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Warning: Exploding Batteries
batlike writes "It seems I have been quite lucky up to this point as I habitually leave my laptop in the trunk of my car - which is just over the gas tank (duh!) . See this article in InfoWorld by Ephraim Schwartz for details. You may want to give it a once over if you currently use lithium-ion batteries."
so i go to read the story and...
"Because Valence claims to offer a safer alternative"
"Currently, Valence is shipping outboard devices -- N-Charge, weighing just under three pounds"
"The next generation from Valence will be small enough to use as a direct replacement for your current laptop battery and will be available next year."
come on slashdot, infoworld, this isn't news, this is a PRESS RELEASE
replacing it with NEW Folger's Crystals! (lets see if they notice the difference)
But when I read three stories, all in reputable news outlets, well, that's a trend.
Okay, chicken little. Whatever you say. Three stories in reputable news outlets is a trend. Let's see. If .05% of the 290M+ population of the U.S. owns a laptop, that means what, 2.06 x 10^-6 % of all the notebook owners in the U.S. experienced that in the past several months (someone might want to check my math.. it's really early)? That's a trend? If that's the case, aren't you far more likely to win the lottery several times than have your laptop battery explode?
Imbecile. There's an enormous difference between something being a possibility and being even remotely likely. Sounds like those idiotic news reports networks show to get stupid people to watch ("WILL YELLOW STICKY NOTES KILL YOU? FIND OUT HOW YOU CAN PROTECT YOU AND YOUR FAMILY AT SIX!!!!")
Alito: A vote for Alito is a punch in the eye to put that bitch back in her place!
Not to mention that he brings up fuel cells in the article/ad:
"Long-term fuel cells that convert hydrogen and oxygen to electricity -- don't ask me how -- are a promising alternative."
Notice that he neglects to go into any basic details on fuel cells. I found this link by doing a google search on fuel cells.
It would have taken him very little effort to come up with a one or two sentence description.
Damn lazy journalist.
Dogma - "let's just say we'd like to avoid any empirical entanglements."
You can't, it's often integral to the cell, so a fair amount of surgery is involved.
Nearly perfect bomb and perfectly legal to bring onboard passing all security checks with flying colours.
Oh for chrissakes...no, something that would get really hot, start smoking, and then catch fire. Ever since(and in fact before) the Valuejet incident, planes have smoke detectors and fire suppression systems in their cargo holds, so it's a moot point if it ends up in cargo vs. carry-on. The issue of toxicity is moot because that's why planes have oxygen systems that the pilot can deploy. The mask systems in the cockpits are also usually much better than the paper-cup jobbies the Cattle get.
People- Calm. The. Fuck. Down. Planes don't explode because something inside them catches fire, they don't start crashing because someone shoots a gun, yadda yadda. Cars don't explode because a battery overheats in the trunk. Stop watching so many action movies...
Please help metamoderate.