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Wednesday, November 12, 2003
Beer-loving Brits raise glasses to favorite invention
An online survey in Britain found that the recent invention most admired is a little gadget that allows people to enjoy draft-type beer at home.
The "widget," a small ball of nitrogen that gives cans of beer a proper, pub-style head of creamy foam, far outstripped the rest of the candidates in an online survey that drew almost 9,000 responses.
Forty-eight percent of respondents said that the widget was the most impressive invention of the past 40 years.
The Internet, which may in fact have a greater global resonance than a good pint of draft, scored a distant second, with 13 percent, and mobile phones were a dismal third with 7 percent.
The top-10 list was rounded out by cloning, microwaves, contact lenses, three-dimensional technology, video games, CDs and DVDs, and plastic surgery.
Considered too trifling to make the first rank were space exploration, solar-powered cars and contraceptive pills.
The survey was organized by T3, which bills itself as the "World's Best Gadget Magazine," and the Wilkinson Sword Co. They make no pretenses of scientific accuracy. But the survey illustrates the peculiar priorities of the British people, T3 said.
"Brits obviously only care about the simple things in life. ... It's official -- we can't imagine anything worse than sitting down in front of the telly and pouring a pint with no 'head'!"
The Ireland-based Guinness brewing conglomerate introduced the widget in 1989 after years of research.
The invention won a Queen's Award for Technological Achievement two years later and is now churned out in the hundreds of millions every year.
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