind him, which was traditionally the job of the mechanic. To achieve this goal, he installed what is believed to be the first rearview mirror in an automobile, thereby assuring race officials that he could safely race solo. (The Indianapolis 500 was run on a brick surface at the time, and Harroun later admitted that he couldn’t see a thing in his jiggling rearview mirror, but he won the race anyway.) A more mundane example of user innovation can be found in the case of the skateboard, which was invented in the 1940s by numerous kids across the United States and Europe who took apart their roller skates and nailed the wheel mounts onto crates or boards.