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Thursday, October 30, 2014

Hidden Flaws

Problem solving is part of being alive.  Some people aren't conscious of exactly how much we problem solve every day.  Those people are on autopilot and are ignorant to just how hard their minds are working behind the scenes.  That can make for a blissful existence, but autopilot suppresses our sense of wonder. Life is boring without it.

My autopilot broke as the result of a freak accident involving an out of control turtle and a light pole in a parking lot.  At least that is what the vehicle's owner believes caused the damage to the front end of the car.  A turtle's shell is considerably stronger than a steel or aluminum vehicle body, especially when the turtle is taped to the concrete reinforced base of a steel light pole and the vehicle hits the opposite side.  We know this from extensive testing.  This is a dirty industry secret that has been hidden for years.  All official vehicle crash tests are performed with a turtle taped to the opposite side of the crash rigs.  This is why the cars take such extensive damage even at low speeds.  Turtle shells are forged from the hardest known material.

We had hoped to reverse engineer the process so we could make our own indestructible shells, but it has been quite difficult.  We continue undeterred by our frequent and painful failures.  There is little chance we will run out of vehicles to crash.  That is a project for another day because we are currently focused on improving our already released products before anyone figures out we should have recalled them years ago.

The latest product that needs attention is our Ultimate Signal Protection Head Gear.  A surprising and almost fatal flaws were discovered during product testing.  The device exceeded all performance benchmarks at night and on cloudy days, but was transformed into a dangerous weapon in sunlight.  I need to be clear here because there are significant ramifications if this is misunderstood by the wrong people.  AcMo is not in the weapons manufacturing business.  Every weapon we may or may not have produced was done so by pure accident.  Some of the world's greatest discoveries were a result of a fortuitous accident, and we can't help it if a small percentage of our accidents may or may not have resulted in new weapons being developed.

The importance of internal signal protection grows each day as the world becomes more connected and unmentionable parties become more skilled at intercepting those signals.  We need protection because the day our innermost thoughts become public will result in certain truths being revealed that should never be known.  AcMo is dedicated to protecting those secrets and to helping society prosper through a difficult adjustment period.  We do this because we care, and because there are several revenue streams hiding within the effort that need to be exploited.  Revenue streams are as vital to life as water, so we do everything we can to hoard them when we discover them.  That refers both to the revenue streams, and any previously unidentified sources of fresh water.  We are not going to be caught out again when the worldwide drought occurs.

The problems we discovered with our signal protection are obvious now, and we probably should have accounted for them in the original design, but this is what happens when the desk engineers are allowed to work without restrictions and without considering real-world suitability.  That's my fault for not assigning at least two field engineers to the project, but I couldn't spare the human power at the time.  I can't spare it now either, but we don't have much choice.  We can't take any more shortcuts.

The issue is quite grave.  Sunlight causes several simultaneous failure modes with the head gear. The heat of the sun warms the user's head to unacceptable levels. Boiling brain fluid is never conducive to long-term survival. The other serious issue was that light would reflect off the headgear and blind anyone within the vicinity.  The heating problem was overcome by adding portable refrigerators to the top of the unit which added the bonus of cool drinks all of the time, but the light beam problem was more of an engineering conundrum. 

We eventually solved that by creating a second layer consisting of solar panels built on top of the core.  Now the wearer is gifted with a portable power generator and personal head cooling on board with complimentary beverage service. The next evolution of the design is a full body suit to contain thermal signatures and prevent any unwanted surveillance or harmful toxins from effecting the user.  At that point, we will have created a complete signal vault.  That may be a little while. 

The ideal solution will be to adapt our cloaking technology to the head gear so that it will be impossible for anyone to know it is even being worn.  We hope this will not reduce its effectiveness.  At the very least, we will have to create a super strong retaining mechanism because if it falls off for any reason, the wearer will never be able to find it again.

This was just a small sample of the type of problems we encounter on a daily basis. We are always looking for talented drivers and problem solvers, so apply now for a spot on our team. We won't pay you, but the education you receive will prove invaluable. 

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