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Lexmark's DMCA-Abuse Case Coming To An End
Adama writes "Lexmark is dead in the water with their hopes to use the DMCA to force their customers to buy their over-priced toner. Their request for another hearing has been denied. Ars has
an especially great write-up on this." (See this earlier story for more background on Lexmark's lock-in attempt.)
This is only a problem with inkjet crap printers. Its much more economical to buy a laser printer, even a color laser printer. Sure, the toner is like 100 bucks. But it lasts forever. Especially if its just your house. Plus, laser printers often have network cards making it much easier to network the whole house to use just the one printer. And its higher quality printing that makes copies faster.
Sure, it's expensive to start out, but you can find pretty good cheap used ones on ebay, especially if you only need black and white. And its cheaper than inkjet over the long run. More reliable too.
Personally I think apple needs to re-enter the printer market. They used to make great laser printers.
The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
Are you saying Canon is dumping cartridges onto the market?
This isn't the case, AFAIK. The reason the Canon cartridges are cheaper is because they are not entire cartridge assemblies like the HP and Lexmark ones are. Canon printers have you replace only the ink tank, rather than the ink tank and entire print head.
+++ATH0
I would know, having worked as a sales rep at an electronics retailer.
There are so many nightmarish stories customers walk into the stores with. Dried up ink, cartridges that run out in a few weeks, broken printers, etc. I never recommended a Lexmark once. Many computer packages were bundled with Lexmark by default, maybe because they're so cheap and there are rebates, but you're better off with other brands.
Oh, and the cartridges. Just as shoddy as the printers. Customers complained of ink drying up after not using the printer for a week. A week. Wee small things too, the ink compartments are. I doubt the ink would last long.
Lexmark will be dead soon even if they had won this lawsuit. Just as well that they lost. People won't have the stupid choice available to them that much sooner.
I guess you could still call it "digital" although not electronic. Lexmark uses a metal tab to prevent you from putting Samsung cartridges in their E210 printer, even though the printer is manufactured by Samsung.
Of course, the Lexmark cartridges cost 50% more.
If anybody still has an E210 and is still shelling out for Lexmark cartridges, please visit How to use a Samsung cartridge in a Lexmark.
And never buy another Lexmark.
As the owner of an HP Color LaserJet 4550N, I can attest to the fact that color is not cheap! A plain black laser printer is a steal compared to an inkjet, but not their colored brethren. I paid about $700 on eBay for the 4550N which had about 30,000 sheets run through it already. Not bad. However, the thing takes four toner cartridges which run over $100 each. Then you have all of the kits that will eventually need replaced; those run around $300 each. Granted, I love the thing to death, but it's expensive to run for color jobs.
Consumer Reports puts a Price per Page figure in their articles.
Religion is the main cause of atheism.
The company is called Stots and the product is called the TemplateMaster. There's an pretty good writeup of the issue online, and an old Slashdot article about the Ed Foster write-up.
LOAD "SIG",8,1
LOADING...
READY.
RUN
You're talking about the Stots TemplateMaster. The license is even worse than you indicate - the license attempts to restrict resale of the physical object.
...) Copyright is the place for non-tangible items ... like software and IP. Unfortunately, the software industry seems to be purchasing politicians as fast as the entertainment industry is.
I've got serious objections to folks who try to "license" me physical objects. If I purchase it through retail channels, it's a "sale." I have certain ownership rights at that point. If I choose to give the object to my slacker brother-in-law, the manufacturer is SOL to do anything about the transfer. If you have a patent on the object, you have legal recourse to pursue me if I make a duplicate item. However, you still can't prevent me from giving the original to someone else.
Even the First Sale Doctrine in copyright law doesn't apply here. Assuming that you could actually copyright a physical object (i.e. a dovetailing jig,) I've still got the right to transfer ownership under the First Sale Doctrine. You can't take that away from me with some crummy EULA-esque piece of toilet paper jammed in the box.
The crossover of IP into meatspace is a bad thing. IP is not a physical object that I can bash into the curb if I want to. It deserves none of the ownership protections afforded to hardware. That includes patents. (Don't get me started on software patents being a horrible thing, or why I think IP *is* software
The EFF was a part of preveting yet another case of the DMCA being used to quash innovation.
/. crowd: http://www.eff.org/endangered/list.php#toner
This is a perfect example of what the EFF has been trying to do on our behalf: and by "our" I especially mean the
The relevent text from the page:
Species: Static Control Components remanufactured Lexmark toner cartridge
Genus: Printer toner cartridge
Threat averted: Overreaching claims under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).
What it is: A printer toner cartridge refurbished by Static Control Components, sold more cheaply than new Lexmark-branded cartridges.
What it lets you do: Toner cartridges are among the most expensive consumables of a laser printer. Lexmark's cartridges include chips with little bits of code that report back to the printer about toner-fill level -- but they also reveal whether or not the cartridge is "Lexmark authorized." The printer will refuse to print if the cartridge isn't "authorized," so Static Control replaced the chips so its refilled cartridges would work in Lexmark printers and report themselves "full of ink."
Why it was endangered: Lexmark wasn't very happy about competing with Static Control for cartridge sales. It sued, claiming that the cartridge-printer "handshake" was a mechanism protecting a copyrighted work, so circumventing the mechanism violated the DMCA. The copyrighted work in question? The "toner loader program" in the cartridge chip.
How EFF helped save it: EFF filed a friend-of-the-court brief supporting Static Control Components. We argued that the software was no more than a lock-out code, and that the DMCA explicitly permits the creation of interoperable software. The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed.
Have *you* joined yet?
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uR iGn0ranc3, Their Power
HP is mostly a printer company plus some side interests that barely earn any money.
According to the HP's quarterly report, it had quarterly revenue of $21.5 billion and earnings (profit) of $1.1 billion.
The Imaging and Printer division produced $6.1 billion in revenue. The other $15 billion came from what you call the "side interests", personal computers, storage and servers, software, services and financing.
The printer division is by far the most profitable, contributing about 70% of the profit. But the other divisions contributed about a half a billion dollars for the quarter, which is a long way from barely any money.
HP claims to be #1 globally in inkjet, all-in-one and single-function printers, mono and color laser printers, large format printing, scanners, print servers, and ink and laser supplies
However, its "side interests" make it
You forgot to mention that cartridges expire (both ink and toner carts). After expiration they will not let the printer print, even if full.
Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity, though I'm not yet sure about the universe. - A Einstein
The Lexmark decision was a nice victory, but the Federal Circuit decided a DMCA case that may well have a bigger impact on the interpretation of the DMCA - The Chamberlain Group v. Skylink Technologies, 381 F.3d 1178 (Fed. Cir. 2004). Opinion on Findlaw
The Federal Circuit basically read into the DMCA an "intent to pirate" requirement - simple circumvention isn't enough to violate the DMCA unless you intend to pirate or facilitate piracy of copyrighted works. What effect the ruling will have isn't clear, but it goes MUCH farther than the Lexmark decision. Lexmark basically said (a) that the code contained in the Lexmark printer cartridges wasn't copyrightable and therefore the DMCA couldn't apply, and (b) that in any event, the code was only protected from one form of access, but was completely unprotected via another - i.e. it was not effectively protected. Meaning the 6th circuit didn't really address the big issue - can the DMCA be used to stifle competition?
To get a quick idea of where the Chamberlain Group decision went, read the relatively short (2 page) concurring opinion in Lexmark by Judge Merritt (cite: 387 F.3d 522) Lexmark Opinion on Findlaw.