Slashdot Mirror

Obligatory link to the most awesome indication that AOL had lost the plot with regards to CD mailings.

Huh? I thought AOL made plastic furniture.

What the heck is AOL?

They're a manufacturer of chair building materials. I hear that Steve Ballmer is a customer.

No, but CDs can make a fairly uncomfortable throne.

have you seen the throne?

The AOL CD Throne

What ? You need a CD to connect to an ISP ?
I didn't understand the news was about AOL !

What's on this CD anyway ?
A Comcast-rebranded version of IE and other crapwares, or do they really use non-standard protocols and a proprietary DSL "winmodem" ?

I never heard of a DSL ISP that uses anything other than PPPoE or just plain Ethernet to connect their modems to your computer, so I'm genuinely interested...
I always though the only purpose of ISP's CDs was to fill up trash cans (or build a throne), I've never even loaded one in a drive...

You could always build a Chair with them . . .

http://stupidco.com/aol_throne_intro.html

I'm surprised no one has mentioned the AOL Throne yet.

Perhaps you should collect a few more and build:

http://stupidco.com/aol_throne_intro.html

I'm not a lawyer, nor do I play one on the Internet, but I love paying "Devil's Advocate". Who's up for a game?

The central issue revolves around can someone request money after the transaction has taken place. Generally speaking, once a transaction has occurred it is done and over with. A restaurant cannot deduct more from your credit card just because you left a mess at the table once you sign the bill. The bookstore cannot add additional fees because on your way out you took stacks and stacks of their free papers. So we work on the premise that what's done is done.

Now let's say you go to the grocery store because they are having a sale on Top Ramen. If you use a 'club card' you can get 30 for a dollar instead of the normal 20 for a dollar. So you load up on Ramen, peanut butter, Red Bull, and an orange to ward off scurvy. You enter your phone number for your club card... Well, you enter *a* phone number for *someone's* club card and take your purchase home. You head to the basement and find that even though the card worked and everything else was discounted, the Ramen was still full price. Damn them! That's cutting into your WoW fund. But do you accept that what's done is done? No, you get someone to drive you back to the store and demand the store give you back your money (cash or crediting your credit card). So in this case, the store was able to go back and change a completed transaction. They advertised a deal and did not keep up their end of the agreement. So now we've established a precedent for modifying a transaction after the fact due to one party not fulfilling their part of the exchange.

Many online store have been caught advertising an incorrect price (decimal moved in the wrong direction, wrong price entered, no price entered, etc) and get hammered from people trying to take advantage of that. Normally the store catches it before anything gets sent out, refunds the money and puts up a big "Opps and sorry" page. They take a PR dive for a while then life goes on. But in these cases, nothing has been sent so perhaps the FTC does not consider the transaction complete and StoreX is within their rights to refuse to make a sale even though money has been exchanged. It's just like you can't shove a money order under the door of Best Buy and expect them to give you a Wii when they find your money. Just because you gave them money does not mean a sale is happening.

However Amazon went so far as to actually send out a number of these DVD sets; that brings more laws into play. According to the FTC, if someone sends you something in the mail that you did not request, "You can't be forced to pay for the item or return it." So from a purely high level look at this, the consumers that did not pay for the product (or at least some got away without any payment) so therefore the DVDs are gifts and Amazon.com cannot later charge the consumer. Point of note; companies CAN sent you something that requires your payment to use such as the brazillion AOL CDs--The disks are free but in order to make anything other than coaster or a chair you need to give them a credit card.

So let's recap...

In this case, Amazon said "Buy one, get one free." That's the deal. That's the terms of the agreement. Someone found out that the ordering system was flawed and told people how to exploit that flaw. Online transactions were made, at zero to little money, and Amazon.com mailed out the DVDs fulfilling their end of the agreement. But did the consumers fulfill theirs? Did they really "buy one" in order to get a second item free? Can Amazon sue to get their money because most of the consumers made the transaction in bad faith? Breach of contract?

This should have nothing to do with big, bad corporation vs poor, little guy. These laws apply to Ma & Pa's Used Movies too. What if they screwed up orders due to Pa's Alzheimers? Would people feel so justified, proud

i wonder if we can get enough of them to make a new throne..

http://www.stupidco.com/aol_throne_finished.html

Why trash what you can transform into lovely furniture? http://stupidco.com/aol_throne_finished.html

I think this has been covered before. Make a throne.

I hope they bombard us with Free VoIP trial CD's!
As I sit in my throne http://stupidco.com/aol_throne_intro.html I contemplate all the wonderous things which I could create from these circular wafers of enjoyment.
I might be able to create a VoIP ATA to complement my desk lamp http://neil.fraser.name/hardware/lamp/
...
Or I could just wang them at my brother like I've done with the last hundred or so I recieved.

Those aren't coasters. They are parts for a throne.

Here are the instructions on putting it together

http://stupidco.com/aol_throne_intro.html