Sean to the Rescue and the Forum is Wide Open

pcstru4 started off Sunday's discussions with this question:

Believers - What will your excuse be when Steorn does not demonstrate a working OU device in July?

This caught SeamusF's attention:

LOL do you know something that even Steorn doesnt know?

Dam I may go and cancel everything, the venue, hotels, media, etc seeing as Pcstru4 stated that "Steorn does (will) not demonstrate a working OU device in July?".

Besides all of that pcstru4, where are you based? Are you going to come along and see the demo, or are you happier making random comments about a technology which you actually know anything about?

I guess Seamus took this question personally! pcstru4 later posts that he'll definitely come if Steorn has an OU Device. SeamusF unknownly sets himself up with this statement:

We will see you at the Demo then. I will ensure you have full details on
venue as soon as we announce the dates. Make sure you introduce yourself to me
or Sean when you arrive and we will see who is right or wrong

You'll find out from Sean in a second why Seamus set himself up, but first the discussion turned to whether Steorn has actually announced that their July Demo will be of an OU device at all. SeamusF again starts digging himself a hole:

Information on this will be published as a Press Release. We are not releasing any information on it before that.

So we're now starting to all think that the July demo may not be of an OU device at all, but something else! But wait, Sean to the rescue!

July will be a demo of a real self sustaining OU device.

Sean did bring some bad news for those across the Atlantic:

On the July stuff we are not going to pre-announce the actual dates. ... The
press release will be issued the day the event start ... Its a decision we have
made based on advise from our PR company. And its one that we will not change.
Dr. Mike has a mail with a copy of the advise (and indeed the dates themselves)
however he is under NDA and cant put it in the public domain.

I'm sure that disappoints some folks, possibly even Seamus after his remarks! It's still great to know that Dr. Mike is still planning to go.

Finally, Sean made this announcement:

hehe, well I just reopened the membership thing so you get a change to get pcstru5 thru x now!

I verified that the forums are wide open at the moment. Get your account now before it's too late!

GizMag's Steorn Writeup

If you haven't already, check out GizMag's writeup on Steorn. The article itself isn't completely accurate, such as the time when the jury is expected to report their results, but they do offer a few unique ideas of what may lie ahead for Steorn:

... Finally there are the 22 renowned scientists engaged to test the
machine; scientists who could possibly seek compensation from Steorn if it is
proven to have deliberately misled them.

I had never considered the potential lawsuits from the Jury, and possibly the SPDC if this were all contrived.

SPDC Update, Fraudhalt Details

SeamusF dropped in on the forums today and had an update :

Hi,

Seeing as nobody must read my comments () I had said that we were doing update 1.4. during this week.
Updated modules and a new module will go up by close of business today along with the version update. You may experience intermittent log on difficulties before that.

Are you guys experiencing withdrawal symptoms yet!! LOL!

Cheers

S

It seems the SPDC is ranked up with cocaine as far as addictiveness.

Also today, chili fries asks:

Were Mike and Sean working on Fraudhalt's ATM surveillance system when they "discovered" the Orbo effect? Has Sean discussed that? Did Fraudhalt have the right of first refusal?

< http://www.siliconrepublic.com/news/news.nv?storyid=single8164 >

"FraudHalt is finalising a deal with one of Ireland’s largest banks to roll out an ATM surveillance system that can detect if the machine has been compromised by criminals."

SeamusF replies:

Hi Chilli Fries,

Good find on that article, I hadn’t seen it.

To clarify a couple of points that you asked. This is the same surveillance system that highlighted the “anomaly” when we were looking at power options for the monitoring system. The “anomaly” was put aside until the surveillance project was handed over to Fraudhalt. A lot of our early work with Fraudhalt was also on the Discmatch and the hologram verification projects.

On your first refusal point, which I assume is in regard to Orbo. Once we started looking at the initial "anomaly" it took us a couple of months to realise we had what we thought () had.

We are all delighted for numerous reasons that things are really starting to take off for Fraudhalt as their tech offerings are really a significant technological step-up in fraud prevention.

Cheers

S

The orbo creation story has always fascinated me. It's amazing that Steorn went from developing surveillance systems, etc to being a multi million dollar funded free energy company.

Magnets In Motion

Today there was an interesting discussion in the forums debating Sean's claim of orbo's power density at around 0.5 watts per cubic centimeter. pcstru4 starts the thread off:

The probability of them breaking CoE might still be 0.000001% but the probability of 0.5w per cc using only the motive forces of even the most powerful rare earth magnets, is 0. Steorn's claim of 0.5w per cc is simply false in any configuration, stop/start or continous motion. Fact.

I haven't taken the time to do the math, so I can't say one way or the other if this is "Fact" or not. WhiteLite did a little digging and had this to say:

OK, I've seen figures of 2.5W/cc for electric motors, (which contain electromagnets and therefore magnets with field that can be switched on/off), so if we assume that permenant magnets can be more powerful than electromagnets for the same size and that Steorn's device doesn't have to rely on permenant magnets being "switched off" I think a figure of 0.5W/cc is easily reasonable.

cyrilsmith had some thoughts and a suggested experiment:

Something wrong with your math there. Forget about acceleration, just measure force.v distance. I have some NdFe magnets that are 25mm dia and 5mm thick, magnetized along the thickness direction. I can place these in a tube glued upright to the bench, put two magnets in opposing each other.

And finally Dr. Mike puts all of this into perspective:

Hi JiO,

I don't think there's any problem with physics. I do not think power density is useful, energy density is far more useful. It doesn't really matter how much time it takes to get the energy out, what matters is how much is there.

It takes energy to create a magnetic field. It takes energy to create a mountain lake. Once formed, the energy can be extracted later. Using a water wheel with a magnet tied to it you can create electricity. Using electricity and a superconductor, you can create a powerful magnetic field.

I don't think the power density claim is valid either, but I also don't think it really matters. There's no such thing as "free energy" or "over unity" or "perpetual motion". I'm really not to worried about "paradigm shifts".

It's unclear if pcstru4 was off on his calculations, or if anyone has reached an agreement on the topic. It's always fun though to read about other people's experiments with N42 grade neo magnets.

If there are past threads that you found interesting, let me know. I have a feeling we'll be focused on the past over the next couple of months while we wait for the July Demo.

A Look Way Back

Since August, many folks over at the forums have pointed others to the way back machine to get an idea of what Steorn was up to before free energy. First up, February, 2001:

"Steorn is a specialist service company providing programme management and technical assessment advice for European companies engaging in e-commerce projects."

Soon after in March, 2001:

"Steorn is an expert in the field of technology risk management."

In February, 2003 we see another shift:

"For Technology Buyers At Steorn we provide a range of services for organizations that wish to outsource their technology needs. From supplier evaluations to a fully managed service Steorn is the only technology partner you will need. For Technology Inventors Technology inventors face many different challenges. At Steorn we provide a full range of services that enable you to achieve your vision. From rapid product development to technology strategy, Steorn is the only technology partner you will need."

Also note at this time they launched a web hosting service called HostMe.com:

"From domain name registration, site design, build, hosting and support, HostsMe.com provides the most cost effective solution to your website needs."

After spending over a half of a year in "under construction" mode, Steorn updates again in March, 2004:

"steorn helps organisations create value through the application of innovative technology steorn provides services to assess, develop and implement technology to organisations ranging from early stage technology ventures through mature public limited companies steorn has a successful track record and can offer the only insurance backed guarantee outside of the USA"

And then in July, 2004 we go back to under construction and a different logo:

And finally, in November, 2004, we have a recognizable logo from Steorn:

Steorn has been up to a very diverse set of activities over the past few years, including e-commerce, technology risk management, technology outsourcing, rapid product development, and so much more. Thanks vox_causa for the suggestion!

beating a dead banana

Thanks go to Windplay, our banana loving forum skeptic, for starting this thread on the SPDC. While nothing monumental has been revealed by our fellow SPDC members, it's still nice every once in a while to hear how things are going. In the thread, J i O discusses his Narrative approach to understanding what is going on with Steorn. He also posts some amusing aspects of the SPDC:

Sean has a blog and it's kind of fun to get a peek into his life as he tells little stories as good bloggers are wont to do.

Oh man I wish I had that RSS Feed! ralphyboy also had a few things to say about the SPDC:

The SPDC is a really fun place to be. It is extremely civil and (mostly) all business. Progress is actually being made, although sometimes the sledding seems a bit tough as I expect it would be with any collaborative effort where one doesn't see each other face to face on a daily basis.

And, oh yea, it's even more addictive than this forum.

And finally, GravityBoots points out the differences between the SPDC and Steorn's forum:

This forum: "shut yer face ya donkey lover...you're talking bollox!!"

SPDC: "With respect my dear friend, I appreciate your opinion but please accept my apologies as I must beg to disagree."

I hope we continue to hear about how things are going within the SPDC, with or without bananas.

Questions for Dr. Mike

First off, thank you Magnatrix for posting the contents of Sunday Times article. If you haven't read the article yet, you can see it here. There doesn't seem to be any new information in the article, just a summary of what has been going on.

Finally, I thought you might enjoy this forum thread. Dr. Mike points out what he'll attempt to do to Steorn's Orbo if they let him:

It would be really nice if I can take it apart and put it back together again, both correctly and incorrectly. If not, attaching some magnitometors and watching things change will help. Sean did say at one point (jokingly I'm sure) that I can "hit it with a hammer", so I think taking it apart and looking for hidden power sources is ok.

I really hope Dr. Mike makes it out to the July demo and gets to hammer on the Orbo. His analysis will definitely change a few minds around here, one way or the other!

14 Million?

Steorn appeared in the Sunday Times, Ireland today according to forum members at Randi.org and also in Steorn's forums. I haven't seen the article yet, so I can't say much about what it states. If anyone has a copy, I would be very interested in reading it!

As far as the 14 million euros raised mentioned in both forums, It's unclear from what I've read if this was raised before Steorn's pronouncement of not accepting funding until the Jury process is over. Giving Steorn the benefit of the doubt, I would lean towards guessing that it was before August. Sean has mentioned funds before in the forums, specifically this comment, posted here back on April 9th:

Where does the 3 million number come from??? We have funding well in excess of 10 million. Your position may make some sense to you, but it is wrong - time will tell.

Crank's Silence

Over on the Free crank!!! thread, we've learned why crank hasn't posted in a while:

Hello all - I just stopped posting once I realised I was getting quoted elsewhere It's one thing spoofing around with people that you think of as 'friends' (which included Thicket, I have to say) another when you realise you're being quoted elsewhere. So now I glance in once a day or so, then run.

I wonder who she's referring to? ;-) My personal thought on this is that the Internet is the Internet. Whether crank is posting on the forum for the whole world to see, or quoted here on this little ol' blog, there's no difference.

I'm certain that Steorn's forums get a lot more traffic then this blog anyway, and my other guess is that the majority of the visitors here also frequent the forums. My goal in all of this is to make it a little easier for folks who don't have as much time as the rest of us to keep up with the latest Steorn activities.

Another Week has Passed

The week is over, and while we've got a status update on Dr. Mike's visit, we unfortunately haven't heard about any progress with crank's potential visit. This week I've missed crank's comments in the forum, let's hope she's just on holiday! I did notice that her account was active a few hours ago, so we know she's not completely MIA and hopefully next week she and Cathy C can work something out. It's not much fun tracking Steorn when there's nothing to report!

On another note, an anonymous poster suggested that I add a link to Gabbly here. Notice under the external links section that you can now visit Steorn's Forums with Gabbly Chat. I jump on every once in a while, but lately no one has been too active at least when I'm around.

SciGuy Reports and More Bannings

Today the only activity in the forums had to do with a few bannings. Unfortunately no explanation was given, but as nleseul points out in a comment here:

Just a guess, but maybe if one account was banned for being obnoxious, then the other two were banned for the same reason, being that they, you know, belong to the same person.

The most interesting part of the whole banning activity was learning that the administrator nosy banned them. I didn't even know there was an admin named nosy!

Also today the SciGuy from Houston, Eric Berger, published a blog entry with an update on Steorn. Eric contacted Dr. Jeff Bechtold and actually spoke with him briefly:

I contacted Jeff earlier this month and received a polite reply, but he wouldn't spill any goods on what Steorn is up to, or what he thinks of the technology.

Dr. Bechtold's silence to me implies that he's definitely a jury member. We've seen how potential jury members who didn't get select react when asked questions.

Dr. Mike's Trip

Today we learned more details about Dr. Mike's trip. Instead of visiting Steorn Headquarters as initially planned, Dr. Mike will be meeting with Steorn at the demo site in London. He'll have to days prior to the demo to look at the device. While Dr. Mike mentions bringing tools with him so he can dissect the machine, it's unclear how Sean feels about that:

Steorn: Well its great to see that you are preparing your ....screwdrivers.... This whole thing is clearly going to be interesting.

As many pointed out in the forums, it is somewhat disappointing that Dr. Mike won't be able to visit Steorn in Dublin. It's also disappointing that we have to wait till July. Many thought Dr. Mike would be making his visit before the end of April.

Disappearing Threads and Questions for Sean

According to folks in the forum and an anonymous commenter here, there were some threads deleted from the Steorn forums today. If anyone has a copy of the deleted posts or could summarize them for me, please email me @ wgorman AT gmail DOT com. I hate it when I miss out on drama like this!

On another note, I'd like to compile a list of questions that everyone has for Steorn, so next time we get a Questions thread or a gabbly chat with Sean we can go in prepared to ask the most interesting questions. Here are a few that I've thought of to get the discussion started:

Jury Questions for Sean:

When visiting the US in February, did you meet with any of the Jurors in person?

When did the Jury's white paper phase begin?

How often does Steorn interact with Jury members? Once a week, once a month? How much time do the Jury members seem to be spending on validation per week?

Business Model Question for Sean:

You've mentioned before that your prime market is mobile consumer electronics. Crank mentioned that she has seen an NDA between Steorn and a global company. In addition to the SPDC, jury process, and internal prototype development, are you actively working with other companies on creating products, or will those companies have to wait till after validation day to start working with Steorn?

Toys, Demos, and Pennies

Sean posted some additional information on the demo in the Questions discussion today:

thomas:Sean, This public demonstration of the "technology", is this going to be a working PMM or just another "toy", operated by a finger tip?

Steorn: It will be a self sustaining system. The difference between the stop-start type and the constant motion type is not manual intervention, its the fact that in the stop-start version the system stops and starts (with no outside influence, finger or otherwise). The constant motion device does not have 'stop-start' as part of its sequence. The constant motion version of the technology has not yet completed development, but do not confuse this (at it seems that some forum members have) with the fact that the stop-start version is self sustaining, i.e. it has no external intervention, manual or otherwise.

thomas: Oh, one more thing, are you going to put up a video of the display unit, after or perhaps even before the public display?

Steorn: Well you will be able to watch the whole thing live over the internet via webcams. You can also chat via live chat software with people there. This is not going to be a one day thing, its going to be there for 10 days. And yes after that we will put videos on our site, but I expect that there will be plenty of them anyway with loads of new hoax theories as well!!

Can you imagine the frenzy that will take place in July? Also, an anonymous commenter or two suggested that we read these forum threads again:

Pennies points unanswered.
Steorn/Experts; Pennies found contradictions,

Both of the threads took place back in August of 2006. It's fun to re-read these conversations and compare them to the ones we're having today. If things get really slow around here, I'll start pulling out the more interesting highlights of days past.

A Few Points from Sean

Sean may be disappearing for a while from the forums, so make sure you read his latest message. Highlights include Sean's asking that we don't consider Steorn a fraud, and that we accept that this will be a long process before things are cleared up.

As an open minded skeptic, I can offer Sean the benefit of the doubt about this not being a fraud. He points out that there are no clear victims at the moment. I honestly don't know what this is all about. I'm sure we'd all love to believe Sean, but it's his responsibility to prove his position. I'm looking forward to the July demos and more updates on the Jury. We're definitely in for a long, hopefully entertaining, ride.

Sean's Answer of the Day and More!

Sean got back into the Questions discussion again today. I especially enjoyed the answer of the day.

Lister: Have the jurors (or at least some of them) seen the device and if so have they concluded that it works or have they concluded that it doesn't?

Steorn: It would only take a small amount of time see if we had faked a machine - I in fact agree with this statement. lol, there are only so many places to look for energy that is being added into a system in a hoax fashion. However this is of course not what we are doing, you can believe that or not - but it is a fact.

With respect to the current phase that the jury are engaged in, it is as I have said before a form of 'peer' review, despite some of your comments from last night these people do in fact have other careers and other demands on their time. The process is in depth and indeed our presentation of the effects behind the technology, and the Q&A's that follow this address the heart of the matter. It should also be said that I have little doubt that some of the tests that have been presented by us have been replicated by some of the jurors.

Have the jurors yet seen a machine? Ok well I answered this last night, and the
answer is no. Lol, I can already hear the cries of foul and deep intakes of breath as I write this. The physical test phase is scheduled to start soon, but IMO this will involve the selection of independent lab(s) and definition of tests to be conducted.

This was never going to be a fast process, it is going to take a lot of time and those who read stuff into this are mis-reading the situation. Of course these people are going to slow and cautious. I again stress that none of the above should be misunderstood, the core issues behind our technology are being addressed. For those who believe that this could be done in a few days staring into a machine, you are just wrong.

It's interesting that Sean speculates that some of the Jury have built their own machines. If the jury has Steorn's white papers, and they are clear enough to reproduce the device, you'd think the process would move a bit faster.

blue_energy: I have presumed that the forum must serve a longer range purpose for Steorn to have made it worth your while to have spent so much of your time answering our questions, etc. I have further presumed that the reasons would have to do with establishing some credibility with the public prior to the completion of the jury. With that in mind, I have 2 questions:

1.) In as much as the plan for the format of the jury tests, and the number of jurors, were published knowledge at the outset, what is the reasoning behind keeping the change in these things a secret until now?

2.) The web site alluded to you publishing detailed technical specifications at the completion of the first quarter. You acknowledged, earlier in this discussion, that what you published is not, in fact, 'detailed' - and you apologized for the disappointment that this has caused. However, you did not explain your reasoning for not following through with what you said you would do. Would you explain your reasoning?

Steorn: There was no real plan behind us having a forum, we have zero experience with forum life and boy what an eye opener it has been. Again I stress that we like to engage, and so since it is on our site, we will come in and correct things when we have the time. We have also be learning about this whole forum thing as time passes, I think that in hind site we should have moderated the forum better, but hey hind site is 20-20 and all that.

We really are not going to discuss the ins and outs of the process while it is in progress (and to be honest I am trying not to go into this now, because for all the fun that the debates in here are, the Jury process is far too important to mess with). Lets face it no one is watching Steorn at the moment, we do not want to be news and we are not news.

With respect to the 'detailed' technical specifications, this was my fault, we were never going to publish detailed specs and will not until the end of validation. So I have to say sorry for this, if it makes you feel any better I still have the whip marks from our lawyers for even suggesting that I would do it.

Rhaomi: 1) A few months ago, you stated this:

"Due to the fact that the US patent office does not allow patents with this claim we have filed a sequence of patents wich describe various aspects of the technology. "

However, according to the US Patent Office website: A working model may be requested in the case of applications for patent for alleged perpetual motion devices.

Has the Office's policy changed since Steorn sought an American patent, or were you guys simply mistaken about the process? Or perhaps you did not have a working model that was ready for transatlantic shipping and government inspection?

Steorn: We have of course applied for US patents, and I am not going to go into details on them. We do not see any problems at this time about getting these patents granted.

Sean doesn't come out and say it, but it doesn't seem like Steorn is patenting any claim towards OU, instead it sounds like he's patenting specific configurations of Steorn's discovery. I agree with Rhaomi here, it's hard to believe Steorn wouldn't attempt to show up at the USPTO with a working device in hand if they had one. Who knows, maybe they will on Validation day.

ro2778: What happened to the American demonstration?

Steorn: Good question - the answer is that we are going to try and get media attention. Only a few of us are prepared to stand in the public eye and it is just not practical for us to try and split this 'event' across two locations. I should point out that this does not mean that we will not be doing a demo in the US, its just that doing two at the same time would be too much of a stretch on the company, I doubt if the July thing will be the only demo that we do.

Spiritual Beggar: If (hypothetically!!) Steorn did not release it's technology (or pretend you never discovered it!) What do you think the chances would be, of another company/individual/university/boffin discovering the effect by accident? Is it so incredibly obscure that it could go unnoticed for another 100 or 200 years??

Steorn: Well first thing to say is that there is nothing that is going to stop us releasing our tech, whats going on at the moment (the validation and the development of a developers forum) is really about ensuring rapid and widespread deployment. On the other point, what one man discovers another man can.

rubentherat: How do you explain to yourself how a couple of hundred years of science and engineering could have missed the effect.

Steorn: I do not think that they did. Gosh now I am writing this I know I am going to get a forum beating, but thats how I see it.

salvnaut: This is the winner for The Sean's Answer of a Day.

Sean, I remember you explaining how you thought that discovery of this technology wouldn't had been possible without todays technology of precise measuring instruments and easy access to information (Internet). Has something changed with your understanding since then? Or should we understand those two as not at all contradictory statements?

Steorn: The point that I was making is that a group of people like us could would not have made this type of discovery 20 years ago. It is simply a question of money, the type of measurement equipment, computing power and so that is necessary to rule out measurement error would simply have priced us out the the possibility of discovery 20 years ago. If we had the initial measurements 20 years ago with the type of equipment that a normal company could afford I have no doubt that we would just have written it off to measurement error.

granthodges: Any more on "I do not think that they did?"

Steorn: Well I think that it is a question of mindset, once we discovered and proved to ourselves the initial anomaly, we got very interested. After some research we found that we could explain the results with known effects, i.e. the result itself could be expected. But we went one step further, which is rather than just accepting classical explanations of these known (if little known) effects (and there are indeed many views on what causes these effects over the years) we decided to do what our engineering educations taught us to do, which is to design tests and make up our own minds on the matter. We did this by the way because we could not find a consensus position on what drove these effects within the third party white papers, the approach seemed very much a 'rule of thumb' approach and so we got at it.

I read this as saying Steorn believes that the discovered phenomena is right under scientists noses, that it won't be some new form of energy like ZPE or quantum foam that explains what is going on. Fascinating!

ro2778: Do you foresee, sometime in the future, orbo, on an industrial scale, being able to compete with standard power generating technologies e.g., solar, nuclear, fossil fuel, wind etc. in terms of useful energy output?

Steorn: Yes, we are a small company and can only take the development so far, thats why we are releasing the technology in the way that we are, the more, smart, fast companies that work on this for their own commercial interests the better for everyone.

Dovetailed: 1) What are you going to do if/when the jury comes back divided or unwilling to accept your claims without even further testing? Have you given them any time constraints or other forms of constraint to deal with potential (for want of a better word) filibustering or wilful obstructionism?

2) Psychologically, how does it feel to believe/know (you’ve said you 100% believe your claims before) that you will go down in history?

Steorn: On (1) I guess that I do not see this as a real possibility, if it happens (and I do not think that it will) we will face the issue at that time.

On (2) - its embarrassing to be honest, I want this to be over so that I can go off and work on some other stuff.

I hate to do this to Sean, but if what Steorn has is real, they could be the next Google squared. It's embarrasing to hear the CEO say "I want to move on" and "we're just a small company". Google started off in a garage, and all they started with was a clever way to rank search results. Now they have a market cap of $150 billion. ARG!

Fez_2007: With out giving away the configuration can you tell us the exact elements (period table) that interact to produce the effect. I presume a soft magnetic element of Fe and Neodymium magnets? Will the device only work within a particular temperature range? (Discounting the fact that it will stop working above curie temp) Does the device involve the principle of magnetic saturation? In particular over saturation of the soft magnetic material?

Will there be a second round of SPDC entries, I'm dying to talk with other engineers scientists on the idea. - I' have emailed you my details

Steorn: Ok, temperature (other than the curie point) is not important and its based on hard magnets - mail Cathy on the SPDC comment!

Dovetailed: "Steorn: Again I cant comment on how long the process will take, if we feel that we are heading into many years then we will discuss with the Jury ways to deal with this, but again I do not see this as being a problem."

Is there a reason why you are so confident this won't be a problem? Or is such a reason un-commentable again?

Steorn: Ok, well I think that people need to think about the details of our claim. In essence we are saying that it can be proven experimentally that magnetic forces are not in fact conservative. While such a claim must be treated cautiously, it is also not an overwhelming task to deal with the claim. But again its really not up to me how to do this, time will tell.

Sean has said the jury will take a long amount of time, and then he goes and says that it's not an overwhelming task to deal with. Do these two points jive? As you can tell from some of my comments, I'm a bit frustrated. I'm guessing we all are. I feel like I'm watching Lost or 24, and have to wait till next week, and then another week, and so on. Oh how I wish I could just rent the DVD set and watch the whole thing unfold over a weekend!

External Steorn Forum Comments

I've seen a few comments asking to either host a forum or have a link to fizzx.com. I'm interested in everyones opinion on this topic. I don't want to compete with the Steorn Forum, and Sean has stated that he'll be opening it up again to everyone this July. Also, I unfortunately don't have time to moderate a forum. So here are my questions for you:

Does fizzx.com meet the needs of those who don't have access to Steorn's Forums?

What could fizzx.com or another forum do differently?

Should we launch an "Until Steorn opens back up" Forum?

Thanks for your thoughts on the topic!

The Day After Questions

Today Sean posted this to the forum:

After all the disappointment of yesterdays 'news', drop any questions in here and I will try to answer.

Unfortunately Sean wasn't able to keep up with the gazillion questions from everyone, including myself. He did address many of the questions and concerns. Here are most of Sean's comments broken into sections:


On The Jury Process and the Demo:

SteornTracker: ...Do you have any plans between July and December to keep up the publics awareness? What impact do you expect the July demos to have on the Jury?

Steorn: Hi ST - the July demo was never in the original plan, it is a 'opportunistic' move on our part. Again I have to stress that I cannot with any degree of confidence say when the Jury process will end, its just not up to me/Steorn in any way. We have no other plans at this point, but I would not rule out anything at this stage either.

duncan torus: do you promise that come July if the constant motion version is not ready you will still demo the original "start/stop" device?

Steorn: The demo will happen, we fully expect to have a constant speed device, if not we will demo a 'stop-start' device.

Dovetailed: What is the principle reason for Steorn's current level of secrecy?...

Steorn: There are several reasons, on a very basic point it will make no difference to our time to market, since we are obviously waiting until validation anyway. There are IP and patent issues also and clearly there is a risk of giving counterfeiters and competitors a heads up.

The decision on the July demos was a risk/reward decision for us - we feel that the public exposure will be worth taking some of the risks highlighted above. And it is also about the time that we need to engage with main stream media again.

Sean didn't explain why Steorn needs to engage the main stream media again before the Jury process is over, that'll be a question for a future discussion.

nleseul:Have the jury members seen a working device? (If this is something you can comment on.)

Steorn: They are currently in part I of the process (an addition at the request of the applicants), this is a form of 'peer' review and is paper based. We have confirmed visit dates set for the near future, but I am not going to go into this any further for obvious reasons.

nleseul: Unfortunate that the skeptics are going to love spinning that one, though.

Steorn: They are entitled to their views, the non-believer/believer war will not be resolved until the Jury process is complete, and for the truly crazy this will in fact be part of the scam as well. Its all noise, lol Seamus was showing me some of the comments from another forum, its pure vitriol, according to the stuff that I was shown I had already made 750k from sale of Steorn shares (I have for the record made zero from the sale of Steorn shares), there are crazy theories surrounding the Steorn Nominees thing and so on.

We do far more than most companies would be bother do do about demonstrating that we are about the validation process, and not a fraud. People will always make their own minds up about this. It is never the reaction of the fringes of either side of the argument that matter, it just seems that way because the fringes tend to be very vocal!

spinn3er: General expectations (at least here on the forum) for the jury to conclude phase 1 was from 5min to a month maybe. Now after more than 3 months, what is going on? Thanks for the answer. (i hope)

Steorn: Yes, but again I have to state that the addition to the process was done at the request of many applicants. We are very much slaves to the process that we have engaged in, it was never going to be fast, some parts may be faster than we expect and some may be slower. I personally believe that the current phase of the process will in fact speed up the overall process, because the fundamental 'science' issues are being looked at, but as always time will tell.

We've learned a lot more about the current state of the Jury process this past week. From a closure standpoint, it's sad to learn that the Jury process may go on for a much longer period then what was initially expected.


On The Technology and Orbo Product:

my_pen_is_stuck: Can you please tell me the colour, length, width, etc of the 100K orbo toys?

Steorn: They will fit on a desk, but I wont say anymore than that at this time, sorry!

Steorn: The colour, like the device itself we will only 'reveal' following validation. They are all going to be the same colour though!

Neutrino:what progress do you have with the continuous motion testing? Do you observe this effect at all, if so, how much more effective it is than the start/stop version, does it it make all your existing patents obsolete? Well, any news in this direction?

Steorn: Yes, we have made huge progress on this - we expect to be demoing this version in July. Again I have to say sorry and say that there is not a lot of detail that I can go into at this time.

babcat: Could you share any more technical specifications of the technology with us (start/stop or constant motion)? ... is there anything you could tell us about the general direction the specifications (for example power densities or power to weight ratios) are headed?

Steorn: Hi babcat, the answer is no at this point. Of course the very limited details we put on the site yesterday in no way could be considered 'detailed', and I am genuinely sorry about the disappointment that this caused. With respect to the direction, the version that we are currently developing will have a significantly greater power density than the 0.5 watts/cm3 quoted yesterday.

I appreciate Sean accepting the fact that yesterday was a bit of a let down for us.

rubentherat: How far are you on the road to continuous motion. An estimation? 50%, 60%,70%

Steorn: I would say 80-90% of the way.

uomipoika: What's the basic difference between start/stop and continuous motion devices? Does the start/stop mean that the device must be restarted and restarted all over again to keep it running? Or does it mean that the device is startable and stoppable? (Once you start it, it rolls until someone presses the stop-button?)

Steorn: Stop/start devices stop in the middle of a cycle, there is no manual intervention.

Chilean One:Does the Continuous motion involves electromagnets?

Steorn: Nope

icuken: What is the cycle timeperiod for the start/stop device?

Steorn: Well obviously it depends on the config, they can be pretty fast, I do not know off the top of my head, sorry.

smarthousesys: Sean, Any unfamiliar elements used in Orbo (Neo is a familiar element) - just looking for a yes/no? Thanks

Steorn: No!

J i O: You've publicly stated that your intention all along was not to move forward with the development of continuous motion. Yet that decision was reversed? What did you learn or ascertain that motivated this reversal?

Steorn: Well we obviously continue to look at methods of implementation (mostly from a patent standpoint), one of these concepts we spent some time building a test rig and testing and the results from these tests lead us to believe that the development would d be worth the investment.

On the SPDC and Near Term Activities:

Suomipoika: Question about crank's and drmike's visit. Have those visits been scheduled? If not, why?

Steorn: The answer is that no they have not yet been scheduled, the reason is that we have been extremely busy for us. Cathy C keeps our to-do list and she has started to hassle me about it so I think that these will get set up pretty soon.

my_pen_is_stuck: I'd like to know your reaction to the progress of the SPDC. Are they living up to about what you expected?

Steorn: Again another slow process - we are pushing content up as fast as we can produce it, but it takes time. I guess the real question would if the members feel that it is living up to expectations, if I were a member I might be frustrated with the speed of content .

On the Media, the Documentary, and Everything Else:

my_pen_is_stuck: ... So, are you guys deliberately trying to look like nutters to avoid attention?

Steorn: lol, we never had any doubts that we would be viewed as nutters from the outset, and we have rejected any media interviews since early September, we have no more to say of an substance until the key question is answered.

Neutrino: Since Steorn technology is known to public for 8 months now, have you been contacted by some influential people, e.g. governments, military, UN, European Commission, greenpeace, individuals?

Steorn: We still get contacted by loads of people from across the spectrum, we do not meet any of them to be honest, there is just no point until the validation process is complete.

Neutrino: I remember you said that the validation should be completed before the documentary will be released. What is the planned format: one episode 45 or 90 minutes long or whole series dedicated to one of the greatest inventions/discoveries of XXI century? Any clues from the production company?

Steorn: My understanding is that it will be a single 60 min documentary.

With all the video that has been captured and the magnitude of the claim, I expected at least a mini-series!

my_pen_is_stuck: At this point, the fence sitters still don't know if it's real or not. Are they wasting their time? Or are they in for the most exciting ride of a life time? We just want to know if the bloody thing works or not.

Steorn: I understand that, but to be honest the if it works or not is up to the Jury, it has always been. I must admit to being shocked at how much time people spend debating us, I think that in a way that Steorn is just the topic that allows the people in here to get into debate, it could just as easily be religion or something else. The answer to the question is still some time off.

I do enjoy a good debate. Good observation Sean! And finally, iscore4ever wanted to know how Sean felt about the technology somehow being thwarted by big oil, governments, or some other entities:

Steorn: Ok first, we do not file patents in the US only, second we will not only rely on patent protection and finally our 'market' is the internet.

I wonder what else they will rely on besides patent protection. With their claimed licensing model, and the Jury publications digging into the fundamental physics of the phenomena, it doesn't sound like they plan on holding any trade secrets. Sean's comment on the market being the Internet sounds a little dot-com'ish to me. Maybe he was getting a little tired by this point!

I appreciate Sean's willingness to confront some of the more ardent skeptics in Steorn's Forum. I hope he continues the dialog. There are so many more questions!

More Jury Clarifications from Sean

Today Sean cleared up lingering Jury questions. chili fries asks:

I also can't resist asking (though I understand if I don't get one) for clarification. Are they only testing the devices with Steorn's measurement apparatus? Are they building the devices for themselves? Are they building and testing the devices at their places of business, or is the validation process only taking place at Steorn in Dublin?

Sean's reply:

Well I can't in fact 'tell' the Jury what to do. They will not rely only on Steorn data, who would? They will not only do tests in Steorn, who would? I doubt that they would rely on Steorn provided systems (the ones with our hamsters in them!), who would?

This talk about the supposed 'test limits' placed on this process by Steorn is false and mis-leading. Part of someones game no doubt.

Here are some additional comments from Sean today:

I fully expect that the method of reaching their conclusions will form part of the final assessment. The only purpose of 'information control' is to allow these people to do their work, without the need to deal with media or bloggers and to allow the results, once ready, to be released in a coordinated way to the media, that simple.

In regards to how the Jury is going:

Well I guess that the first thing to understand is that our original view of the process was modified based on input from people who where applying. Basically the suggestion was that an additional phase was added to the process that in effect involved a 'peer review' of white papers, test methods and test data provide by Steorn. This will not of course be the basis of the final evaluation report but was included, by request, so that they have a very clear understanding of what the technology is about. This is reflected in the jury contract posted on the main site, part I being, in effect a form a peer review and part II being selection of independent labs (by the Jury), definitions of tests and so on.
...
The whole point about the Jury process is that it is not conducted under any form of pressure, hence we will not be in the business of predicting when, how and so on. So I guess that the best that I can say is that we will give another update at the end of Q2.

It looks like we'll be waiting a while for the next jury update. Let's hope they've made a lot of progress on phase 1 testing by then. Here's more from Sean:

We said from the outset that this would be a long and involved process, others of course have views that this could all be over in 10 mins, this was never going to be the case and we have repeatedly stated this from the very start . No credible scientist is going to throw out hundreds of years of experience in the blink of an eye. The process will be must be in-depth and run at a pace dictated by the Jury.
...
...we have no doubts about our claims - but we have never expected anyone in the public domain to believe us. The role of the Jury is to provide a deep technical analysis of our claims, at that point I will ask you to believe us. Up till then I will simply ask you to believe that we are genuine about the process.
...
Not only the people involved and the methods used to determine a result will be available, but also the details about how we came to select the 22 and so on. There is no point at all in this process if its details are not in the public domain AFTER the result. I stress after for the simple reason that while doing this, the last thing the people involved need to do is (1) deal with some of the crazy bloggers that are out there or (2) give a false or misleading impression of what is going on. As always the answer to the question we pose is far too important for all of us to allow it to be influenced by some of the very cynical bloggers or indeed the crazy ones. It really is a case that the full story will be known at the end, but it will only be known at the end.

It's been an eventful week, but my hunch are things will slow down around here before they get busy again. Sean is holding his cards close. I hope between now and Q2 we can make some progress with Dr. Mike's visit and also with crank's activities with Steorn.

The "Technical Specifications" have been published...

From Steorn's Website:

Orbo is based upon the principle of time variant magneto-mechanical interactions. The core output from our Orbo technology is mechanical. This mechanical energy can be converted into electrical energy using standard generator technology either by integrating such technology directly with Orbo or by connecting the mechanical output from Orbo to the generation technology. The efficiency of such mechanical/electrical conversions is highly dependent on the components used and is also a function of size.

Orbo technology is subject to continuous development. This development is focused on improving the manufacturability of the technology, production costs and power density. Orbo was initially developed as using stop-start mechanisms (with a power density of 0.5 Watts per cm3), Steorn is currently finalizing the development of constant motion systems and a significant improvement in power density is anticipated.

Not exactly what I expected, but hey, this is their show, not mine.

Dr. Doug Natelson's Email Conversation with Steorn

Dr. Natelson has posted his email correspondence with Steorn here. Some of the interesting parts are posted below. From Steorn's Email:

Please find attached a letter outlining the jury process and requesting information regarding your availability for a period of four consecutive days between November 1st and January 31st 2007.

These types of conversations and documents present evidence that the Jury process is really happening. From Dr. Natelson's reply, it seems that he was so busy that he didn't even get a chance to read the attached letter. I'm guessing the letter discussed the actual testing of the device. Steorn has made it clear that the jury will be able to test in this manner.

My apologies for the delayed response. Unfortunately, between
my academic and family obligations (which have both grown significantly
since I filled out the form on your website), I won't be able to
participate in your 'challenge'. Please pardon the inconvenience.

I wonder if Steorn consulted any high profile scientists about the jury process idea before moving forward with it. At the end of Dr. Natelson's email, he had this to say:

PS - I still don't understand the "jury" business anyway. Build and
demonstrate a couple of working units, and you can patent and publish
in the open literature.

Note that Dr. Natelson has updated his blog entry with these details. The comments are worth reading also if you have the time.

Steorn's Q1 Update

The Highlights:

• There are 22 Scientists on the Jury vs. the assumed 12
• The Jurors are reviewing the technology, and will start a test phase in the next couple of months
• A public demo will take place in July in London, with a webcast for the rest of the world
  

I'm really surprised that the test phase hasn't started yet. This whole process is taking entirely too long!

Dr. Doug Natelson's Adventure with Steorn

Today, skeptical points us to a blog entry by Dr. Doug Natelson, an associate professor at Rice University:

I actually did communicate with Steorn last fall; while the had some interest in talking to me, they did not come close to answering my questions about how their jury process was supposed to work (e.g., would scientists actually be able to play with the gadget in an off-site laboratory; did Steorn really mean that their machine produced energy, or were they trying to finesse conventional jargon by talking about "coefficients of performance greater than one" (which may mean nothing for a refrigerator, for example)). I'm willing to wager that they have not discovered a loophole in the first law of thermodynamics. It will be interesting to hear what they report, and whether any actual scientists would be willing to stand up and back Steorn's claims.

This got Sean's attention:

Interesting, I will pull the correspondence on this person (Doug) tomorrow (if they did in fact apply) and post back on the matter.

And Dr. Natelson replied on his blog:

They asked me; I declined. There isn't much correspondence - two emails from me, IIRC. Discussion was done over the phone. Believe me, I would love it if I were wrong - it'd be the biggest scientific news of the century. However, having an open mind doesn't mean believing everything people tell you uncritically.

Finally, Sean had this to say:

Well all our calls are recorded so I will check these also, I would not like to think that the guy was treated unfairly.

Both Sean and Dr. Natelson will most likely post more details tomorrow, including emails and possibly even the telephone conversations between the two.

In the News and in the Forums

Today the rest of the world heard a little bit about Steorn through Engadget and Digg. Both sites featured the news that Steorn will be releasing an update this Friday. My hunch is that the actual news will make an even bigger splash.

Also, in the forums today Sean had some more information to share:

I have always stated that the ONLY way to confirm we have what we claim to have is a full evaluation by experts, this is what the Jury are up to. The reason for the July demo will be addressed in the video update on Friday.

It's nice to know that we'll learn something new on Friday! Also, Sean made this comment in response to Kent767's inquiry about a major investor in Steorn:

The Patmore Group that is a Steorn shareholder is not an Irish company and hence you will not find them on cro.ie

If someone does dig up more information about the Patmore Group, we'd all be very interested in hearing about it. Some more notable quotes from Sean:

When the documentary is released I think that you get a greater understanding of why we felt that we had no other choice but to take this route, until then you can take my word for it, or not.

EarthTech International was brought up today in the forums. Here's what Sean had to say about the company:

I must state the I have a huge respect for EarthTech, we do have an NDA in place with them and I am sure we will discuss ways to work together. I should also point out that this is nothing more than an NDA and they have in no way endorsed our technology, I state this simply to let you know that we are very interested in getting their views on what we are doing.

Dr. Harold Puthoff is the CEO of ETI. We've seen that name floated around before, now we know that at least something is going on between the two companies.

And a final note, the Steorn's Orbo blog has moved to a new domain. All of us bloggers are careful not to upset Mr. McCarthy.

The Fence - By Spiritual Beggar

Wow... This is fantastic Spiritual Beggar. We'll see if there is any shift in movement to the left or right after this Friday!

A Chat with Sean

Thanks to Rhaomi's posting on the webchat Gabbly, many of us tonight got to speak with Sean about upcoming events at Steorn. Discussions like these make me question the possibility of this being a scam. An anonymous user posted the whole transcript in a comment on this blog in an earlier post, but I've pulled out Sean's highlights. Note that I've corrected some grammatical errors so it's easier to read, and I've done my best to not take comments out of context... Please correct me if I've made any mistakes:

:: what can we expect on friday the 13th?
Steorn: not at lot, most of the stuff you guys know - it is an update for people who do not spend too much time watching us

steorntracker: Sean, do you expect anything exciting to happen at Steorn between now and the July demos?
Steorn: Anything exciting, not really, if you believe it or not, we are focused on the validation, and this keeps us busy

steorntracker: How is the SPDC going Sean? Any new modules coming out soon for them to play with?
Steorn: There was a video experiment last week and a new module, I believe that another module goes up this week and another video experiment the week after

gabber196: Sean, have you any ideas about solid state version of your technology ?
Steorn: solid state would be the holy grail - cant get my head around how it could be done, but we do need to spend some time on it

steorntracker: Sean, patent question for ya... Any idea when we'll start seeing your latest patent apps on the web? It seems to take about 8 months for them to appear.
Steorn: On patents, not for a while, we use provisionals, then changes and so on to keep them out of the public domain!


Steorn: But the funny thing is that most of the 'revelations' in the SPDC could have been worked out in a pretty logical fashion!

In Reference to the Video to be published Friday:
energyman8: Hows it lookin Sean?
Steorn: The setting is nice, the fat fella in the camera should be changed, other than that ...

TESLA: how much for the license?
Steorn: The license fees are not yet decided

Rhaomi: how will the third-world charity thing work?
Steorn: the humanitarian stuff is simple - there will be no money due to steorn

steorntracker: Any feel on when the Jury process will be complete? Do you think it'll be around the time of your July demos?
Steorn: No, validation will not be completed y July

yossarian: Steorn, considering the lack of infrastructure in Africa how would you suggest your tech best be implemented?
Steorn: Ok on the Africa thing we are putting our money where our mouth is, but we will not solve the problems, just give i some focus

GravityBoots: Not much mention of the water pump recently...how's that coming along?
Steorn: Not much mention of anything to be honest, but we have appointed a local engineering company in Africa to start the build
Steorn: The pump is designed yes, we are getting a company in Africa to build it

Rhaomi: What about the goal of validation?
Steorn: The goal of validation is simple - to get the world of science to acknowledge that it works
Rhaomi: so no attempt to formulate it?
Rhaomi: or to try to integrate it into current scientific understanding?
Steorn: we think that it fits in pretty well with most of science
Note: I'm not sure what Sean is saying nope to here...
Steorn: nope - I think that we will see a redefinition of what energy is

gabber699: So what is the next big thing after "free energy"?
Steorn: well I do not want to be in this position again! I will go back to developing antifraud tech
Steorn: thats what I love
gabber699: but its like discovering electricity then saying your going back to farming.
Steorn: not at all, there is nothing particularly complicated about this tech, the battle here is a PR battle, how do you change a state of mind

Karellen: if validation is completed, will there be an announcement by steorn or is every jury member going to publish results on their own ?
Steorn: The jury will publish as a group and be available to the media

Rhaomi: How is the validation going, anyway?
Steorn: well the Jury process is long and very indepth - as it has to be, our original estimate is that it would take a couple of years

steorntracker: Do you think the July demos will cause problems with the Jury? Jumping the gun on validation possibly?
Steorn: No - there is no conflict with the Jury on the July demos

TESLA: and do you have a plan C still?
Steorn: We no longer need Plan C

gabber527: It's simple? and validation takes a year?
Steorn: A serious review of this technology takes very carefully designed experiments, time to conduct the tests, review the data and on to the next tests.

dtorus: sean: end of this year, beginning of next - are you referring to all 3 phases?
Steorn: yes

steorntracker: With the July demos, the SPDC and activites like Dr. Mike visiting between now and the end of this year, do you think the Jury becomes somewhat irrelevant?
Steorn: no July is important to put the technology back onto the public agenda

crazy: Li-ion batteries were never validated in such a way and sell like ..crazy
Steorn: indeed, but li-ion is not a claim against fundamental science!

WhiteLite: Sean, have you contacted the press about July yet? If so are they interested or where they like "yeah whatever"?
Steorn: Hi WL - we get requests for interviews every week and turn them down. We are happy that we will get a lot of exposure in July
Steorn: When I say happy, its great as a company, but feckin difficult as an individual

Rhaomi: how concerned are you with leaks from the SPDC? Or even from the people you work with or from inside Steorn?
Steorn: leaks, not that concerned, leaks happen - we have nothing to hide

jellybean: just a thought... what would have happened if you had decided to quietly develope and release a product on the market and then people just sort of found out once they had bought it.. instead of all of this validation stuff
Steorn: hi Jellybean - we decided not just to start selling the stuff because it would be written off as a fraud - validate then commecialize

avid_engineer: Anyone know if an estimate is set for completing the documentary work?
Steorn: The documentary will only be completed with validation , since interviews with the jury will form part of it

Fiksu_V: I still want to get an answer to whether the results will only be published after all three phases
Steorn: @ FV- we will only release reports with the agreement of the Jury - now if for example the full thermodynamic analysis requires a search for ZPE or mass loss the it is most likely that a report will be released before such tests (that could take tens o years are done)

fizzoid!: so 5 years from now, will the world look different?
Steorn: in 5 years, for sure

energyman8: Sean, how much do you plan on expanding the company once this is all over?
Steorn: @ E8, to be honest once the validation is in and the full developers forum is rolling I doubt that I will stay in Steorn much longer - hand over the reigns to someone who is better at that kinda thing than me

WhiteLite: I guess you'll have enough money to persue all those cool engineering projects you've always wanted to do
Steorn: Money, the funny thing is that it is the last thing in the world I could give a sh*t about

supes: so, april 13th is the sure date for the updates?
Steorn: yep - friday the 13th - watching it now - not a lot to say to be honest

Referring to the video:
Fiksu_V: how long is it?
Steorn: about 5 mins

Referring to the Steorn Product:
crazy: how much will it cost ?
Steorn: the price and the product itself I will not go into at the moment

GravityBoots: As CEO you have company shares....what about the rest of your staff...will they get a nice hefty bonus when this is all over?
Steorn: @ GB - all the staff are shareholders (or at least the paper work is in place)

Dirtfarmer: So Sean, brutal three weeks or so? Still getting another working vacation, or has that passed?
Steorn: lol, I love to moan about my workload, but went mad over the long weekend when I was not allowed to work- heck this is great fun

crazy: are there plans to keep the forum running for ever?
Steorn: we have no plans to shut the forum - we will open it up again in July
gabber81: What you mean you'll open the forum again in July? Are you closing it?
Steorn: nope - at the moment new members cant post and there are a few banned members out there that we will welcome back!

steorntracker: Sean, is this the first time you raised millions for a venture?
Steorn: @ steorntracker - no I spent a year with an irish company called microsol - from memory we raised about 7 million
steorntracker: Sean, how often do you meet with Steorn's investors? How have they handled the ride so far?
Steorn: @ st - several times a year - and yes they are happy - we are on plan

Kent767: so sean... a simple emoticon response will suffice... how's the jury process going?
Steorn: good

Dirtfarmer: So Sean, can I assume you did initially hire the documentary team? or how would they approach you? (post ad perhaps?)
Steorn: @ DF - they in fact do most of the stuff for U2 so there was a bit of a third party connection
energyman8: you are friends with Sir Bono Sean?
Steorn: Nope

Kent767: Sean was the demo reel shown at Kinetica going to be the same device as you originally planned to demo?
Steorn: @ kent - nope

Sean, thanks for taking the time to answer our questions!

Blog Comments

Due to some unfortunate events tonight, I've enabled moderated comments. Intelligent comments and questions are still welcome. Thank you to those who've commented to date, it's unfortunate that one person caused all of this.

Fire Hose Today in the Forums

Sean was back in the forums today and had a lot to say. Here is a summary so you don't have to read all 316 comments (and growing) left in the Steorn's investment background? thread.

In reference to Thicket's "Despite superficial appearances, all the Steorn investors seem to be private individuals. There are no institutional investors." Sean started us off with this:

Well first this statement is not true, indeed if you look at the information there are several 'institutional' investors listed in the post. But regardless of this, the point is that there is no point - this after all the bull posted about Steorn means what? Well the answer is of course nothing.

I disagree with Sean here on his second point. Thicket hasn't reached any conclusions yet, just digging into Steorn's financials. If we all look at the data and don't see anything suspicious, that is a plus for Steorn. Here is a follow up on Thicket's banning and what may get others banned in the future:

I will also add that I have no problem at all with honest skeptics, indeed I would encourage this. However using our forum for anti-Steorn propaganda that is based upon lies and half truths is a different matter.

And an update on the April 15th vs. End of Q1 comment:

Hi Lister, to be honest I have just been too busy, really wanted to avoid the 1st April thing - anyway the updates will happen on Friday

Here is a personal apology from Sean to Rhaomi for banning him. Meta also got unbanned soon after Rhaomi. Also note his position on posting theories:

First have to say that I am very sorry, my bad!!!! Anyway I do not have a problem with theories, I do not want a forum of believers (I do not think that there is enough information for anyone to believe at this stage). The fraud/scam stuff is just wrong and I do have bad days!

Steorn then asked Rhaomi to post his theories, twice actually. Here is Steorn's reply on the Mocumentary theory:

Ok, I can understand this point of view. Indeed it is one that we identified very early on. So in signing up the documentary crew, we made it a contractual point that we neither profit from the proceeds of the film, or have any editorial control (the same is true for the book). Now Crank can discuss this with the film crew and indeed have a copy of the contract (if she does not already have it). Of course people can always say that Crank is a plant but there is only so much that we can do to prove stuff over the net!
...
I wish I had more time because most of this stuff can be dealt with (again and again) to the satisfaction of a reasonable skeptic.

Here is Sean's reply to Rhaomi's "wrong with measurements" theory:

Ok, the most probable explanation is in fact that we just got it wrong, I could explain for example self sustaining devices without CoE violation. The probability of us being right is in fact very, very slim. However it is a very far cry from this position to fraud. We have done as much as possible to demonstrate this, everything that we do is always weighed against the question of what would those who would cry fraud say about this - and how do we mitigate these cries. We are right or wrong about the technology and the Jury is out on this question!

In response to Kent767 about how Sean would react if he were to encounter a claim like Steorn's:

If the roles were reversed I would be (1) curious (2) check for a fraud/publicity stunt and when I had ruled this out I would guess that you got it wrong but wish you all the luck in the world and hope that you where right. I would then get on with my life.

I asked Sean about the leaked juror and also about when Steorn originally thought of creating the SPDC:

I will never comment on speculation on who is in or out of the Jury. The SPDC concept has been in our plans since early last year.

In response to Kent767's proposed "steal money from the investors" theory:

Ok, but this is where your theory falls apart, the company has raised money, I get none of it and take all the risk - so you believe that I would sacrifice my career and ruin my family for a crappy salary?
...
Ok, so I am now going to empty the company bank account and head for a warm country with no extradition - again this falls apart because if I was going to do this I would have done it before the publicity and all the money that we have spent since. Why have my face all over the net and a far smaller bank account to rob?

Kent767 then suggests maybe it is a long con scam. Here is Sean's reply:

Ok, but for this theory to work, there must be a lot more money coming in soon - from where?

From Kent767:

100,000 units of a fake product? From book deals on the greatest prank pulled in the 21st century?? All seem more probable than free energy.

Sean's reply:

Ok, now how much do I have to spend to rig a Jury? Where is my profit, all seems less likely than us being wrong.

And to finish off the debate with Kent767, Sean updates us all on how much funding Steorn has at the moment:

Were does the 3 million number come from??? We have funding well in excess of 10 million. Your position may make some sense to you, but it is wrong - time will tell.

Now onto Friday's update:

Well, instead of a press release kinda of thing we are going to do a video interview (its being filmed tomorrow). It will touch on a whole load of issues including the Jury.

Along with details on FraudHalt and Steorn Nominees:

FraudHalt was a customer (I am still the CTO of the company) and Steorn Nominees was a holding company for our investment in Orbo Ltd.
...
First the position is unpaid and is due to historical reasons (I am the architect of their products).

icuken asks if Steorn is still planning on having Dr. Mike visit:

Yes - I need to follow-up with Mike, will happen next week.

Here are details about Steorn's licensing approach:

Our plan is an equal access plan. Following validation anyone who wants access gets its. We will not deliver products to market (the 100,000 units are really just validation) - at the end of the day the market will decide where the technology goes and at what pace.

It was a breath of fresh air to have Sean back in the forums. Things have been awfully slow lately without real content. I look forward to watching the video on Friday!

A Name Change

Steorn was busy in the forums today. I'll get to the interesting posts later tonight, but first I wanted to address Sean's comment:

Hi SteornTracker - its good to be back ... there will be an update on the Jury process on Friday and I will never comment on speculation on who is in or out of the Jury. The SPDC concept has been in our plans since early last year.

And I must also apologize in advance for the nasty letter that you are going to get from our lawyers in the next few days.

He followed up the "apology" with this:

Well any URL with Steorn or Orbo in it is getting a letter, we need to enforce our trademarks, it has nothing to do with the content.

After doing some digging, I found that I'm somewhere between fair use and trademark infringement. I see no reason going down the legal path when all I have to do is make a quick change to the website. So everyone, welcome to the Free Energy Tracker blog.

A Video and a Banning

In the forums today, Sean links us to this fun video exploring Steorn's office:


As Fiksu_Vekotin puts it "The people working at Steorn are actually.. people." It's nice to see some of their labs and the upbeat tempo of the Steorn employees.

On a sad note for some of us, as seen in previous comment posts here at SteornTracker, Thicket and his 11 or so other usernames have all been and his username Thicket_ have been banned from the Steorn forums. Thicket posted a now removed post insulting Sean, and I assume it was the straw that broke the camels back.

edit: I've updated the info on Thickets banning, my mistake. There were others banned also yesterday, and it is unclear why some of them were. We don't have a reason for some of the bannings, and we realize it's Sean's prerogative to ban anyone he chooses. We're almost getting to the point where we need an independent forum ;-(.

Update on the Updates

From Steorn:

Hi Folks,

Its been a while - just to let you know that we will be releasing the update on the Jury process and so on on Friday April 13th.

Thanks,

Sean

urbanvibration had this to say:

We don't even know if there will be any news, that last time he said that there wasn't.

And Sean replied:

and yes there will be some new info ....

Sean also stated that end of Q1 is actually April 15th, so technically Steorn isn't late with their news. Now we just have to make it through next week!

Dr. Mike's Visit

Here is the latest from Dr. Mike on his potential visit:

And no, not one word boo since they told me they got the NDA. So we all wait.

Also note, I've got access to Steorn's 2005 financials thanks to nleseul, and there have been some interesting discussions in the forums regarding how Steorn originally discovered their claimed over unity machines. I plan on digging into both this weekend so we'll have something to keep ourselves busy with as we all wait.

When the SPDC goes down...

When the SPDC goes down, we actually get updates and discussion on the forums! We had a few interesting posts in the What's been happening in the SPDC? discussion. SeamusF defends Sean in this reply to Thicket_:

Thicket_: It's only a matter of opinion if you DON'T know much about physics. If you DO have a grasp of physics, it's obvious that Sean knew very little and Hairy cornered and trashed him on several occasions on basic Physics issues.

And where was Sean trashed by Physics questions? Can you please provide questions on Physics theory/application that HK posed and Sean could not answer?

Also, enginerd gave a great update on the general feel of the SPDC:

The reports here about what goes on in the spdc forum are not hiding anything. If you want drama, you can pretend that all kinds of information is pouring into that forum and that all us members have nearly finished orbo powered clocks in our workshops.

The truth is that we are reviewing information from the learning modules and recently a video about steorn-effect linked magnetic properties. We are discussing stuff very much as is done here but more politely. There are many more posts in the "relaxation zone" category (where the non-technical talk is supposed to take place) than there is in the "searching for OU" category or the "magnetic effects" category.

Lots of feedback has been provided to make the learning tools better. We are looking forward to when the learning tools will proceed past general basics and get into steorn-effect specifics.

I would be very very surprised if we are told anything that would provide any understanding of "the effect" until the jury has spoken. Otherwise, what point the jury?

And of course we're still waiting for the Q1 Update, but at least something was discussed today!

A Slow Start to April

This has been a painfully slow week here at SteornTracker. Here's one of the more interesting discussions going on in the forums while we wait to hear from Steorn. keelymoto points us to Steorn's latest financial filings in the discussion Annual Return:

From what I can gather HERE;

http://www.cro.ie/search/submissionse.asp?number=330508&BI=C

it seems Steorn made submitted their latest Annual return on 12 March 07 - has this been flagged before, Sorry for causing yawns if it has.

I've yet to look at the actual accounts - has anyone done so yet? Seeing as were waiting for other info, I wondered if anything can be gleaned...

Also note that April first has come and gone. At least that removes one of the more wackier theories of what has been going on with Steorn. There were plenty of great April Fools pranks online this year, but none of them had to do with Steorn.

You Know Its a Slow Day in the Forums When...

crank doesn't even post ;-(

Sorry, nothing to report today. Hopefully we'll have a busy week of reporting once Steorn releases their updates this week.