It's a great idea! Don't be discouraged just because someone else thought of it as well. In a lot of these "product" type projects the only thing that REALLY matters is execution. Do you think the iPod was the first MP3 player? That Google was the first search engine? Think again. An academic prototype or a paper describing an idea is worth next to nothing. Getting it to work, and getting it to work well, and getting people to use it – that's what separates the winners from the also-rans. Go for it :-)

Kofi Annan. I was working for an organization that he chairs and I ran into him in the hallway. He seemed surprisingly small! Maybe that's because I'm relatively tall though. But he was very busy so I just mumbled "uhm hello how are you" and then he shuttled off to his next meeting. Still nice though :-)