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Microsoft Class Action Suit Outcome: Indifference
Ec|ipse writes points out that only about 7 percent of eligible Californians have decided to take Microsoft up on their settlement claims resulting from a class action suit in that state, writing "Microsoft contends that it's because the software giant is so popular with consumers." Eclipse excerpts from the press release on Yahoo! (from Settlement Recovery Center, a company that "helps businesses participate in class action settlements"): "With only two weeks remaining until the January 8 deadline, fewer than one million claims have been filed, out of some fourteen million eligible, for a share of the $1.1 billion fund arising out of the Microsoft class action settlement in California."
Could it be that so "few" people have filed a claim because of the lack of publicity surrounding the case? I don't exactly see front-page articles in the Los Angeles Times saying to go pick up your money.
How am I supposed to fit a pithy, relevant quote into 120 characters?
What percentage of those eligible are aware of the suit? Of those, how many bother to file it? The claimed 7% seems pretty high as it is. Why bother to file this (spending the time to look for the required paper work, giving away information you may not want to share) only to get a few bucks? It's not worth it. Class action law suits are never worth anything unless you are the attorneys filing it. Those are the only ones making any money out of all this (and absurd amounts at that).
Did it ever occur to them that every time we try signing up for the class action lawsuit, when we hit submit iexplorer.exe gives us a general protection fault? That seven percent must be the Mozilla users.
My state of Missouri decided to "get tough" with Nintendo's price fixing back in the late 1980's, I belive. I signed in for the class action suit and everything. Being young, I had the nievity to believe that this would change things. The state "won," and I got a certificate for $10 off my next game purchase. Wow, Missouri punished Nintendo with a game sale and state-wide advertisments.
The only think that Microsoft didn't manage to do in this case was tie the deal to new purchases; otherwise, it's Microsoft laughing, not rumbles from Mt. St. Helens over there.
Bel, the mostly sane.. "Of course I can't see anything! I'm standing on the shoulders of idiots." -- Me
Doesn't it seem like "exploiting customers by fraudulent means" should carry a heavier sentence than this?
Microsoft has smart lawyers, and California's lawyers apparently rolled over and played dead, after making a good show of pursuing the case after most others had dropped it.
But let's look at this...Microsoft's lawyers negotiated a settlement whereby:
1. claimants have to produce and file an old receipt for purchase of software. (dropoff percentage upward of 75%, for sure)
2. claimants receive a VOUCHER FOR FUTURE PURCHASES of computer stuff. (dropoff percentage at least 50%)
3. claimants have to send all that paperwork to a claim management company to get their real money (dropoff percentage at least 30% -- would be much higher, but any customer who is this far along can be presumed to be motivated...)
and lastly, the icing on the cake:
4. two-thirds of unclaimed funds are donated, by Microsoft, to California schools in the form of computer hardware and software. The software, of course, has zero incremental cost to Microsoft except in lost sales to CA schools, but even more importantly...there is no donation better spent than a donation to kids. Get them early, get them for life.
What ever happened to: "You screwed the plaintiffs over. Make full restitution now or go to jail."?
From the site: People and businesses that are covered by the settlement can get vouchers that may be redeemed for cash after buying eligible computer products.
Yeah, that's right. You can get up to $100 in REBATES. You will not end up with a net gain of $100, you will just get $100 off some crap that you probably wouldn't have bought had you not been given some stupid voucher and felt the need to use it.
Kudos to Microsoft for fooling the courts into such a meaningless penalty.