The inventor of everything

http://www.theverge.com/2014/4/14/5561250/cool-planet?

by nkurz • 12 years ago

161 42 12 years ago

nkurz• 12 years ago

This was submitted earlier today, but didn't get much traction: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7586285

The full title (which doesn't fit in 80 characters) explains the story better:

  The inventor of everything:
  How an egotistical genius convinced Silicon Valley to
  invest hundreds of millions in his shoddy science

It's an account of how Mike Cheiky, the founder of Cool Planet, has an almost uncanny ability to repeatedly raise large amounts of investment based on pseudoscience that doesn't ever pan out. It's one of the most negative pieces on a company that I've ever seen in print.

funkyy• 12 years ago

Very interesting read indeed. They guy seems to be trying to sell perpetuum mobile. I am amazed that large, well known companies invested in him. Did they failed to do proper research?

adventured• 12 years ago

Science-technology has always had hucksters / snake oil salesmen, and always will. They combine optimism, passion, enough science-speak, futurism, and an aurora of 'this is going to change the world.' Those things will always sell.

jasonlaramburu• 12 years ago

Good investors recognize that markets>technology. With enough time and money, virtually anything is possible. If Cool Planet does succeed, they will change the way the world uses energy. Chieky is definitely eccentric but he's no more of an a$$hole than Jobs was.

DennisP• 12 years ago

It's not quite perpetual motion, the energy would come from the sun. Start with organic material, use pyrolysis to produce biochar, which you work into soil, along with flammable gases (which Cool Planet wants to turn into liquid fuel). Here's someone else describing the basic concept: http://biocharfarms.org/biochar_production_energy/

The problem is that it won't produce near as much fuel as Cool Planet claims. According to the article, it turns out a lot of big technology investors don't actually consult engineers during due diligence.

Fasebook• 12 years ago

Strange, no writing about the idiot people with money who keep wasting money on this guy. Don't hate the player..

jordan0day• 12 years ago

While I understand your sentiment, and to a certain degree, agree with you, you're implying "the game" is "how to extract the most money from other people", and not "how to build the best stuff for humanity, and hopefully get rich in the process".

If the game really is "extract the most money", then yes, we should hate the game.

I certainly hope most of us are playing the latter game, rather than the former.

gamerdonkey• 12 years ago

They actually do get a mention in the article.

  The venture capitalists who’ve sunk tens of millions into
  Cheiky’s startups have a lot to lose if his suspect science
  is discovered — exposing Cheiky might stop him from raising
  money again, but it would also tarnish their reputations.
  None of the firms who backed Cheiky would speak with The
  Verge about him on the record, but several shared negative
  impressions on background. Unlike many serial entrepreneurs,
  who return to previous investors for favorable terms,
  Cheiky’s last three startups all have a very different set
  of backers.

Seems they're just playing the same game.

anigbrowl• 12 years ago

"So, my approach in early-stage development is to cover a lot of ground with very little money by flying through the test process and only cherry-picking for the most interesting and promising candidates for further later-stage work," he wrote. "I contend that this is not bad science, it is simply a super lean management style to move the company forward very fast with limited resources."

No wonder he's so successful - this is the sort of thing that will resonate perfectly with his target audience.

mbesto• 12 years ago

"Cheiky’s next plan to help mankind is a startup called V-Grid. As he explained in a YouTube clip, the company’s goal is to revolutionize the electric grid, bringing cheap, renewable energy to millions around the world. The clip was pulled a few days before this story was published and edited to remove several seconds. In the original video, he claims to an audience of small investors that a team of backers, including Google, BP, and GE, and NorthBridge are already funding V-grid.

Cheiky says the because he secured a loan from Cool Planet to start V-grid, all the investors in one company are essentially backers in another. Yet when I asked those same investors if they had ever heard of or funded V-Grid, all adamantly and repeatedly denied it. But with the ink barely dry on Cool Planet’s recent fundraising, Cheiky’s already got another dream to sell, another round of investors to pitch. Seeing big-name backers already committed gives small investors confidence that someone has done due diligence on his claims."

I'd be shocked to find that any clever lawyer can't find fraud in this...

carrotleads• 12 years ago

This is just the extension of the "testimonials" culture I see with many businesses, including startups.

How many of you double check testimonials profiled on a site. But sales people seem to swear by them.

How does that work?

midas0073• 12 years ago

So I have it on good account that [withheld top 3 VC] invested $15 million USD in [withheld] because they needed to have an investment in China to satisfy some arbitrary mandate. It was an investment of expedience.

There is little science going on. It's mostly hocus-pocus business theater wearing a suit and tie and saying the expensive, semi-gloss prospectus in front of them mitigates risk when they're too dainty to understand how sausage is made in the sausage factory. This is exactly why some angels are now cutting 5 figure checks with zero due-diligence. It's mostly a CWOT apart from "just promise not to retire to Bermuda before you've given it a go."

midas0073• 12 years ago

The tone of the article comes off as character assassination, so there's likely to be suits regardless of merit either way.

Beyond that, I can't see how this is anything different than most any company: the boss has some grand vision and hands-on people make the hand-waiving into enough of an economic reality to keep said the company afloat. Moller has been promising flying cars since I could read Popular Mechanics. We need more crazy, enthusiastic fools to keep trying.

swatkat• 12 years ago

Reminds me of Steorn Orbo[1] overunity generator. They created a lot of hype, managed to raise huge funding, and announced they'll be demoing Orbo at Kinetica Museum London (which didn't happen). Now they're selling their technology[2].

[1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steorn

[2]http://www.steorn.com/orbo/

arjn• 12 years ago

Yeah, I remember that fiasco. What a joke. Apparently they had a lot of scientists and engineers look at their stuff and it never passed muster.

markbao• 12 years ago

Fascinating. This reminded me greatly of yesterday's article on Shai Agassi and the failure of Better Place [0].

Both accomplished people, both were able to have brilliant ideas and ambitious plans, but when the rubber meets the road, they're delusional about the challenges they have and reject the reality that there are problems afoot.

I'm reminded of a quote: "Great entrepreneurs are stubborn contrarians and eternal optimists." [1] Maybe this stubbornness and optimism is exactly what leads them to build something great in the beginning, but also what leads them to ignore reality later on.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7584093

[1] http://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20131015141133-15...

jacquesm3• 12 years ago

I don't like the tone of the article much, there is an element of spite in it that would be better removed and replaced with on the record quotes. That said, there is clearly a lot of smoke here and possibly a fire.

There is a reason some people refer to certain suppliers of money as 'dumb capital'. Playing the game well and moving on before the inevitable collision with reality happens is a strategy that can work for a long time. This guy seems to be so good at it that it likely will never catch up with him.

I've met people like this, I've even worked for one or two.

It's scary how they can use a combination of charisma, drive and self delusion to relieve others (including their co-workers) of their contributions, line their pockets with cash and move on before the crash.

Which of course is never their fault because they've already moved on. And if the company is successful in spite of them then they get to claim the credit.

I'd like to see the substantiation of the claim that Wozniak used 'some of Ohio Scientifics technology'. That sounds like patent nonsense to me. They both used a 6502 but that was an inmos general purpose cpu, nothing specifically made for Ohio Scientific.

The Apple I was launched in '76 (also using the 6502), the II followed in '77. The early ('75-'76) Ohio Scientific products were more along the lines of the KIM-I than the Apple I.

joshu• 12 years ago

Inmos != MOS

jacquesm3• 12 years ago

You're absolutely right, have an upvote. I had transputers on the brain. That raspberry pi compute module has me re-visiting all kinds of old and interesting alleys. (See: http://jacquesmattheij.com/raspberry-pi-as-a-poor-mans-trans... ).

JoachimS• 12 years ago

Exactly. According to Wikipedia, the first Challenger was released in 1978 - the year after Apple II.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ohio_Scientific

But his version of Siri was clearly waaaay earlier. ;-)

w1ntermute• 12 years ago

It's scary how they can use a combination of charisma, drive and self delusion to relieve others (including their co-workers) of their contributions, line their pockets with cash and move on before the crash.

They are also very good at discrediting those who try to expose their fraud. I've dealt with people like Cheiky (albeit on a much smaller scale than him). As soon as I expressed skepticism in their idea, they knew how to respond to prevent that skepticism from spreading to other people. They immediately moved to discredit the person trying to discredit them.

And even after the house of cards does fall down, those who believed in them continue to believe that it wasn't the charismatic person's fault that it all failed.

throwaway5752• 12 years ago

The embedded Scribd presentation by Banholzer was very worthwhile.

austinz• 12 years ago

His story resembles Ray Kurzweil's quite closely: an eccentric inventor with an extensive and impressive portfolio, parlaying his accomplishments into advocating shoddy pseudoscience. In Cheiky's case, Google is involved through their VC arm; in Kurzweil's case, he may or may not be doing research at Google.

lingben• 12 years ago

except that Kurzweil actually makes stuff that actually works, again and again and again

normloman• 12 years ago

That doesn't mean he's not prone to pseudoscientific thinking. The guy takes like 100 different vitamins a day in hopes of extending his life a few years. He promotes the idea that taking tons of vitamins can extend your life long enough to see the singularity, and sells vitamins through one of his companies. https://www.rayandterry.com/

Maybe someone with medical training can tell me if I'm wrong. But as far as I know, otherwise healthy people won't get any benefits from taking massive amounts of vitamins daily.

nawitus• 12 years ago

I don't find that comparison really fair. Kurzweil makes "wild predictions", but they're not inherently breaking any known scientific laws.

antinitro• 12 years ago

Anyone got any more information on "Basically an iPad in 1981" - the Ohio Computers Centerpoint?

kirk21• 12 years ago

Sadly, (Cold) fusion seems to be in the same boat (see ecat etc.). People want to believe...

mschuster91• 12 years ago

Oh, the e-cat. Should be known by now that Rossi cheated by using the ground wire to transfer the "heating" current...

Clever trick, I have to admit. Unless you knew the guy was cheating by abusing a safety feature in a way that no sane person ever should do, there was no way of proving the cheat.

danso• 12 years ago

“People always say it sounds too good to be true,” says Wesley Chan, who led Google Ventures’ initial investment in Cool Planet. “That is exactly the kind of company I get excited about as a venture capitalist. We’re in the business of making big bets.”

The bizarre logic in that quote made me think of this laugh from the Scorpio episode on The Simpsons: http://www.snpp.com/episodes/3F23.html

------ > Hank: Good afternoon, gentlemen. This is Scorpio. I have the Doomsday Device. You have 72 hours to deliver the gold or you'll face the consequences. And to prove I'm not bluffing, watch this.

[activates a remote]
[an explosion occurs near the UN building]
Man 1: Oh, my God, the 59th Street bridge!
Man 2: Maybe it just collapsed on its own.
Man 1: We can't take that chance.
Man 2: You always say that. I want to take a chance.

----------

Also, anyway to validate Chelky's claim that Woz used his technology in building the Apple ][?

rwallace• 12 years ago

The claim being made is that Cheiky's ideas are nothing but pseudoscience, but the article seems to be saying that the companies he left behind are all still in business making real products. That's actually a pretty impressive track record. I would have thought it has to mean some of his ideas worked out after all, even if most didn't (or his ideas had a solid core even if the more exaggerated claims had to be cut back, or some such). Is that not the case?

coldcode• 12 years ago

Company raises enormous funds based on someone's apparent brilliance who then leaves and the people find something our of the ideas to make a real company because they had a lot of money. If it works it's a reasonable plan. Given enough money, people can usually find a way to make something.

paul_f• 12 years ago

This is the money quote;

"They have a lot of investment guys, who are like bankers, and they don’t use their engineering talent to do due diligence."

DonGateley• 12 years ago

This guy should be Kickstarter's patron saint.

The inventor of everything

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