Copyright Office Rules Against Lexmark

SparkyTWP writes "'The United States Copyright Office has ruled in favour of Static Control Components, of Sanford, N.C., saying that its microchips do not contravene the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.' This was in regard to SCC making microchips that imitated Lexmark's in remanufactured printer cartridges. It appears Lexmark won't be able to do anything about third-party cartridges."

Comments

YAAAY!

[idontgno]

Now printer companies will be honest in their product pricing models. No more low-ball piece-of-crap printers and highway-robbery refills cartridges. A little competition in the expendables market will be awesome. Let quality and price drive the market, not consumer lock-in.

Does anyone know if Lexmark has any legal recourse beyond this ruling? Can they appeal somewhere? Or is this the done deal?

Which printer to buy?

[Realistic_Dragon]

Linuxprinting.org has a vendor score card to show you which vendors deserve yor support.

Their recommendation (and HP's work writing opensource drivers that support all the features of their printers) was the reason that I purchased a PhotoSmart 7260 from HP and I haven't regretted it - even the integrated card reader works.

Not surprisingly they rate Lexmark inkjet printers as useless.

No they can't - Magnuson-Moss act

[yerricde]

No they can't. With the DMCA out of the way for now, and disregarding patents, the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Improvement Act prohibits a manufacturer from conditioning a product's warranty on use of other products identified by trademark unless the manufacturer can prove that the off-brand product damaged the product under warranty.

Re:No they can't - Magnuson-Moss act

[Anonymous Coward]

I guess I won't k-whore, so I'll post anon, but here is a pretty good discussion about Magnuson-Moss. The part that prohibits tying a warranty to follow-on sales of supplies is nicely explained in the section titled "Tie-in Sales" Provisions.

Now, that being said, there's nothing to keep the companies from trying to tie warranty to their own supplies. Most consumers are sheep and will believe the "customer service" droid at the end of the 1-800 line when the droid says "your warranty is void because you didn't buy Barfco toner carts."

So the tie-in might work by default. The company will just get its pee-pee slapped by the FTC or a state attorney general if they get called out. But that may take years, and we all know that business milestones are measured in weeks. That's plenty of time for the marketing VP to gather his bonus and promotion and leave the aftermath of anti-competitive and illegal warranty policies to the customer-service VP that he personally doesn't like, anyways.

(It's not everyday that a bright executive gets to garner laurels and financial rewards for a bright idea that simultaneously torpedoes a competing executive in a different department of the same company. Gotta push down to rise up, right?)

Re:No they can't - Magnuson-Moss act

[EinarH]

I think you are wrong.

From FTC.gov ; Understanding the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act

The Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act is the federal law that governs consumer product warranties. Passed by Congress in 1975, the Act requires manufacturers and sellers of consumer products to provide consumers with detailed information about warranty coverage. In addition, it affects both the rights of consumers and the obligations of warrantors under written warranties.

Nothing about cars as far as I can see..
However as a IANAL, I can see that there is a lot of leagal speak about "limited warranty" and "requirements" for the law to apply so comments from law gurus are appreciated.

more info @ scc's website

[morcheeba]

Here's SCC's webpage on the case. They have a Press Release (pdf) and a link to the official ruling site (but I don't see the ruling there yet).

I've been watching this case closely, and I'm glad it's been thrown out like the Garage door opener case!

"Consumer products" not "motor vehicles"

[yerricde]

Relevant text of the statute from an off-brand inkjet ink manufacturer, quoting 15 USC 2302:

(c) No warrantor of a consumer product may condition his written or implied warranty of such product on the consumer's using, in connection with such product, any article or service (other than article or service provided without charge under the terms of the warranty) which is identified by brand, trade or corporate name; except that the prohibition of this subsection may be waived by the commission if:

1. The warrantor satisfies the Commission that the warranted product will function properly only if the article or service so identified is used in connection with the warranted product, and
2. The Commission finds that such a waiver is in the public interest.

Where again is it limited to motor vehicles?

Great!

[retro128]

This can only be a good thing. Not only does it put Lexmark in their place, but it also tells other companies that they can't cloak their anticompetitive practices behind the DMCA.

There was a similar case where the Chamberlain Group, a garage door opener manufacturer, sued Skylink Technologies over a universal garage door opener using the DMCA by saying that the program that interpreted the signals from the garage door remote was being exploited by Skylink, and thus fell under the circumvention article in the DMCA. Skylink has won this case. The judgement is here.

Re:Doh!

[Balorn]

Furthermore, with a lot of our copiers, we have to go through the name-brand dealers or it voids the warranties and service contracts on our machines

IANAL but isn't that illegal?

Doing a quick search: Magnuson-Moss Warranty Improvement Act - United States Code Annotated - Title 15 Commerce And Trade - Chapter 50 - 2302