Companies within the same industry should get together periodically and decide upon issues of product standardization as well as issues like how best to comply with government regulations, and any other issues common to their industry. For example calculator companies should get together and decide on standardizing the sequence of inputting some mathematical operations and computer software companies should work on standardizing the software so that a special driver is not required for every piece of equipment. Standardizing things so that as many things as possible are able to work in harmony with as many other things as possible will go a long way towards making this world a less frustrating place. Battery-powered devices could also be standardized to a greater degree so that far fewer that the current myriad of batteries need to be produced to satisfy all market needs. Piping thread standards should be more uniform. For example, water pipe threads and hose threads should be of the same dimensions. Continual communications between all of the businesses within the same industry will increase the chances that very beneficial standards will be set near the beginning of the product development process and that such standards will be robust and effective enough to adequately support a wide variety of products for a long time. Of course, these standards could always be changed at any time in the future, but striving to achieve standards will inevitably result in more stability without necessarily reducing, even perhaps increasing, the variety of products produced. Greater standardization would also lead to lower product costs, in many cases. For example, the nuclear power industry could have benefited greatly from an increase in the use of standardized modular reactor components rather than to have sought approval for many different unique designs.

Standardized Clothes Measurements

There should be a national (or even a global) standardization of clothes measurements so that every maker of clothing, regardless of brand or style, is required to label their clothing according to the same sizing standard. Consumers would then be able to determine whether or not an article of clothing will fit them by using only information provided on the label. There should not be separate standards (size scales) for males, females, or even children. Clothes for every human being should be measured according to the same standardized scale. All articles of clothing given the same size measurement should be required to be exactly the same size physically regardless of who or where it was made. Pants labeled with a waist size of 32 inches should be 32″ regardless of who or where it was made. The penalty for not complying with this standardization system would be a fine of 5% of the wholesale price for each article of clothing not labeled according to this standard system.

Clothing manufactures should also be required to standardize their sizes called “small”, “medium”, “large”, “extra large”, etc. Such measurements should all be required to be developed around a reasonable definition for “medium”, a measurement which should be based upon the “medium” or average size of an individual in that region of the world in which the target market is located.

Clothes labels should also indicate the gender for which it is designed to eliminate confusion or embarrassment among potential buyers, unless the intended gender is obvious.

More odd-numbered clothing should be produced, at least the odd number sizes in the most popular size ranges (especially pants waist sizes 31, 33, 35, etc.)

All brand new products should, at the point of sale, meet all the necessary requirements for legal and safe use. If for any reason a product fails to meet any of these requirements, the seller should be required to inform the buyer, in writing, exactly what needs to be done in order to bring the product into compliance with all relevant legal and safety regulations. The buyer must then sign a form acknowledging that he has been informed of these requirements.

Governments should not restrict the sales of any product or service, apart from imposing the common taxes associated with such products or sales. For example, no level of government should restrict the physical location of auto dealerships or the geographic areas in which they could sell, nor should they prohibit direct automaker-to-consumer sales. Any auto-maker or any auto reseller (dealerships) should be allowed to sell to whoever and wherever they want.

Services, such as medical advice, should be allowed to be distributed from anyone to anyone, conditioned upon full disclosure of either the qualifications of the person giving the advice (i.e., whether they are accredited by some reputable organization) or whether the advice itself has been approved.

The default government position should be to allow all products or services to be sold, unless there is a compelling reason to restrict it. Full disclosure requirements could be required, but banning certain products or services should be reserved to things which pose an unambiguous threat to the safety or well-being of people.

Products or services that are illegal to sell or use in this country should also be illegal to export from this country.

All computer operating systems should come with free antivirus and malware protection. This would encourage these software makers to further reduce the vulnerability of their software.

Electric utilities should be required to provide electricity that is free of transient defects (to within certain bands) to its customers. Similar requirements should hold true for water utilities in that they should provide clean water and at the proper regulated pressure. Consumers should not be required to install (or at least pay for) whole house surge protectors or water regulators or filters. These costs should be part of the provider’s responsibility.

Governments should require that any customer who installs a piece of equipment which, under normal operating conditions (including start up and shut down) induces noise or other unwanted properties into any portion of the grid that affects other parties sharing that grid, that customer should be required to install whatever equipment is necessary to ensure that their draw of power (or water) from the grid maintains a ‘clean’ supply of the utility to all other users.

Utility companies (power, water, gas, etc.) even other service providers like cable, telephone, internet, etc., should be encouraged or perhaps even required to provide their customers with 1,000% refund of the prorated monthly billing time that the service was interrupted.

Payment cycles (such as of paychecks and other forms of payment) and billing cycles (such as of credit cards, telephone bills, etc.,) should begin and end on clear and logical points in time, such as from the first day of the month to the last day of the month. Telephone or credit card bills covering the period from March 13 to April 12 or bank statements covering the period from May 6 to June 7 are not blocks of time with logical starting and ending points. They are not even the beginning or ending of weeks. Life would be much easier if bills, statements and other ongoing account records were made to cover obvious and clear-cut time periods such as from March 1 to March 31, or June 1 to June 30. Semimonthly (twice monthly) payments would then always run from the 1st of the month to the 15th and from the 16th to the end of the month.

The point at which governments should require producers and manufacturers to reduce the amount of nuclear radiation emitted by their products should be based upon a multiple of the national average amount of radiation emitted by similar types of products.

For example, if a certain product or material normally emits 5 millirems (mrems) of radiation per year, the sale of similar products radiating at least five times this amount (25 mrems) would be prohibited. Thus producers would be required to keep such values below the threshold. For materials that would normally emit 25 mrems, the threshold would be set at three times this amount (75 mrems), while the threshold for materials that normally emit 50 mrems would be set at 100 mrems.

The multiples of normal average product radioactivity use to determine where the thresholds should be placed for each product would be determined by using a smooth curved line plotted on a graph so that all three points used in the examples above lie on the line. In other words, the same multiple would not be applied to a range of different products, but rather each product would have a unique multiple applied to it because the threshold is based on that kind of product’s average emission levels.

This system would apply to all materials except specifically nuclear materials or nuclear waste because these are categories of materials with high enough radioactivity to warrant strict, continuous suppression of their emissions.

Internet addresses or domain names should be treated the same as names on any other medium like television, radio, magazines, etc. Furthermore, names on the Internet should be the same as names in the real world. Whoever registers or copyrights a name first, whether it is on TV, radio, magazines, a real life bricks-and-mortar store, etc., that same entity should have the right to the same name on the Internet and any other medium.

This principle should also apply to the names of every individual person on earth. If somebody wanted to create their own Internet address or home page, they should have the right to use their own names as written on their birth certificates or SS card. If an internet searcher types in a name (or a simplified version of a name, like John Smith instead of John Quincy Smith), the search results would bring up a list of every person on the planet who has the name John Smith. The internet searcher would then look over this list to see exactly which John Smith they were looking for. To provide some security and a little more privacy, the owner of each personal webpage could be allowed to give a key code only to those people that the owner permits to visit. In addition, the owner of this webpage should be entitled to receive a detailed list of everybody who has visited that page, how long they stayed, what they looked at, etc. And/or the owner of their webpage could allow access to virtually everybody, but then without notice prohibit access to specific people for whatever reason. Among the many different things a personal webpage may have, one could be a gift wish list. This way anybody who knows an individual’s name could check to see what they want for their birthday, Christmas, etc.

Buying & Locking Up Domain Names

It should be illegal to purchase web domains without any intention to develop the site, lock it so other competitors cannot use the name, or expressly for the purpose of selling it at a cost of more then 10 times what a not-in-demand domain name would cost.

Guns should be treated like any other consumer product and should be subject to all relevant health and safety requirements.

Registration Requirement

The owners of all guns and other projectile-throwing devices, including all barreled weapons, bows and arrows, blowguns, etc., which impart more than 20 joules (~15 ft. lbs.) of energy to the projectile should be required to register their ownership of these weapons with the government. Also, all firearm owners and purchasers must be licensed. These regulations would apply to include even most BB guns and paintball guns. Each time a gun changes ownership, it should be re-registered under its new owner. Registration fees should be set such that they would cover all costs associated with creating and maintaining this database of guns and their owners.

Furthermore, every purchaser of a gun, must be at least 20 year old, and must pass a background check for criminal history and psychological and/or other tests used to ascertain emotional and mental stability.

Any gun that is lost or stolen, it must be immediately reported to the police and all relevant agencies.

All gun sales must be made by a licensed dealer and be recorded in an official government record immediately. Otherwise, private sales must be conducted in the presence of a licensed dealer and immediately recorded in an official government record.

Projectile Signatures

All barreled weapons that impart more than 100 joules of energy to a projectile, should be built so that each projectile fired from that gun carries with it a signature that is unique to that gun. (Guns throwing projectiles near the low end of this energy range may not be able to impress a significant signature on the projectile, thus may not be able to comply with this requirement.) Since the barrels of guns can change significantly over time through usage, cleaning, tampering, deterioration, and other factors, guns should be required to be re-registered at least every 5 years, a process which would include recording anew the signature of the barrel and updating owner registration information. Nevertheless, owners would be required to report any significant changes made to the weapon as well as any updated owner information immediately.

Embedded Identification

Guns should have identification numbers and other unique identifying information in both a visible and hidden or inaccessible place on the gun itself, such as in a hollow or in some portion of the gun that can only be reached by cutting through to that portion of the gun. Or perhaps guns could be manufactured from metal stocks that have randomly embedded markers (such as radioactive grains or pellets) which would, in effect, give each gun a unique ‘fingerprint’ which could not be easily tampered with. Before the gun is sold or ownership is transferred, its ‘fingerprint’ would be recorded along with its barrel’s signature and identification number.

Higher-Powered Weapon Restrictions

The possession of firearms and other projectile throwing devices which impart more than 10,000 joules of energy to the projectile should be prohibited, unless such firearms are held in government approved secure facilities such as locked deposit boxes at shooting ranges. Exceptions may be granted for bows (bows and arrows) and other unusually large projectile throwing devices that cannot be easily concealed. There should be no limit as to how many or what kinds of guns any individual can own, but such high energy weapons must be held in government approved locations. Owners may use their firearms at the shooting gallery anytime during its hours of operation.

Automatic and Semi-Automatic Weapons

All automatic and semi-automatic guns should be prohibited from being owned anywhere outside approved facilities, like shooting ranges or gun shops. Anyone who meets the qualifications for owning a gun may own these types of guns, but their use outside these places must be by permit only.

Permits For Removal From Secured Facilities

Such high energy firearms, automatic or semi-automatic guns may not be removed from government approved locations without obtaining special permits. Permits may be obtained to use them for professional sports, hobbyist activities, sport hunting or other activities that require that the firearm be taken off the premises unless certain requirements are met. People applying for permission to remove guns from government approved facilities must have a valid reason and agree to several conditions. They must take (or have had taken) an educational course or pass a test explaining the responsibilities they will assume, which include the responsibility to insure that no unauthorized access and usage of the gun is allowed. They must also clearly know of the severe penalties for not complying with any relevant regulations.

Only class 3 or higher lasers should be regulated and required to be used by trained personnel in approved locations or on approved applications. Class 1 and 2 lasers need not to be regulated at all. Laser pointers used as presentation aids and for other common purposes should be encouraged (perhaps mandated) to be made to fall into the class 2 category thus allowing them to be widely and legally used without the burden of complying with government regulations. All laser products should contain a label indicating into which level the laser falls as well as any precautions to observe.

Federal law should not require international carriers to have cargo insurance to cover potential losses due to theft, damage, or other forms of loss. However, any carrier without insurance should state this fact on all important documents, such as advertisements, bills, receipts, etc. Regardless, all carriers should still be held financially responsible for any losses.

By law, credit background checks (regardless of how many times they occur to an individual or other party) should have absolutely no effect (especially no negative effect) on that individual’s credit score or rating.

All appliance remote controls should contain both permanent batteries (only if really necessary) and built-in photovoltaic cells to recharge the batteries and/or directly power the device. Remote controls should also be shockproof, waterproof and easy to clean. These qualities would prevent virtually all problems anybody could ever have with remote controls.

As many appliances and devices as possible and practical should be designed to be powered by photovoltaic cells so that the environmental scourge of batteries could be minimized.

Gift cards should be allowed to have expiration dates, but these dates should be permanently and legibly printed on the cards so that they can’t be erased or worn off. It should also be required by law that the balances of every gift card should be able to be checked through either the telephone and/or Internet using only information printed on the cards.

Stores should be required to pay customers one half of the remaining value of any gift cards upon customer request. Such payments should be either in cash or credited to their credit cards, depending upon the request of each cardholder.

Stores should be allowed to charge customers directly for all the bags (whether paper, plastic or any other kind) needed/wanted in which to put groceries or other items.

Plastic bags or any other types of bag should never be banned.

Knives, especially kitchen knives, should be sharpened on both sides, not just one. Knives sharpened on one side don’t cut straight and that is very annoying.

A regular duty and service of the gas company’s meter-reader personnel should be to periodically (at least once a year) check to make sure that gas shut-off valves are not stuck or are not too hard to turn. Of course, they should also always be easily accessible. The meter-reader person should notify the owners or tenants of any problem.

Also, gas valves should be redesigned to be able to be shut off by hand without the need for any tools to turn the valve. However, if any tools are required, they should be required to always be within arms reach of the gas shut-off valve for quick and easy shut-off.

Utility meters (natural gas, electric, water, etc.) should be located in an area accessible to the meter reader person without needing to actually enter or seek permission to enter through any gates or other barrier on the property.

A better alternative would be to enable all these meters to be read remotely. This way the meter reader person could just check the information from the sidewalk or car. Better yet, the information could be sent directly to the utility company through some sort of yet to be implemented technology.

Reduce Maximum Volume Levels

Audio items like radios and televisions should generally have their maximum volume limits reduced significantly (maybe by 20%). At maximum volume settings, the sound produced should be required to be clear, not crackling through the speakers as is the case with most devices. Rarely are these louder, unintelligible ranges used anyway.

Increase Volume Dial Spread

More importantly, the normal, comfortable zone on the dial is far too narrow, making it unnecessarily difficult to control quickly and easily. This normal, most-used range of volume needs to be widened considerably.

Increase Capacity For Treble

Radios and televisions should also be built with the capacity for more treble. With more treble, people could listen to TVs and radios with the volume lower and reduce the disturbance to others sleeping in the same house while still understanding everything that is being said on the TV or radio. Even with the bass turned all the way down, sometimes there is still too much bass being emitted.

Shopping carts should always have the two rear wheels aligned and fixed in a straight position. This way, cart operators would have the most control over the cart and make shopping more pleasant. Shopping carts should also be maintained and thoroughly cleaned regularly to ensure that they are in good working order and are sanitary.

VCR counters and all other video or audio devices that have counters should make these units of measurement mean something to the average person, like seconds of run time or something. Also, the rate at which these units are counted should be constant, as it would be if seconds are being counted, and should not speed up or slowdown depending on whether the video or audiotape is near the beginning or end.

Printer companies should be allowed to sell their own brand of printers with the condition that they use only their own brand of ink and toner cartridges, otherwise certain printer warranties could be invalidated with the use of other brands of ink or toner cartridges. Printers could be designed to check for, and keep records of, which types of ink and toner cartridges have been used, but printers should never prevent or restrict the performance of other brands of ink or printer cartridges.

Ink and toner cartridge manufactures could design and sell such products, even for a discount, if desired, to consumers with the condition that they be returned to the manufacture after use for recycling, refilling, or any other purpose. However, such products must be clearly labeled and the manufacture must provide, alongside such products, the exact same product without this limitation.

Generally, manufactures of products should not prevent third party components from being used, though warranties could be affected.