EEVblog #751 - How To Debunk A Product (The Batteriser)

[SundayProgrammer]

I think that at least one contact was made a week ago. It is a comment post to a "#786" youtube video:
https://www.youtube.com/all_comments?v=3OrG5ucVQBA

On my Maker Faire video! 
No wonder I didn't see it.

Yep. A wrong place and obviously not noticed. The letter is quite polite and constructive. Is is possible to hold on "anti-batteriser videos" for a moment and listen what they have in mind.
I don't know about rest of you but I would like to see the actual product in your hands reviewed and analyzed.

Axel.

[edy]

It is interesting how the Batteriser Fan Page has access to Batterisers and signs their post "Batteriser Team" yet claims no association with Batteroo. And in their post to Dave offering a test kit (on his Maker Faire video no less) talk as if in the first person like they are from Batteriser. Yeah, they are very definitely very linked to Batteriser and have access to all the videos and inside information.

With respect to the test kit, why not do what EVERYONE ELSE has done which is send one in the mail to Dave Jones that crazy Aussie bloke, not Austria, and mail it to his mailbox PO Box. No strings attached. We don't need any video chat between Batteriser and Dave. We need a no strings attached Batteriser (or several Batterisers) in Dave's hands so he can independently test them, do a teardown and circuit analysis and review the merits of this product. I trust Dave to tell it like it is, and if the Batteriser has any usefulness in certain cases I am sure he will point it out.

[Fungus]

Is is possible to hold on "anti-batteriser videos" for a moment and listen what they have in mind.

What "anti-batteriser" videos?

I haven't seen any "anti-batteriser" videos on here.

I've seen some videos pointing out technical mistakes in the Batteriser claims, some videos calling them clowns when they deserve it by acting like clowns, but no "anti-batteriser" videos.

[firewalker]

Ok, Dave, accept the offering of a Batteriser. 
 
Alexander.

[tree]

It is interesting how the Batteriser Fan Page has access to Batterisers and signs their post "Batteriser Team" yet claims no association with Batteroo. And in their post to Dave offering a test kit (on his Maker Faire video no less) talk as if in the first person like they are from Batteriser. Yeah, they are very definitely very linked to Batteriser and have access to all the videos and inside information.

With respect to the test kit, why not do what EVERYONE ELSE has done which is send one in the mail to Dave Jones that crazy Aussie bloke, not Austria, and mail it to his mailbox PO Box. No strings attached. We don't need any video chat between Batteriser and Dave. We need a no strings attached Batteriser (or several Batterisers) in Dave's hands so he can independently test them, do a teardown and circuit analysis and review the merits of this product. I trust Dave to tell it like it is, and if the Batteriser has any usefulness in certain cases I am sure he will point it out.

It's obvious Dave tries to be as unbiased as possible. I think in the first debunking video he mentions that it might have uses in certain applications but those applications are far and few between. The biggest [technical] issue is their original claim of 800% more battery life which then changed to 80% more. The former being absolutely ridiculous and the latter also  ridiculous but to average Joe they perhaps thought it would seem "plausible". It might be a good product for incandescent flashlights for instance, but it will NOT give you 80% more battery life. If anything, it will ensure that you have constant brightness at the expense of reduced battery life. if they came out with a claim such as this I'm sure no one would care and we might have though it would have been a great product.

[5ky]

...
o There is continual requoting that the GPS is "well designed", however I wouldn't say so if the device was designed for alkaline batteries and reboots when the voltage dips due to creating 600mA current spikes. However, Garmin recommend NiMH and Li presumeably for exactly this reason. Online reviews of the device refer to strange battery behaviour too, so is it really that "well designed"?
...
o The GPS test is not a representative use case. Not only are they not using recommended cells, the high energy, sunlight-readable display is continually kept active by tapping the touch screen. In real use this would not be the case. In addition, the GPS will continually be in acquisition mode as the test is performed inside.

I don't necessarily have a problem with these two issues raised.  In the latter statement, sure, it's not a representative use case, but at least it's apples to apples.  It speeds up the test by keeping the backlight on.  We do similar types of accelerated lifetime testing so we don't have to literally test a product out to 100K power on hours.  The one caveat is this though:  as I've mentioned before, use of the Batteriser will defeat the screen dimming power saving feature and theoretically shorten battery life because of that.  If the device is readable in all situations where it would be used without the backlight, then I would say yes, it's fair to test the unit without the "finger pressing".  Although in this case, it seems like a really poor design that the backlight is on unnecessarily when the battery is fresh.

As for the former issue:  use in older and poorly designed products.  My feeling is that if there are a lot of these products out there in people's homes, then it's fair to put those types of products forward as candidates for Batteriser use.  If there really were a lot of these products that had high cut-off voltages or shut off prematurely after the slightest "kiss" of the cut-off voltage, then fine, there is a case to be made for the Batteriser.  Dave showed in the first video that high cut-off voltage devices don't exist (although I will say that Dave probably has higher than average quality devices lying around).  And I bet they had to specifically search for a device that exhibited this kind of behavior.  I don't think it's common at all.

I guess most damning though is the fact that I am now convinced that they cheated on the GPS test.  Did the GPS actually shut off shortly after the screen dimmed or did they just declare it dead and turn it off manually.  I don't think there was enough to go on in the original video to make this call.  But very clearly in the full length video Chris points to the point at which the device died, and clearly it did not.  I'm usually willing to give people the benefit of the doubt until more data is provided, but in this case I really think they cheated.

Without even testing, I guarantee they just stopped the test when the screen brightness warning came on.  The thing ran down to 1.1v per cell, which is the majority of the energy in those AA's, and what's left could not possibly run the GPS unit 5x longer.  Not possible.  But there's no way I'm going to stop there when I can make a video to disprove their dishonest marketing further.

I got the test rig mostly set up last night.  Similar to theirs, only I'm using a servo instead of a "taken-apart" relay.  I'll use the same interval for touching the screen.  I'm going to datalog the whole thing too.  I'm going to use my 34461A to datalog via Agilent's BenchVue software.  I figure it's worth doing some high resolution datalogging to see if these voltage "dips" really exist or not.

I agree that using the batteriser will probably HURT the battery life of that unit since it defeats the battery saving screen dimming feature.  I have another garmin gps unit, non touchscreen, that uses the exact same LCD screen and without the backlight on, it'll go all day no problem.  I've taken it on several float trips where we started at 7am and we didn't get back until ~12 hrs later.  The GPS was on the entire time and didn't ever give any warnings about battery life the entire time.  (it uses AA's just like the approach G3)  There's no way batteriser gave them 5x the time. 

EDIT:  I forgot, that's not to mention the 10-15%+ loss in the boost converter

[Fungus]

EDIT:  I forgot, that's not to mention the 10-15%+ loss in the boost converter

10-15% is rather generous IMHO. If you could get 10-15% efficiency out of a tiny inductor with voltage doubling and "as much current as a battery is able to supply to the device" (Batteroo's words) then somebody would have already noticed by now.

Linear Tech, Analog Devices, TI, etc. have been working on this problem for decades.

But hey, feel free to prove me wrong. I'll survive the shaming! 

[samgab]

...I got the test rig mostly set up last night.  Similar to theirs, only I'm using a servo instead of a "taken-apart" relay.  I'll use the same interval for touching the screen.  I'm going to datalog the whole thing too.  I'm going to use my 34461A to datalog via Agilent's BenchVue software.  I figure it's worth doing some high resolution datalogging to see if these voltage "dips" really exist or not...

Can't wait to see your video response 

[Fungus]

...I got the test rig mostly set up last night.  Similar to theirs, only I'm using a servo instead of a "taken-apart" relay.  I'll use the same interval for touching the screen.  I'm going to datalog the whole thing too.  I'm going to use my 34461A to datalog via Agilent's BenchVue software.  I figure it's worth doing some high resolution datalogging to see if these voltage "dips" really exist or not...

Can't wait to see your video response 

Be sure to get a clear shot of the screen when the "NiMH" message appears and good footage of you dismissing the message before continuing the test for several more hours.

[FrankBuss]

I got the test rig mostly set up last night.  Similar to theirs, only I'm using a servo instead of a "taken-apart" relay.  I'll use the same interval for touching the screen.  I'm going to datalog the whole thing too.  I'm going to use my 34461A to datalog via Agilent's BenchVue software.  I figure it's worth doing some high resolution datalogging to see if these voltage "dips" really exist or not.

Please do a teardown after your tests, some highres photos of the circuit board, or just send it to Dave

[firewalker]

Alexander.

[timofonic]

Well there you go, they backed down and apologised
After Batteroo kicked their arse of course.
What's this rubbish about Batteroo not being able to set up a Youtube channel though? They have a ton of money, make all these professional videos, have a Vimeo channel, social media to the wazoo, but have no idea about how to set up a Youtube channel? Sorry, I'm not buying it.

 ¯\_(?)_/¯


It's a wise combination of astroturfing and a tricky try to avoid legal responsibility to the information in their videos.

The fanboys were a way to do bullying by proxy and make astroturfing a bit less obvious or obfuscated, but this crap can be researched.

Maybe they didn't research a shit about EE for the product, but they seem smart asses

That's the link I shared a few pages back: https://plus.google.com/106095496873834311761/posts/9zCvkcWPjhu

Wow 
All this fun happening I didn't know about!
Seems like he's stopped posting now.
I wouldn't be surprised if he nuked the whole Youtube channel  and g+ account.
Those playing along at home should take captures while they still can.

What about contacting organizations like this?

http://www.fraud.org
http://scambust.org

Maybe there are more a lot sites like this, I don't know right now.

Kind regards.

[edy]

This illustrates some of the two-sided coin that is crowd-funding. Namely, while it helps to promote your product (the media and hype train) that follows very successful Kickstarter and IndieGogo campaigns, it can also work against you.

I do not believe Batteriser needed the money necessarily from IndieGogo. It was purely a strategic play on the part of their investment capitalists and PR firm to create promotion. However, early release of the concept to market (before product availability) created a huge opportunity for analysis which, in the case of Batteriser, created more negativity.

Looking back, I think they would have been better off just releasing the thing on the unsuspecting public and marketing the heck out of it in more traditional ways. By the time anyone figured anything out, they would have sold millions because items that cheap tend not to bother consumers much if they feel it was a waste. "Oh well, I spent $2.50 at Wal-Mart when I bought my batteries for my kids toy and it didn't really work, who cares?".

When the dust finally settles and we have some more history behind us sometime in the fall and next year, there will be a lot to learn from this story, even more than the electronics that we are focusing on now. I do hope the Batteriser materializes... It would be a shame for it to just vanish. While that may be better to avoid a potential "scam" situation, we would never quite get full closure on this. We'd always be left wondering, what exactly was in that device and what was the performance?

I eagerly await the release of the Batteriser when everyone in the world will have access to it and we all can independently evaluate it. If nothing more, it may be an interesting gadget to hack and use the bits from to do various other things.

[Fungus]

I do hope the Batteriser materializes...

Has anybody come up with a device that's designed: a) to run on common alkaline/NiMH batteries, and b) that has a cutoff voltage above 1.1V?

Until we do, Batterizer is worse then useless. It will shorten battery life.

nb. This is being generous and assuming an 80-90% conversion efficiency. It can get a lot worse.

By the time anyone figured anything out, they would have sold millions because items that cheap tend not to bother consumers much if they feel it was a waste. "Oh well, I spent $2.50 at Wal-Mart when I bought my batteries for my kids toy and it didn't really work, who cares?".

Nope. People should be protected against false claims and snake-oil products.

(And yes, there are laws...)

[edy]

Nope. People should be protected against false claims and snake-oil products.
(And yes, there are laws...)

Yes true. Unfortunately we are not in the position here on EEVBlog to be the police. I don't think Dave wants to necessarily police the entire world of crappy electronics products either. But calling out fakes and scams, flooding the internet with "balancing" viewpoints (to counter-act the media PR spin) and informing the real CONSUMER PROTECTION bureaus is all that we can really do? No?

The problem is, until a product is actually "out in the market" nothing can be done. You can't stop a product that doesn't exist and hasn't actually harmed anyone yet, nor gone through testing to dispute false advertising. So until Batteriser actually exists, we can all bark and shout but the real "police" won't be able to do anything.


EDIT:  One other thing - once the Batteriser is physically being produced and can be tested, there will be independently verifiable and reproducible data that can be used for any lawsuits claiming false advertising, harm to people and devices, and so on. Then the lawyers can nail Batteriser to the wall and make them pay. But until then, we can only discuss the scientific merits of their claims on theory only. Unless they have discovered some "magical sauce" that is in the Batteriser, we will know soon enough.

EDIT 2: Case in point - The "Airing" (https://www.eevblog.com/forum/crowd-funded-projects/the-airing/) is a crowd-funded project that has over $1,000,000 in money raised. It has the real potential to harm people, and everything points to it being a SCAM OF MONUMENTAL PROPORTIONS. IndieGogo washes their hands of it. The campaign site has been white-washed of all negative comments, serious questions and critiques. Medically-compromised people are desperate for this to work and have paid on average > $100 each to get in on this. We won't know for 2-3 years what will be, and by my understanding of the laws regarding crowd-funding campaigns, there is NO LEGAL RECOURSE anyone can take at this point to bust it open. By comparison, the Batteriser is small-potatoes.

[jippie]

What is the use of announcing that you will be announcing "great news" some time soon? If you know you have "great news", why not just share it? This isn't the first time they announce the announcement of some time soon great news.

[Fungus]

The problem is, until a product is actually "out in the market" nothing can be done. You can't stop a product that doesn't exist and hasn't actually harmed anyone yet, nor gone through testing to dispute false advertising. So until Batteriser actually exists, we can all bark and shout but the real "police" won't be able to do anything.

EDIT:  One other thing - once the Batteriser is physically being produced and can be tested, there will be independently verifiable and reproducible data that can be used for any lawsuits claiming false advertising, harm to people and devices, and so on. Then the lawyers can nail Batteriser to the wall and make them pay. But until then, we can only discuss the scientific merits of their claims on theory only. Unless they have discovered some "magical sauce" that is in the Batteriser, we will know soon enough.

We don't need to own a Batteriser to measure cutoff voltages or pull batteries out of our devices and test their "only 20% used" claim.

We don't need to own a Batteriser to know their videos are lies - we can see them measuring batteries open-circuit right there on video, despite their own FAQ telling us this is the wrong way to do it. Daves measurements of the monkey are just icing on the cake.

[edy]

We don't need to own a Batteriser to measure cutoff voltages or pull batteries out of our devices and test their "only 20% used" claim.

We don't need to own a Batteriser to know their videos are lies - we can see them measuring batteries open-circuit right there on video, despite their own FAQ telling us this is the wrong way to do it. Daves measurements of the monkey are just icing on the cake.

I agree. The videos are all marketing B.S. - but because they have not sold anybody anything yet, there is no actual legal recourse. Sure they took a bunch of money from crowd-funders... over $300,000, and promised them absolute horse manure. But the laws have not caught up to this yet. Batteroo can still refund the money. None of the backers are getting together (yet) to demand any compensation... They willingly gave Batteroo money. There are still no victims to come forward.

After a few months, when the backers start getting their Batteriser and find out it is complete nonsense, perhaps they will launch a class-action lawsuit against Batteroo for damages. On the other hand, if Batteroo delays and stalls on delivering the Batteriser or never fulfill their campaign promise, the backers can sue them for a refund of the money.

The way crowd-funding is legally worded, I believe it is very hard to argue a case. There is only 1 that I know of in the news that finally got sued (a Kickstarter campaign). Many hundreds of scams have never had any legal recourse, even after the campaign creator took off with all the money.

We really need a lawyer who knows this stuff to explain the ramifications of crowd-funding campaigns and how false and misleading advertising is regulated in this new arena, whether "the public" needs protection or only people who are "backers" (a very different group) as they could argue that it is very different from a product sold on the shelves in the open, versus an investment or support or donation to develop a product.... with a "reward" attached. I'm not a lawyer, so I don't know. The fact that so many scammers go to IndieGogo and Kickstarter is likely due to the very shady legal frameworks and they know it.

[TheAmmoniacal]

I don't understand why anyone is talking about legal recourse, lawsuits? What.

What we are seeing here is simply the biology equivalent of creationism. Whenever you see nonsense like this in tech, debunk it, debate it, explain why they are lying, give the science. When they want to teach overunity and free perpetual motion physics in the classrooms, that's when the law comes into the discussion.

[edy]

I don't understand why anyone is talking about legal recourse, lawsuits? What.

What we are seeing here is simply the biology equivalent of creationism. Whenever you see nonsense like this in tech, debunk it, debate it, explain why they are lying, give the science. When they want to teach overunity and free perpetual motion physics in the classrooms, that's when the law comes into the discussion.

Exactly. The way I see it is this. Batteroo has $300,000 of people's money. Either they deliver what the backers expect, or they don't, in which case they will have a bunch of angry people wanting their money back. Batteroo has dug this hole for themselves. They will have to answer for it, one way or the other.

Meanwhile, the rest of us who are watching this debacle are doing what we can to uncover the nonsense with the only objective reproducible non-biased approach possible.... the science. Dave and many others have done testing and critical analysis that will have hopefully educated many more people that otherwise would have known about it.

The only "legal" contract that is involved here is between backers and Batteroo, or when (and if) it ever gets sold to the consumer public, will be between people who buy it, or not.

[TheAmmoniacal]

Except Indiegogo specifically states that backers have no rights here, all and any support is between the backer and the campaign. There's no contract or expectation of delivery of these perks. Kind companies try to give back the money, but they don't have to. Failed startups get away with this all the time, the sums involved per individual is usually too low for anyone to 'really' care.

I think you would win if you were to take them to court, as the government do treat campaign perks as purchases (at least that's how they tax them here). Anyone in the US now the VAT rates charged on these campaigns?

[Galenbo]

What "anti-batteriser" videos?

I haven't seen any "anti-batteriser" videos on here.

I've seen some videos pointing out technical mistakes in the Batteriser claims, some videos calling them clowns when they deserve it by acting like clowns, but no "anti-batteriser" videos.

As there is still no product/proto/schematic/documentation/... some people see "batteriser" as just collection of false promises, lies and scam.
In that definition, I am definitely anti-batteriser.

[Galenbo]

...
The only "legal" contract that is involved here is between backers and Batteroo, or when (and if) it ever gets sold to the consumer public, will be between people who buy it, or not.

False marketing is illegal, customers or not.
Falsely discredit a company like in their comments is illegal too.

[Fungus]

Except Indiegogo specifically states that backers have no rights here

No legal recourse against IndieGoGo isn't the same as "no rights".

[TheAmmoniacal]

Interestingly, indiegogo is now starting a refund scheme (only started 1st of Sept 2 days ago):

Effective Tuesday, September 1, 2015, contributors may request a refund from Indiegogo, before the end of a fixed or flexible funding campaign they have contributed to. For campaigns that have entered the InDemand program, contributors may request a refund from Indiegogo within 10 days of the contribution.

https://support.indiegogo.com/hc/en-us/articles/526876?