Broadcasters pump out tons of of RF from their big microwave towers, operating on the mere hope that some of the RF will hit a TV antenna and deliver unto someone the evening news. Since power demands for electronic devices continues to reduce (see Moore's Law), those radio waves can now act as currents in a stream, turning the digital wheels inside small electronic devices. The catch is that the antenna harvesting the electricity has to be in line-of-sight with the microwave tower. On the bright side, the TV station (or cell tower or home Wi-Fi network) will never feel the burden of these added devices. It's just RF that didn't make it to its intended location.

The same team at Intel Labs Seattle also figured out a way to develop motion-sensing RFID tags that require the same off-the-shelf RFID transceiver used to simply count boxes and other simple tag apps—in other words, gear that's already in place in many buildings. By sticking the little tags on a bunch of household products in a room, the researchers could track what people were doing with 90% accuracy. Some people are already testing these Wireless Identification and Sensing Platform (WISP) RFID chips for use inside the human body (pacemaker location) and deep under the sea (testing seawater 1km below the surface).

The thing is, none of these technologies are going to charge your phone or power your laptop. For that, you'll need Intel's other wireless power initiative, Wireless Resonant Energy Link, first shown off in 2007. Currently, a demo model features a 45W lightbulb operating at full brightness at 1 meter with around 80% efficiency. And best of all, it doesn't electrocute people when they walk by. [Intel Labs Seattle]

First, a little recap: In 2006, a little-known IT company announced that it had, in effect, circumvented the law of conservation of energy with its "Orb" generator, which produces "Clean, Free and Constant" power. To mitigate the inevitable response from rational people horrible skeptics, they issued a challenge to the world's scientists in The Economist, claiming they would assemble a qualified, unbiased jury to evaluate their technology. And so they did.

The next—and many assumed, final—chapter of the Steorn saga was a botched demonstration in 2007. Steorn blamed heat from the camera lights for the failure, but by then, people weren't really listening.

Today, we get this terse announcement from the jury, who has been silently plugging away all the while:

Twenty-two independent scientists and engineers were selected by Steorn to form this jury. It has for the past two years examined evidence presented by the company. The unanimous verdict of the Jury is that Steorn's attempts to demonstrate the claim have not shown the production of energy. The jury is therefore ceasing work.

But guess what! They didn't see the new stuff, apparently. Cue Steorn's (familiar) response:

[D]uring 2009 the company had resolved the key technical problems related to the implementation of Orbo and is now focused on commercial launch towards the end of this year, at which time academic and engineering validation would be released concurrent with public demonstrations

In other words, Steorn has discovered an unlimited source of energy, and they're using it to power their PR department, forever. [Steorn Jury via Ben Goldacre's Twitter]

The invention was refined in conjunction with engineers at the University of Ottawa, and its debut at MIT certainly raised a few eyebrows, even causing electromagnetics expert Markus Zahn to praise it cautiously:

It's an unusual phenomena I wouldn't have predicted in advance. But I saw it. It's real. Now I'm just trying to figure it out...To my mind this is unexpected and new, and it's worth exploring all the possible advantages once you're convinced it's a real effect.

Heins named his invention after a Greek word meaning an action that "has the opposite effect to that intended," and that certainly applies to his life—his wife walked out on him—as well as his device. He's certainly reluctant to use the phrase "perpetual motion" himself, because of the controversy attached, and the allegation that they violate the hallowed law of conservation of energy. Mystery success or just another myth: let us know what you think in the comments. [Toronto Star]

No, Steorn did not create a wormhole to another part of the universe. There was no white hot spinny thing raging out of control, though there were problems with spinny things, and they did involve excessive heat. The "technical difficulties" message appeared thusly:

We are experiencing some technical difficulties with the demo unit in London. Our initial assessment indicates that this is probably due to the intense heat from the camera lighting. We have commenced a technical assessment and will provide an update later today. As a consequence, Kinetica will not be open to the public today (5th July). We apologise for this delay and appreciate your patience.

The question now is: Will it ever happen? We're not so sure, although much of the world has already pounded the gavel and headed off to chambers. Stay tuned to the camera link and find out. In the meantime, I leave you more technically minded readers with Steorn's own description of the Orbo technology (which it is very happy to license or have you invest in). Is it snakeoil? Or does it have real bite? You be the judge:

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.