Saturday, April 14, 2007

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. :sad:

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!

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

In case amyone missed it the 'Update on the Update' sticky was just wiped.

That was the one that said this,

"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 "

---------------

Orwell would be proud.

Google cache here,
http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:WJpI6nVPDSMJ:www.steorn.com/forum/comments.php%3FDiscussionID%3D54881+steorn.com/forum+update&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1

Anonymous said...

I don't understand how you think that post was Orwellian. The topic didn't have any replies, so it's not like they deleted skeptical discussion. And since that date has passed, it makes perfect sense to delete the news saying "Tune in this date."

Anonymous said...

Hey! Sean is back answering questions. Someone asked Sean: How do you explain to yourself how a couple of hundred years of science and engineering could have missed the effect.

And Sean replied: "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."

Any suggestions what Sean meant by this?

Thicket said...

With respect to not providing "detailed technical specifications" Sean used the tried and true excuse that never fails.

--The lawyers made me do it.--

*snicker*

Anonymous said...

I don't understand how you think that post was Orwellian. The topic didn't have any replies, so it's not like they deleted skeptical discussion. And since that date has passed, it makes perfect sense to delete the news saying "Tune in this date."

----------------

The post itself was fine.

The problem is history. The post could have been sunk instead. 6000 threads, containing 95% garbage, are still there, but deleting the 'Update' post was crucial?

Deleting the Speedy, Noethers and other threads that highlight Seans lack of technical acumen seemed a priority to. Not Sunk, ERASED by the Ministry of Truth.

So deleting the 'Update' post is not that big of a deal in isolation, I agree. Looking at the dodge, weave, hide, ban, ( blame the lawyers, lol )environment of Steorn, it's just business as usual.

Anonymous said...

Sean’s back at it in the 'A Few Points' thread.

"Those who spread this type of thing of course have no evidence (because there is no evidence, there is no fraud)"

Am I the only one that sees the sophistry in that?

Sean's been studying;
http://www.phact.org/e/con_man.htm


I will post a full critique when ST posts a summary this evening. I have spotted some laughable stuff already.....

Anonymous said...

From now on, I suggest people use this little form when questioning Sean. I am sure he would agree that this is the only way to avoid the confusion that arises from some of his answers.

eg.

Q: Sean, will the jury members be constructing the devices they are to test?

Check one only, Y/N.
( )Y / ( )N

Additional comments;

____________________________

____________________________



This will help keep everyone clear, and make it easier for Sean answer clearly and then give an explanation of the answer.

Someone please suggest this to Sean. (Seamus, you are lurking, right?)

Anonymous said...

Whatever Steorn are up to,

I don't trust Sean and the Crank/Mag, ban/delete team.....

http://www.steorn.com/forum/comments.php?DiscussionID=44301

Sean could do much for Steorn credibility by re-posting the threads that have disappeared. Will he? Why not? Ask him why you should not be able to draw your own conclusions about what was in them?

I hope this does not seem nasty, just my take on things.

Ping1400 said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...
Whatever Steorn are up to,

I don't trust Sean and the Crank/Mag, ban/delete team.....

http://www.steorn.com/forum/comments.php?DiscussionID=44301


Yeah? well here's a case of HK being P.O.ed because his thread got hidden.. That's right
HIDDEN not deleted.

He wanted a particular post back that he worked hard on.
I was nice enough to go "dumpster-diving" and recovered his post for him. He was happy that I helped him.

I don't care if you "trust" me or not.
I'm doing what I think is best for the forum, within the guidelines as set forth to me.

A lot of other forums are moderated a lot more than this one.
I try to be "fair", but I will admit that I give preferential treatment to long-time forum members over newbies.
I could care less about what side of the fence your butt is currently on.
( it makes no difference to me; I can see the behind-the-scenes workings)
If you don't like the way things are run there, then don't go there...
it's really that simple

" Mags " :-)

Anonymous said...

"CoP v CoE" thread

* Steorn
* CommentTimeJan 18th 2007

permalink

hairykrishna:@wrench

True enough. However I don't see anything about 'output is useful work' anywhere in their 3 claims or in their 'jury process' spiel, do you? What are they including to calculate their COP is the million dollar question.



Steorn - CoP based on mech input to a cycle and mech output from a cycle.



Ummm, Input?

Anonymous said...

thread;
"Pennies points unanswered."

* CommentAuthorSteorn
* CommentTimeAug 27th 2006 edited

permalink
P.M. Man -

From a previous post:

"One last point that has been misunderstood - we have built self sustaining systems - the quote that I made was that we had never connected the technology to a generator."

We do not build products - there is a world of difference between building a product designed to perform a function with a life cycle and building a prototype. Despite all this the key issue remains, does our technology create energy? The only answer anyone will believe is based on independent tests, in independent labs, to test methods designed by experts and with the tests performed by experts. This is the process we have set up - we are at its start and at the end the answer will be available. Note also that we do not expect the tests to be performed on the technology we build, but on constructions designed by us and built by others under the supervision of the Jury. This is to avoid the potential that we have 'hidden' something in the technology, although the chances of anyone getting away with that kind of stunt are near zero.

We will play no part in the definition of the tests to be conducted, the location or the duration - we can do no more than this. We are funding the process - but only to cover costs.

This type of request for independent analysis, for this type of technology has never been done before, as far as I am aware. It remains the only way to answer the core issue.

Thanks!

Sean




-------------------

"Note also that we do not expect the tests to be performed on the technology we build, but on constructions designed by us and built by others under the supervision of the Jury."

It's there in black and white. The jury WILL have others build a divice.

Unknown said...

Mags did indeed find a post from me, for me that was no longer publicly visible. I was and am grateful.

I think 'hidden' vs. 'deleted' is semantics though. What does it matter if they have a copy of it? I count 'out of public view' (in the context of a forum) as deleted.

That said, the deleted threads of mine were no big deal. Steorn are obviously out to deceive and their 'science', what little there is of it, is written to facilitate that. Anyone who can’t (or won’t) see that isn’t going to be persuaded by my posts. I admitted a bunch of times that I’m not great at explaining/teaching physics concepts. Anyone who actually wants to learn should get themselves a copy of the ‘Feynman lectures on physics’ - torrent a pdf version if you can’t afford the book. The excellent ‘light and matter’ website is a nice start, Birmingham’s magnetic materials group did have a nice series on magnetic materials too but it seems to be down currently.


For anyone still seduced by the ‘exploiting magnetic lag’ nonsense I would suggest researching relaxation phenomenon (hysteresis) and actually understanding what you read. This may take a little work. While you’re learning you might also want to make sure you understand the distinction between the conservation of mechanical energy and total energy. I’m not sure Sean did. Appreciating what ‘coefficient of performance’ actually means should open up some questions in your mind about the stages in their ‘jury’ process too.

My magnet speed thread was a light hearted (I thought) poke at Sean’s numbers – I invite you to do your own ‘back of envelope’ speed=distance/time calculation using Sean’s ‘thought experiment’ values. You might also want to put that value, along with the mass of the magnets (from volume, density of NdFeB) into a kinetic energy calculation. Useless calculations I admit but sadly the limit of what it’s possible to work out from Sean’s ‘experimental description’.

"Keep an open mind, but not so open that your brains fall out."

Anonymous said...

Mags, Chill,


the comment was "I don't trust Sean and the Crank/Mag, ban/delete team....."


Judging by the number of times you used "I", YOU seem to have decided that the comment was about "YOU". Ask yourself why? The comment was my feelings about the Steorn Forum. You are one of the mods not all of them.


I think someone mentioned that you had some psychology training. Go put your comment on the couch and analyze it. What psychological term(s) would you use to classify the mental state of the writer if you were to look at it objectively?