Now the Rest of the Story, Nondisclosures Aside

In the future, everyone will be famous for 15 minutes. But we won't be able to talk about it because we'll all have signed nondisclosure agreements.

Let me explain.

In March, I wrote about David Whiteis , a 44-year-old from Germantown who found a tiny memory chip on the floor of Los Angeles International Airport. It bore photos from a wedding, and David was able to rather ingeniously use the Web to help reunite it with its owner.

What I didn't say -- what David begged me not to reveal -- was why he was at LAX in the first place. He was on his way back from taping a reality TV show. The show was "American Inventor," the Simon Cowell -produced knockoff of "American Idol," where tinkerers demonstrate their inventions to a panel of judges in hopes of being picked for the $1 million top prize.

David had two inventions -- more on those later -- and he made the cut to fly to L.A. First he had to sign an agreement.

"It's pretty wild, this agreement," David said. "You sign away your life." The producers don't want anyone to find out ahead of time who gets cut from the pack. It's all about maintaining the suspense.

"And the penalty is basically 5 million bucks," David said. That's why he first contacted me anonymously.

In a way, I wish I weren't publishing this article today, for that would mean David was still in the running for the grand prize. Alas, David failed to wow the judges on the show that aired April 13.

On it, David presented what he calls the Capture the Moment Jewelry Gift Box (patent pending). It's a jewelry gift box of the sort that holds an engagement ring. The inside lid is equipped with a tiny video camera, like those found in cell phones.

"When you lift the lid, it begins recording for one or two minutes," David said. The camera is "looking out of the box so it catches the reaction when she sees the ring for the first time."

Cool! But, as I said, it didn't wow the judges, who on the shows I've seen seem to prefer inventions involving toilets.

David admits his pitch wasn't the greatest. He's not much of a showman. He is a real inventor, though. A computer network engineer, David patented a "similarities engine," the sort of thing that recommends other music you might like when you shop at Amazon.com. It did not make him a millionaire.