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Apple's Interest in WiTricity Wireless Charging

iStudentUK said:
I think the "everything is going to kill me" mentality is silly. People see wireless electricity and without any real appreciation of how it works decide that it is a health risk. Places like North America and the EU have extremely strict safety requirements and are not going to let this get into the public domain without checking it out!
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Just like the FDA and every other organization tests and approves products that are later recalled for killing us all the time lol!

Matthew Yohe said:
You don't care what they say (because you don't understand the science) and yet you draw your own conclusions?

Maybe we should burn these scientists at the stake.
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LOL wow! I understand quite well how the science and technology works and I do not make blindly ignorant comments without having an understanding of what I am talking about!

While they may not perceive any known health risks that this may pose based on modern medical knowledge, it does not mean at all that modern science has a firm understanding of the way our body's resonant energy works and how something like this might interact with that in a negative way therefore throwing off our body's natural cycles and mechanisms that we have yet to understand! Just CONSIDER the possibility that we as humans still don't know EVERYTHING yet lol! :rolleyes:
 
Jerome Morrow said:
You are exposed to magnetic fields every day.
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But not at the level they will need to use for transferring useful amounts of energy!

Chronic exposure to high levels of alternating electric or magnetic fields doesn't sound like a good idea.

And before people call me some kind of ignorant luddite:

Azathoth - MSc in RF engineering , BSc in Chemistry

Although I make my living designing wireless solutions to problems, I always ask my clients if they can use wires instead. easier. faster.
 
Azathoth said:
But not at the level they will need to use for transferring useful amounts of energy!.
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If you read my post on the previous page I have a link to an MIT which forms the basis of WiTricity. The magnetic field generated is about 0.1uT to be able to charge something like a mobile device. This field strength is much less than a typical TV generates. What makes this technology so good is that you don't need really strong fields.
 
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Azathoth said:
But not at the level they will need to use for transferring useful amounts of energy!

Chronic exposure to high levels of alternating electric or magnetic fields doesn't sound like a good idea.

And before people call me some kind of ignorant luddite:

Azathoth - MSc in RF engineering , BSc in Chemistry

Although I make my living designing wireless solutions to problems, I always ask my clients if they can use wires instead. easier. faster.
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Still there is no rock solid prove to this and anyway the range is limited. If it's working range is 1 m and you are 3-4 m away how is this a problem for even paranoid type?
 
Jerome Morrow said:
Still there is no rock solid prove to this and anyway the range is limited. If it's working range is 1 m and you are 3-4 m away how is this a problem for even paranoid type?
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For paranoid types everything is a problem, because, well, they are paranoid. They are tricking you into believing you are safe, while in reality your brain will be re-programmed. And of course there is good evidence that some people's health is indeed negatively affected not by WiFi signals, but by the believe that there are WiFi signals (symptoms developing when they were told WiFi was turned on and disappearing when they were told WiFi was turned off, with no correlation to WiFi actually being on or off).
 
Matthew Yohe said:
You don't care what they say (because you don't understand the science) and yet you draw your own conclusions?

Maybe we should burn these scientists at the stake.
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Dude...
Science doesn't have all the answers.
Just the next question and a methodology to finding an answer.

Science doesn't want you suggest people should have blind faith in science. Science always welcomes questions.

I haven't seen anything but concern and question here.
 
This doesn't sound healthy. Wireless networks, bluetooth, mobile phones, 3G, as if there isn't enough "radiation" around us already. Yes, all of these are labeled safe, but there are not a whole lot of studies on the combined effect of all of them.

Taking things like these with a grain of salt is not paranoid.

If there is enough money involved every study can be tweaked to offer the desired results. ;)
 
MattInOz said:
Dude...
Science doesn't have all the answers.
Just the next question and a methodology to finding an answer.

I haven't seen anything but concern and question here.
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Well it took me 10mins to find some original published papers on this technology and to get a basic understanding of how it works. I'm not pretending I've read papers cover to cover and could do it myself, but reading a few key passages is enough to educate yourself a little on this type of technology and alleviate a lot of this "concern".

There seems to be a general knee-jerk reaction to new wireless things. I wonder if people worried about radio when it was first invented? We still see people crying over mobile phone towers, and sometimes even wifi! With WiTricity are taking about low frequencies, very small electromagnetic fields, short distances and low yield devices. It's not like they are powering electric ovens from 100s of metres away.


chaosbunny said:
This doesn't sound healthy. Wireless networks, bluetooth, mobile phones, 3G, as if there isn't enough "radiation" around us already. Yes, all of these are labeled safe, but there are not a whole lot of studies on the combined effect of all them.
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Errr... yes there are. 2 mins on Google got me various reports and papers. That's without online access to scientific journals.
 
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Samsumac said:
Wireless cancer.... /very innovative....:(
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Are some people even reading the article about WiTricity specifically? They actually have a video you can watch where it explains the concept that it uses electromagnets - one that sends out a resonance from the 'base station' and one that receives them 'the iPhone' - and is really genius in how stupid simple it is (in a smart way..), meaning a virtually 100% and realistically 100% safe (for carbon-based lifeforms anyways) magnetic wave sends a non-volatile pulsating signal which the end device picks up (iPhone) which basically "vibrates" something in the iPhone ala those flashlights that you wind to charge up.



Quite Apple-esque, actually? :cool: :D
 
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8J2 Safari/6533.18.5)

I expect that: Convenience > Cancer risk = Widespread adoption. Unless it can be proven to cause cancer with unambiguous data people will eat it up. This has happened before with a little invention called a cell phone.
 
health risks really?????

How about taking off the tin hats for a minute and really think about how this is not feasible. Are you going to buy an iPhone, and 5 of these "induction chargers" and have one wired in everywhere you go? (work, upstairs, downstairs {I charge at night upstairs, quick charges throughout the day on the weekends downstairs} one in the car {dont see that happening without some kind of rectifier} etc etc etc etc.) Have fun with no wires when your phone dies.

novelty item. move along
 
I wonder how much of a power vampire this thing is? Unless it's capable of identifying when/if it needs to charge I can see this operating at full power 24/7 which would be quite wasteful.
 
Jowl said:
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8F190 Safari/6533.18.5)

Hasn't Tesla already done this? Perhaps Apple bought his patents ;)
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No, everything of note in USA was done by Benjamin Franklin:)
 
Hummm... obviously, the technology is there, but does not seem practical yet. What about charging in the car?

Maybe in 5 years there may be something here, but it seems too early to really make this work. Just my opinion. :)
 
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3_3 like Mac OS X; en-gb) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8J2 Safari/6533.18.5)

nozebleed said:
How about taking off the tin hats for a minute and really think about how this is not feasible. Are you going to buy an iPhone, and 5 of these "induction chargers" and have one wired in everywhere you go? (work, upstairs, downstairs {I charge at night upstairs, quick charges throughout the day on the weekends downstairs} one in the car {dont see that happening without some kind of rectifier} etc etc etc etc.) Have fun with no wires when your phone dies.

novelty item. move along
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I think it is more than that. This isn't just Apple, WiTricity are hoping to make this a common thing. Imagine having one under your desk where it can charge a variety if devices at once. Put another one under your sofa/coffee table to charge phones, tablets and laptops whilst they are being used in the living room. Eventually we could see them as standard in cars for charging gadgets.

This is not supposed to be an Apple only thing. There is potential here, whether or not it will be realised is another matter. There are many obstacles like finalising the developments, getting enough companies to adopt it, the tinfoil hat brigade, price, range etc
 
...

how much power does that thing draw leaving it plugged in all day...I have to imagine there is no way for it to sense whether it is being used or not or to scale up and down depending on power draw and so it would be a constant draw of however many amps which seems to me to be a bit wasteful.
 
Safety

like the idea but very cautious!! I'm a Mac geek with a heart problem and there is a chance that I'll get a defibrillator implanted in the future............. I know that some magnetic fields interfere with implanted devices. I need a lot of convincing about the safety angle. :confused::D
 
iStudentUK said:
I think the "everything is going to kill me" mentality is silly. People see wireless electricity and without any real appreciation of how it works decide that it is a health risk. Places like North America and the EU have extremely strict safety requirements and are not going to let this get into the public domain without checking it out!
Click to expand...

Didn't the phrase:

I'm from the government and here to help

win in the biggest lie contest?

How anybody can believe that government or its agencies anyplace in the world do the right thing and always tell you the truth is beyond me.

Especially the US is not to be trusted. We have brainwashed people discussing creationism vs. evolution!
 
This is a long way from being safe or practical.
Just some issues.
1- cancer, if there can said to be a risk of cancer from the EM fields from using a cell phone, you can expect a risk from this type of field all around you all day.
2- wasting of energy. We are getting rid of incandescent lights because they are not efficient enough, I can see that anything less than perfect conversion which we know is impossible will not make it a green technology.
3- Interference problems on so many levels with other devices or metal. Pacemakers? How about metal plates or parts in your body? ...
I'd be very skeptical of this.
 
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