I don't see this as a problem at all. Sometimes these bets pay off, and a thorough tech due diligence is probably not worth their time when they're dropping $3M on a seed round.
Most importantly, where will those $10M end up? You just distributed back to the economy a bit of money that was parked somewhere. That's good on it's own.
That's kind of the same schtick that Meredith and her ilk love to trot out. I mean, they said Edison was wasting his time too, right? And there are always spin-offs, and unanticipated offshoots.
But that's a bogus argument. Just because a lot of really amazing technology once had it's naysayers or was called impossible, doesn't mean that when that happens for uBeam, it will necessarily, likely, or even possibly be the same outcome. Nor does it make it OK to invest in snake-oil because maybe the company might just "pivot" and make a zillion selling USB-3 ultra-sonic coffee grinders instead.
And that money can and should be invested in a much better way. The lines of distinction between uBeam, Theranos, and outright investor fraud are very, very thin.
You may as well defend an investment strategy of sending 10 million dollars each to random strangers on HN and seeing what happens. And I, for one, would definitely prefer this.
"Sometimes these bets pay off" is pretty much never true when the violate fundamental and well-known principals of science. Was the undergrad running uBeam going to change energy physics with his $10M?
No, they won't change physics, but they might drop the idea altogether, pivot to different tech (IR? https://wi-charge.com/), or a different market like low power IoT. It doesn't really matter. The investors buy the idea of wireless power (not the technology), and bet on the team (not the technology).
Of course that all depends on the founders actually wanting to build something that works, and not being a complete scam :)
I envy the possibility in some parts of the world (mostly Silicon Valley) to sell dreams to investors. I'm also glad not all parts of the world a that hype driven but still, I got so many ideas and with $10M I could try most of them.
This is about the general stupidity of the IT community, which is HN
If there was a group consensus around the obvious facts then these companies would just disappear and in theory we'd start making more stuff that works.
But the stupidity is ingrained in the community, nothing to do with investors.
The ultimate irony is things that might work are not pie in the sky enough, which is all the community believes in anymore.
Thankfully we still have the Jobs, and Elons and the Gates of the world.
Most importantly, where will those $10M end up? You just distributed back to the economy a bit of money that was parked somewhere. That's good on it's own.