No worries - again, I'm not out any money, the charge to my credit card is on my June statement, Tremont will not see a dime from me from this experience, I simply won't pay, and will return the power peg to Tremont. US consumer law hasn't denigrated to the level of requiring a credit payment to go through for a useless device. If it did, there's always Judge Judy - how satisfying to drag some marketing manager though the national TV wringer over $159.89!

I was interested in the kinetic energy option, not wowed by it. I volunteer for the Red Cross, I spend all day on my feet sometimes, moving around, often I'm in areas without electricity, and I carry a backpack - the idea of a peg sitting in my pack collecting energy to recharge a necessary device in the field was interesting to me, because the last thing I want to be left with in most contexts is a dead cell phone. Walking around with a solar array (which I have) open on my back is typically not an option. I already have reality based back ups - the mentioned solar array, battery packs, even a spare cell phone battery. I am okay in all but the most extreme scenarios, I was looking for a device to get me though the most unexpected and extreme scenario.

It was worth a look - had it been an offer to invest $60K in the company and not $160, I would have spent alot more time doing due diligence - and I would definitely have demanded a prototype to put through its paces before making any greater investment. But I make my living from technology, I know better than to invest my money in it :-).

And let me be clear, I can't say that Tremont meant any malice in all this, or engaged in intentionally deceptive sales practices - I don't have enough to say that definitively. Sure, they might have set out to screw isolated people out of $160, but what money is there in that? If the interwebs are to be believed, they collected public funds for their tech start up, and garnered some interesting interest and recommendations. All of which, of course, may be false, and they really are just out to scam a narrow market for $160 per - given the other options for scamming, that's a hard market to be in fwiw. But their failure to respond to my inquiries can also be explained by the scenario of a tech start up recently run out of money, after shipping just a few of their wonder pegs to customers, and no one is left to answer the phone or address complaints. I did receive an actual device in real commercial packaging, there was an obvious intent to deliver a power peg to me - it just didn't work, no worries. Assuming they gave it the old college try, I wish the folks who worked at Tremont well in their future endeavors, they are probably out of work on the streets of Cleveland, which can be a cold place to be. I would ask them that next time out their exit strategy include customer support for closing down operations, instead of leaving paying customers out in the cold. But that definitely isn't a concept embedded in US consumer law...