Rossi: Litigation to Last ‘at Least One Year’

Quote from oldguy

Abd- I don't think so.

Great minds think and don't think alike.

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Yes, I find it ludicrous to think that IH was formed just to shut down LENR
and that they paid 1M then 10 M because they wanted to bury LENR.

Does seem a bit far-fetched, eh?

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Or that Rossi did prove his technology to them and transferred working IP knowledge but IH is just sitting on it since 2013 without trying to commercialize, manufacture, and corner a trillion dollar industry.

Sifferkoll discovered a connection between Darden and a company that advises solar energy companies and lept from that to a claim that IH was trying to protect a billion-dollar investment in solar power, though, in fact, there was no evidence of such investment by Darden nor by that company. Cold fusion is a trillion dollar possibility, rapidly, if the Rossi technology were real. This would be face-palm stupid. Plus, ah, illegal, i.e., breach of contract. And ineffective. Rossi could have been working with Hydro Fusion in Sweden at any time, could have set up a demonstration plant in Sweden, easily, instead of futzing with the Doral mess. He had no more responsibility to train IH by 2015 (other than the raw IP transfer, if something was missing). So if IH was trying to keep LENR down, he could simply have given them the finger and created his market anyway with the rest of the planet.

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It is clear that IH was incorporated and spent money to make LENR work at a reasonable commercial level and that Rossi never transferred commercially workable IP to IH so that they could commercialize it.

IH was apparently rooted in a realization of the possibility that LENR could create a non-polluting energy future. That possibility is real, and was real without Rossi in the picture. Rossi, however, presented the appearance of being far ahead of the field. They needed to find out, and I'm coming to be convinced that they realized that the possibility was high of Rossi fraud. They went ahead anyway, and this has already proven to be a successful strategy, once one broadens one's horizons as to what "success" means.

1. They showed that Rossi cannot be trusted. This is not a proof that he has no technology, but that the evidence he has a technology is almost entirely suspect.
2. They have a License as a hedge in case he does create real devices that work.
3. Their bold move won the confidence of Woodford, and they gained another $50 million in funding, with the likelihood being that there is more available if needed.
4. Their reputation is high in the LENR field, high enough that they have been entrusted with hosting ICCF-21 in 2018.

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I hope that IH is not destroyed by these suits and that the continue to support research in the field.

I see no risk of that. First of all, "IH" is heavily defended. It is no longer the "owner." It is, rather, owned by IHHI, the British limited liability company that Woodford invested in. Same people, sure, but Rossi can't touch this money. He is attempting to go after Cherokee, for obvious reasons. This will fail. He is attempting to go after the personal wealth of Darden and Vaughn, which, while not so preposterous as the case against Cherokee, is still ridiculously in violation of precedent; this will also fail. Through all of this, Rossi has utterly trashed his reputation, future investors will be far more reluctant to consider dealing with him. The possibility is very substantial that Rossi will lose everything. He went a bridge too far.

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I just do not understand the views of "Planet Rossi".

It is not difficult to understand unless one expects fully-rational behavior from people. It is not rational to expect that!

Quote from JedRothwell

No one needs to shut down or bury LENR. It is dying on its own, as the researchers grow old and die. A nefarious organization opposed to cold fusion would not spend $10 million to kill it off. It would not need to spend anything, or do anything.

I've known Jed since 2009, due to his and my involvement in the Wikipedia Cold Fusion Fiasco. He has been struggling with the cold fusion rejection cascade since the 1990s, he was pretty early. Some of the old-timers in the field have become cynical and often express despair. It can come as a product of years of struggle. This also is a hazard of age, that afflicts some.

I came in from outside and took a fresh look. I developed an understanding of What Happened in 1989 and later. ("Mistakes were made.") I also, in 2011-2013 or so, took the opportunity to do intense training in transformational technology, how to create community projects and inspire others. I've been having a blast.

I have a level of sympathy for basic skepticism around cold fusion, but also an awareness of the hazards of pseudoskepticism. I have studied the material over and over and have come to certain basic conclusions, the most important of which I then expressed in my 2015 Current Science paper, and which is now the subject of a well-funded research project that, if results are as reasonably expected, will dynamite the fundamental core of the rejection cascade. This is basic science that could have been done twenty years ago, as recommended by the ERAB Panel in 1989, and confirmed by the 2004 DoE panel, and, had this been done, we might be $20 trillion ahead. But that did not happen. So now what? What can we do today?

I'm with Beaudette: Cold fusion prevailed. There are still many, many problems in the field, but they are being addressed, the world is moving on, a world that includes cold fusion research, it will not be forgotten with the last of that original generation. The physics community will awaken to an anomaly, experimental fact that was unexpected, and that may take the best minds on the planet to explain. It's going to be fun.

Quote from oldguy

Abd- I agree with most of what you said except that Woodford group did not invest more based on what they saw with Rossi but based on their visits and review of other researchers and LENR field in general. They, in fact, were "put off" by Rossi after visiting in Fl. I have some knowledge of that.

Well, oldguy, you have misunderstood me. They were impressed by IH, not by "Rossi." IH demonstrated a deep commitment and willingness to take a huge risk. I expect that Woodford was "put off" by Rossi.

Consider a visit to that "chemical plant." They are shown a warehouse with a walled-off area that they cannot look into, but the setup looks cheesy. There is no sign of major commercial activity. The power plant is sitting there. It is not uncomfortably warm. They see a steam line running into the secret area, with a return line. There is no way to actually see any evidence of power generation or dissipation, just what some instruments show, and if Rossi showed them what he showed many others with tests like that (flow rate and a stated assumption of "dry steam" without adequate instrumentation or verification on that point), and we assume that Woodford had done their homework, thoroughly, they would know that this was unverifiable at best and fraud at the worst.

Rossi claims that Woodford was very impressed and invested because of his technology. I find that implausible, though they may have been polite. So, oldguy, your knowledge is consistent with what I expect.

IH "crushed the tests." They eliminated the risk of a Rossi surprise that could make other investment moot. That is, they can now spend millions on other research, and if Rossi makes it all moot, say by coming out with a working and verifiable QuarkX product, they have a License, so they can cry all the way to the bank. Meanwhile nobody need waste more effort with Rossi or "Rossi replications," while NiH research remains, as before, in order, though not as well established as PdD.

(And Rossi remains free to pull a rabbit out of a hat and show a working commercial product with genuinely independent testing and even an available product. As long as he's not in jail, of course. I see no sign yet of a criminal prosecution, but it could happen.) IH may or may not get some of their money back. That could be a difficult call, in fact. What is the probability that, say, the QuarkX actually works? Dedicated pseudoskeptics might say "zero." Slightly more reasonable might be what I saw from a debunker of parapsychology, "1/10^20." Crazy! I would make a rough guess of p = 0.001, one in a thousand. If so, this is basically a trillion-dollar technology, the possibility is then worth a billion dollars. While they would not likely invest that as some new independent possibility, they are already invested, this is a sunk cost. Would they prefer to have the hedge or, say, $10 million? A sane answer might depend on what resources they have and what else they might do with the money. I think they are in no hurry.)

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Through all of this, Rossi has utterly trashed his reputation, future investors will be far more reluctant to consider dealing with him. The possibility is very substantial that Rossi will lose everything. He went a bridge too far.

Ya think? The AY-hole should have been disbelieved by everyone after Petroldragon and certainly after the DOD thermoelectric con/scam/lies. But he wasn't. Are there even more gullible investors out there? Who knows? All sorts of ridiculous free energy scams make lots of money on the internet every day. For example:

https://fundrazr.com/campaigns/5sLS9/ab/5440C3?

http://www.hopegirlblog.com/

http://qegfreeenergyacademy.com/

... and of course, there are many more.

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What is the probability that, say, the QuarkX actually works?

Wrong answer in your post. The correct answer is that the probability is not determinable because there are no reliable data on which to base any statistics. You can say that from general observation of Rossi, the probability is very, exceedingly low but assigning it a number is sort of stupid. How possible are my unicorns? About the same as Rossi's QuarkX, given its claimed properties and dimensions.