Innovation is often viewed as the product of a Eureka! moment, when a flash of insight solves a thorny problem.

In the best outcome of that scenario, the insight is commercial and scalable, and soon is paying the inventor enough so that she can afford that second home on Block Island.

But the Rhode Island Innovation Awards, started two years ago by Providence Business News and the R.I. Economic Development Corporation, proved again this year that innovation springs as much from the everyday as from someone’s creative core.

For example, the Rising Star Innovator, David Berube, found himself on a vacation unable to use his mobile device to keep up with his favorite blogs. Full-fledged Web sites just didn’t work well with his little handheld. So when he came home, Berube wrote some code and started reading the content in his palm.

Of course, friends saw his cool little project and asked him to do the same for them, which he did, until he had done enough of them that he realized there was a business in his tinkering, one that now has 12,000 clients.

Berube’s experience is not singular (even if his innovation is), but we should all remember that the Next Big Thing may be just around the corner. All we have to do is pay attention.

Winners of the 2008 Rhode Island Innovation Awards:

• Collaborative Innovator Leader: ER Card

• Innovation of the Year: GyPSii

• Innovation Champion: R.I. Science and Technology Advisory Council

• Student Innovator: Jean Merlain, The MET School

• Rising Star Innovator: David Berube, MoFuse

• Innovator of the Year: Chris Crawford, TCMPi

• Innovation Champion: Elizabeth Pierotti, The Inventing Life