Precisely the same, actually. And it's still going on. I lurk (mostly) around a forum called "Talk-Polywell", which is mostly about Bussard's approach to electrostatically confined "hot" fusion. There is a long thread currently on about Rossi's claims, and the naysayers are out in full force. It's obvious that most of them have NOT read/studied the actual evidence, but anything that reflects badly on Rossi is trotted out as evidence that "it's a scam". MANY quotes of parts of reports taken out of context. Disgusting! Gross intellectual dishonesty.
I'm not a nay-sayer, nor am I a cheerleader. I'm cautiously optimistic at the moment, but waiting for the 1MW pilot plant to crank up before going to get some pom-poms.
At the point that Rossi cranks up a 50MW(or better) power plant and starts selling power, I might even add a cheerleader's mini-skirt to my outfit (or maybe not -- there's a reason I'm called Papabear -- you do NOT want to see me in a cheerleader outfit!)