I was trying to make a viable solution, and in the process recognized many of the problems that will be present in any solution. Some of those problems are sociopolitical and are completely independent of the solution I proposed (gun smuggling, military vs. civilian needs, etc.). Others are problems that I tried to avoid (finger/palm readers are never going to work reliably because of conditions like gloves, dirt, and false positives/negatives, which is why I went with an enclosed wireless system that can be waterproof). Still other are problems that I didn't address but will be an issue, like fitting existing guns with these systems, and designing the mechanics for every gun that keep it reliable and stay clean.

Disables happen automatically if the enable token stops transmitting, and the enable token automatically stops after a set amount of time. The serial is transmitted in all BLE packets, so the specific rules and edge cases can be hashed out in firmware easily.

The generic lockout may prevent some guns from being fired. A sufficiently motivated person would have a gun without this system and would circumvent any laws on the book anyway. The intent of the generic lockout is to increase that barrier and prevent situations like Sandy Hook, where legitimately owned guns were stolen by an unauthorized user.

I completely agree about the quick open gun safe, and those already exist.

Like I said in my writeup, smart guns don't prevent motivated criminals, and they introduce failure modes which could endanger the owner, but they may prevent other kinds of accidents, and to that end may have merit. Sweeping legislation that mandates the use of a system ignores many of the inherent drawbacks of any system, and will be challenging on many levels to accomplish.

I built a working prototype of a gun control system, and in the process found so many gotchas and problems that I've realized enforcing smart guns is impossible. There's really no way to solve all the problems introduced with such a system, and the drawbacks of such a system make it dangerous. Yes, it could prevent a lot of accidents and misuse, and for that reason there may be potential, but the legislators introducing this stuff have no idea what they're talking about.

Here's my writeup on the system I built and some of the problems I encountered:

http://bobbaddeley.com/2013/03/my-one-post-on-gun-control/

People are starting to get better at realizing the true costs and work required to be successful on Kickstarter, which is why the costs are going up. Kickstarter's cut, shipping, taxes, logistics, tooling, and labor are all costs involved in mass production that many projects don't take into account enough. That's why they've been delayed so much. Building a prototype and calculating the cost of materials is only a fraction of the actual cost of the product. Many of the Kickstarters before weren't calculating those costs, or the tooling times and component lead times, and weren't building test rigs for quality control.

On the other end, Kickstarter backers are expecting huge discounts on the products, too, so at the end of the day, there's almost no margin for the team, and they have to scramble to find a way to make their project work without losing money, and they don't have enough money left over to get their business off the ground.

If you're backing projects where the price is too good, the risk is high that you'll have a delayed delivery.

You're absolutely right, joel.

Yes, we've taken it to a variety of field sports and have always had great feedback, and some have wanted to buy them on the spot. Most of our beta testers are high school coaches or tournament organizers. We have a rolling stock of units that we loan out for a few months (it's time-consuming and expensive to make these units by hand, so we are loaning them out, though some have purchased them to keep them longer). We've had organizations preorder in bulk separately from our Kickstarter campaign. Some of our units have been in the field for over a year now. We've tried contacting local media many times but can't get them to pick us up. We've also been contacting various sports clubs, but rec sports have surprisingly few central media locations, so we're having to go to region by region and sport by sport.

We know Kickstarter isn't our target market, and we knew we were going to have a hard time making it work. But if we are successful, it will skip a few steps for us, so the potential gain is worth the effort, and we're learning a lot about PR and marketing along the way. We'll be making a batch of 100 units soon using our last dollars, and we'll get our traction the old fashioned way.

Absolutely! I have a campaign going right now and I can't even find my own project. I was mad at Kickstarter for a while until I realized they have no incentive to publicize projects that are not near or past their goal. If a project is near or past their goal, KS will make money on it for sure, so why not make as MUCH as they can off those winners? If the project is sagging in the middle of its campaign or is having a hard time even getting started, KS support for the project may be wasted effort. So they make the projects that will make them money more prominent.

(Shameless plug; I need all the publicity I can get) http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/bobbaddeley/digitally-connected-portable-scoreboard

Definitely this.

We have a kickstarter campaign going right now, and we've posted some of our behind-the-scenes stats: http://portablescores.com/behind-the-scenes-of-a-kickstarter-project/

Our video has less than 2000 views; of course we're failing. We've done everything we can to get publicity, but we're doing something wrong, or we're just not lucky. Kickstarter failures are more a testament to one's ability to tell a story and get publicity, not necessarily to the product.

Slightly shamed plug (I would be remiss if I didn't post): http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/bobbaddeley/digitally-connected-portable-scoreboard

I just toured a nearby dam, and was presented some very insightful ideas.

Nuclear and coal power are great for handling base load because they provide consistent power.

But peak load is where the money is; turning on power systems when they're needed to match the load at that second. Solar, wind, and water are all peak-load power supplies because they are not always consistent, vary widely according to weather and time of year and regulations, and can be very unclean with spikes. This is why these power systems cannot replace base load systems yet.

The solution is to even out our peak load systems so that they are more consistent and more like base load systems. Whether that's tying many different types together and hoping they even out naturally, or storing the energy in some kind of battery in the middle.

Since battery technology is nowhere near ready, a viable option is to store water in reservoirs behind dams, using wind and solar energy to pump water up, then releasing it evenly through a generator. This is even being employed in some countries.