Steorn's actions make business sense

Moochie said:
I am absolutely not surprised at their failure to show anything. I wonder if anyone actually expected a positive result.
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I guess it's hard for people to believe that they could have got so far without having something that worked. Generally the self deluded meet someone that gives them a good slap around the face before this amount of money gets spent.

So you begin to think.. obscure marketing excercise? tax write-off? fraud? perhaps the public exhibition was enough to rope in the final few investors... someone is now running to Brazil with a suitcase full of money and random parts of a food mixer.

or perhaps it's real.

sorry, I couldn't keep a straight face there.
 
ohp said:
I guess it's hard for people to believe that they could have got so far without having something that worked. Generally the self deluded meet someone that gives them a good slap around the face before this amount of money gets spent.

So you begin to think.. obscure marketing excercise? tax write-off? fraud? perhaps the public exhibition was enough to rope in the final few investors... someone is now running to Brazil with a suitcase full of money and random parts of a food mixer.

or perhaps it's real.

sorry, I couldn't keep a straight face there.
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I'd vote fraud.
from a marketing profile sense it doesn't make much sense - their reputation would be in shreds if they revealed it to just be an exercise in web marketing....

I imagine they've got a fair few private investors hooked with the lure of untold riches - and all they need to do is spin it out over several years, keeping having "technical problems," writing off large chunks of that investment as R&D per year....until finally they've milked all they can, and they announce that due to financial difficulties they're unable to continue...

They exit the scheme having never had to admit that it was all a scam - and are several million pounds richer as a result -

it certainly is one way to generate something from nothing....
 
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Ladewig said:
Why do you doubt it could be kept secret? The scenario I described, the inventor could just paint some panes of glass, put them on the roof, and tell neighbors that he is running a new type of solar cell to generate all that electricity.
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Let us assume your scenario is implemented. Existing solar cells generate a relatively small amount of power. UO devices, by their very definition, can generate enormous amounts of power. Someone will notice that there is a ton of power coming out of a building that is far too small to be generating power via traditional means. They will investigate and discover the devices.

A real OU device will be the most important event in the history of mankind. More important than splitting the atom, more important than landing a man on the moon, and more important than when Ook said to Groog "Hey, look what happens when I rub these two sticks together really fast". An event of that magnitude would not remain hidden.
 
Grimoire said:
Someone will notice that there is a ton of power coming out of a building that is far too small to be generating power via traditional means. They will investigate and discover the devices.
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I'm sorry, but this statement brought forth visions of people casually going around with thermal imaging goggles, opening up electricity meter closets and various other bits of equipment to detect excess building power.

How much power is your neighbour using, right now?

can you tell if he/she has an aluminium smelting plant n his back room, or an oxygen/hydrogen electrolysis plant?

I would imagine that the most likely scenario is that someone would notice underbiiling at the electricity plant, then they'd break down the doors of the dusty warehouse and the swat team would take over the place, as the OU engineers slowly raise their hands over their heads, and look at each other with that "we've been busted" look on their faces.

Sorry, imagination running away again there :-)
 
ohp said:
I'm sorry, but this statement brought forth visions of people casually going around with thermal imaging goggles, opening up electricity meter closets and various other bits of equipment to detect excess building power.

How much power is your neighbour using, right now?

can you tell if he/she has an aluminium smelting plant n his back room, or an oxygen/hydrogen electrolysis plant?
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Since I live in a townhouse, yup, I can! :) But seriously, standard housing or even commercial lines just couldn't handle the power needed to actually make a bunch of money off of this.

ohp said:
I would imagine that the most likely scenario is that someone would notice underbiiling at the electricity plant, then they'd break down the doors of the dusty warehouse and the swat team would take over the place, as the OU engineers slowly raise their hands over their heads, and look at each other with that "we've been busted" look on their faces.
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That would be a likely scenario, right up until the first comma. ;)

A similar tactic was used here in BC by the police to help track down marijuana grow ops. Use too much power and BC Hydro would sic the cops on you. That changed a while back, when it was realized that the police need a warrant for your power records BEFORE they could look at them...
 
Grimoire said:
Since I live in a townhouse, yup, I can! :) But seriously, standard housing or even commercial lines just couldn't handle the power needed to actually make a bunch of money off of this.
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Wouldn't that depend on the cost of materials and assembly?

Even if you installed industrial lines to the power grid, unless you are breaking the law in some way, no one can come inside and discover your secret. Furthermore, even if the police or other authorities did produce a search warrant, that does not mean they can seize and reverse engineer your devices. I maintain that one could make money and keep the process secret.

In any case, the real money is showing it to a few select investors and then running off with their money.
 
Merge Thread?

Mods?

There's a grizzled old veteran thread on Steorn running in the Current Commentary sub-forum for getting 'nigh onto a year, now.

Could they be merged? Or is this a distinctly different audience(apparently it is)?
 
Ladewig said:
... unless you are breaking the law in some way, no one can come inside and discover your secret. Furthermore, even if the police or other authorities did produce a search warrant, that does not mean they can seize and reverse engineer your devices.
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You're assuming it will be the cops who come visiting. It could very well be representatives of less, shall we say, principled? organizations.


The profit potential for such a device is so huge, you have to expect that a lot of people would be willing to do a lot of nasty things to get a piece of that pie. Consider what a rapidly expanding industrial China might do, for instance.
 
Ladewig said:
Even if you installed industrial lines to the power grid, unless you are breaking the law in some way, no one can come inside and discover your secret. Furthermore, even if the police or other authorities did produce a search warrant, that does not mean they can seize and reverse engineer your devices. I maintain that one could make money and keep the process secret.
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I wasn't just referring to legal discovery. Industrial espionage exists. Just recently, there was an issue between McLaren and Ferrari in Formula 1 racing. Believe me, OU is far more valuable than some aerodynamic parts for a race car. Hell, I'd break in if I thought I could get my hands on a real OU device.

In any case, the real money is showing it to a few select investors and then running off with their money.
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Agreed! :thumbsup:
 
Well, to address the opening post and add some.....

From a business sense this has been a debacle. He got no major media coverage whatsoever, so that's a PLUS, because those that are reviewing the last few days and commenting are not being kind.

This is a horribly run company, of whatever sort it is. To have but one device ready, and that one nearly not tested ("it ran the night before" when the cameras weren't on), no spare parts, no backup device, a presentation in a museum of all places, the sooper secret panel, et al.... It ain't the scientific method, it ain't good marketing, and it ain't good sense.

They're either delusional or scammers. I opt to believe in the former. As to he possibility of the latter, I offer (freely purloined from fence-sitters on the Steorn forum) the following:

The bearings! It was not that the bearings were faulty. It's that the bearings chosen couldn't handle the changed environment, e.g. heat.... They got their bearings from watch/clock makers. Now that's the interesting scam angle.... A well-made grandfather clock can run accurately for at least a week, inaccurately (i.e. losing a little time) for a month or more. The bearings in a clock or watch are such that they are designed to interfere as little as possible, but they are also dealing with fine-tuned mechanisms that will create as little friction as possible. It's highly conceivable that they designed a plexiglas watch without hands, and that it could've run in an ideal climate for the ten days to which they'd committed for the vid streaming.

Like I said - interesting possibility.

Sean also said that the slots that everyone assumed were for insertion of magnets, were actually for air. Someone posited that the extreme sensitivity to the heat was because they were intending to use the air as a possible booster to the SMOT device.... e.g. by heating and cooling the room or area around it, the effect might be to generate 'thermals' that would boost the visible output.

This second theory sounds rather forced. The first one is more appetizing. Neither sounds as attractive, though, as the idea that they really may have believed they had something and that they just crapped all over themselves and aren't willing to admit that they were dreaming.
 
DRBUZZ0 said:
I've seen better. I could probably do better. I'm not impressed
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Probably? Rather a strange statement.


How come you haven't?

http://www.depletedcranium.com/

I think their website is devoid of meaningful content, is poorly managed, and is essentially part of whatever delusion or scam they're all about. But physically, it's a great site. I've seen a couple of others recently for commercial entities that flow much the same way. It's a clean and good site.
 
tkingdoll said:
In the nicest possible way, isn't that a tad paranoid? Why would someone from Steorn bother to come here and post?
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Probably for the same reasons they would claim to have an over-unity device in the first place.
 
JQH said:
Probably for the same reasons they would claim to have an over-unity device in the first place.
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1) to make money
2) to gain fame

I think perhaps you have overestimated the importance of this forum.:rolleyes:
 
Personally, I find it quite poetic that it was, excessive heating of the device that caused failure. Afterall, it's heat generation by the device that makes the whole thing impossible to begin with.

These problems were primarily due to excessive heat from the lighting in the main display area
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Having worked for a technology startup company in the late '90s, I can think of another reason for Steorn's current approach. They believe they have discovered a technology that potentially could do what they claim, but the device can't do it yet, so the current hype is to entice big venture capitalists to invest kajillions of dollars into their company for a piece of the perpetual-motion pie. I remember our product was still in R&D when we sought our second, larger round of funding, and when we pitched the concept to investors we certainly did not say, "Our product should be able to do this and that by the time we finish it." Heavens no. It was absolutely going to do what our engineers and software guys said it was going to do. And our investors were a bunch of traditional bankers who would have scarcely batted an eyelid if we told them we were inventing a matter transporter device. They just wanted to know how much money it was going to make.

And guess what? They never could get the thing to work. Millions of dollars down the toilet. I'm not a techie, and their confidence and know-it-all attitude certainly had me fooled. I left a good, stable job to go work fo them. But hey, we sure had some fun office parties while it lasted!

ETA -- I just remembered something else about my startup experience. When we were seeking our second round, our CEO did not characterize it as money to be used for the further development of our beta product. It was always described as money needed for further enhancements and more efficient versions of the product that would follow the initial, presumably working technology. The written investor information we gave potential VCs (subject to non-disclosure agreements) stated the absolute truth about our situation and the risks involved in making an investment, but in verbal pitches it sounded almost just like what Steorn is saying: "We have a working product that is the best thing ever and blows away everything you've ever seen, but we just need more money to make it even better!" Now I understand that it's a sort of entrepreneur's code language for: "We're really, really hoping this will work, so come spin the wheel with us!"
 
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Stellafane said:
If I invented an over-unity device, it would change everything. Everything. How often do you here that expression, "This changes everything"? Well, this would be one case where it would literally be true.

Think of it -- no more reliance on fossil fuels, with all the vast environmental, political, and economic benefits that would entail. Suddenly we'd be awash in wealth we could spend on matters of social and humanitarian import. We could potentially reverse global warming, and ensure abundant energy for everyone, everywhere, regardless of location or economic class. And that's just the tip of the iceberg (and never mind completely setting physics as we know it on its head).

Famous? Hell, I'd be legendary, a scientist nonpareil, whose only peers would be the likes of Newton and Einstein. Nobel prize, magazine covers, book deals, bio-pics. And that's just for starters. Then there's my moral obligation to humanity to ensure such a epoch-making, paradigm-shifting technology gets deveoped to its fullest potential and distributed to the world as quickly as humanly possible.

In the face of all that, do you think I'd fumble around in an effort to gain something as utterly trivial and irrelevant as money??
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Duh, yes! And this supposed competitor who is planning to rip off Steorn's technology would surely like nothing better than to pay Steorn's scientists billions of dollars so that they don't have to waste time copying the existing work when there's billions to be made just by being first to market.
 
ChristineR said:
Duh, yes! And this supposed competitor who is planning to rip off Steorn's technology would surely like nothing better than to pay Steorn's scientists billions of dollars so that they don't have to waste time copying the existing work when there's billions to be made just by being first to market.
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I certainly think it's safe to say that business people are in business to make money. If they were merely interested in making the world a better place, they would quit their jobs so they could spend the entire day posting in the JREF forum, as I have done.
 
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