FTC Gets Angry Over "Free" PC Offers

Wister285 writes: "The Federal Trade Commission is going after buy.com, Value America, and Office Depot for running 'misleading' free PC offers. The FTC is claiming that the advertisements don't disclose the true restrictions and costs of the PCs, which can be up to $1000. When will people learn that Big Brother is always watching? Catch the story over at ZDNet." This goes way beyond "monitor not included," too.

Comments

Never Underestimate The Stupidity Consumers

[Seumas]

As others have pointed out, the FTC feels obligated to step-in not because it shouldn't be obvious that a free PC isn't really 'free', but because the mass of consumers are overwhelmingly gullible, idiotic sheep.

It isn't too difficult to buffer my statement, either. I can point to a couple immediate things, such as the number of times people drop $17 to buy a formulae pop CD from N'Sync or Brittney Spears or the number of idiots who really thought that if they flew to the Publisher's Clearing House headquarters, they were going to become multi-millionaires, because Ed McMahon had said they might have already won on the envelope they receieved in the mail. Then there are the thousands of idiots who fall prey to telephone scams. They willingly hand out $10,000, $20,000 -- even $100,000 with the promise of securing a million-dollar lottery that you've already won!.

What's funnier is that, in the last scenerio, these people usually end up falling for the same scam a second or even a third time! We hear them on 20/20 and 60 Minutes blabbering their sob stories to half of the televised world, expecting us to sympathize with their gullability.

So, while I think this is stupid that the FTC should have to step in considering how rediculous it is to actually expect that the PC's were without attached strings (who cares what the advertisements failed to mention, you don't need more than a handful of IQ points to figure this stuff out), it is nonetheless their duty to look for obvious exploitation of consumers. And, in this case, I think it's safe to assume that stepping in to defend the lowest common denomonator may have been appropriate.
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seumas.com

$400 Rebates

[linuxonceleron]

I noticed that companies like CompUSA have changed their ads to say $0 after $400 rebate, but before Internet charges of $22/mo for 36 months. Is this from the 'goodness of their heart' or from these regulations? Anyway, who can't tell that the cost of the PC is after rebates after reading for a little more than 2 seconds.

so wait..

[happystink]

Is that free PC as in free beer or free... oh nevermind, I never understood all this beer talk anyway. and I'm thirsty :-(

Re:Proof That Government Can Be Good

[KilobyteKnight]

This kind of thing is exactly why I don't understand the positions of Libertarians...

As a Libertarian, I will attempt to explain my position.

(apologies to Eric Raymond, of course). There are obviously people and--more often--corporations who purposefully deceive consumers to the fullest extent possible for the sake of making a big fat profit. That's why we have things like fraud laws and agencies like the FTC to enforce them.

The protection of the people against initiation of force and fraud are about the only things Libertarians DO believe is the role of government. Libertarians absolutely oppose the use of fraud.

It isn't easy for average Americans (bless their dim li'l hearts) to see through these kinds of offers, and it's great to see people who know what they're doing trying to protect them. Kudos to the FTC.

Here is where we actually depart ways. I do not believe the average American is an idiot. I believe people should be free. With that freedom, comes responsibility. A society that protects its citizens from responsibility is not a free society. Would you really want to live in an "idiot proof" society? Are you willing to give up your rights as an adult in order to have the government raise you children for you? Are you willing to give up a free market in order to avoid having to read the fine print?