Wha...?

Slashdot links to this tale of magnetical horrors in homes in Ohio.  Goin' to the State Supreme Court, forsooth!

The horrors:

Their TV screens were distorted. Cordless phones ran into interference. Computer hard drives were corrupted.

Er, wait.

TV screens distorted: well, maybe, if it's a strong field and you have an old CRT TV.  Flatscreen, no way.

Interference with cordless phones: bullshit.  There's just no freakin' way a static magnetic field will interfere with a cordless phone... unless it's strong enough to pick the thing up by its steel parts.

Hard drives corrupted: just how strong is the field we're talking about, here?  Strong enough to pick up hammers?  'Cause a field that'll mess with the data on a disk platter is going to have some pretty dang obvious effects on any ferrous objects in the vicinity.

I say the plaintiffs are flat-out lying about these purported effects, and diffidently suggest that the actual field strength inside their living space due to the magnetized joists is less than the Earth's natural magnetic field.  Easy test: walk through the house with a compass.  Does it mostly point somewhere near north?  You don't have an alarmingly strong artificial field.

Most likely they've fallen under the influence of some snake-oil peddler who detected feeble fields in the vicinity of the joists and has now convinced them that their lives are in danger, so they're making up unlikely or impossible phenomena, which the courts have so far failed to recognize as such.