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Microsoft Sued Over Alleged Xbox 360 Defects
richdun writes "Reuters is reporting that a Chicago man who was lucky enough to purchase an Xbox 360 has filed suit against Microsoft over the overheating and crashing some users have experienced. The man is seeking unspecified damages, litigation expenses, and replacement or recall of all Xbox 360s. While more suits or a class-action is probably on the way, others have sought less litigious solutions."
I love that the submitter's comments seems to imply that it is somehow more noble for consumers to take the responsibility for defective products on themselves, as opposed to holding the manufacturer accountable.
If you aren't happy with the 360 why not just take it back? Why does everything have to resort to a law suit?
Conserve Oil, Recycle, Boycott Walmart
I think it is about time someone took a stand against companies pumping shit out to the customer before it is ready. Especially since it is obvious this was done to beat the Xmas season...
In addition, I don't like the way it was posted... "a Chicago man who was lucky enough to purchase an Xbox 360"... OH PLEASE!!!! "lucky enough" You make out to be some amazing thing... It's JUST a GAME BOX!!! Hello!!!
WoW!! When playing games is THAT important life must be truly sad.
First iPod Nano then Xbox 360.
Am I seeing a commercial trend where hardware companies are increasing confident to roll out their products even if they are not thoroughly tested, simply because these companies know they have enough fanboys to buy anything they sell?
It's also interesting to see that these hardware companies are also software companies, who are regularly rolling out "beta" software to the public.
Rock that crushes, Paper & Scissors that don't matter.
Unfortunately it is a class action lawsuit. The individual(s) will recieve a $1.25 check 10 years from now while the lawyers rack up $400/hr fees. Microsoft will issue a non-mea-culpa and continue life as usual, short $100 million, a drop in the bucket.
One ring to bind them - should probably have more fiber and less rings in their diet.
Is it a design defect if you're specifically told what the 'problem' is and how to avoid it?
FYI I'm not talking about chainsaws that can accidentally cut your face off, more like a car owners manual that says "keep your radiator topped off or else your engine will overheat." Or in this case, don't put your Xbox in certain places, or it will overheat.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
If Microsoft just recalls all of the power adapters (which seem to be most of the issue), and replaces them with a different design that allows airflow underneath, they can basically stop this lawsuit and any others that are bound to come up. The other option would be to provide a free plastic base to all XBox360 owners that would snap on the bottom of the system and raise it up an inch from the surface.
People who sue over this stuff are worse than companies that unknowingly release a faulty product. There are better resolutions than calling a lawyer, like returning the system, waiting on a recall, or hacking it up with a string.
You have enemies? Good. That means you've stood up for something, sometime in your life. --Winston Churchill
Have things really gotten to the point when everytime we don't like a product we sue the manufacturer? What happened to the days when if a product wasn't what we expected it to be we simply told our friends not to buy one and didn't buy from that manufacturer again? Are companies required to produce products that every single person in the world likes otherwise be victims of a lawsuit? Are standard defects valid causes for suits? We (well Slashdot population) all know that no process is 100% defect free, even a 6 sigma process still has 3.4 defects per million opportunities. Are we that litigious? How long before someone sues a restaurant because their steak was medium instead of medium rare?
This is absolutely insane.
then try this on for size.
The RIAA takes you to court, pays outrageous legal fees (which they can afford), files for extensions, appeals and whatever until you run out of money and can no longer defend yourself.
Then you lose.
Now you have your legal fees, plus theirs!
Do you still think making the loser pay all legal fees is a good idea?
We have always been at war with Eurasia!
That's for a non-critical item. That's better service than we get on some computers here at work, and those are at least somewhat important. A console is entertainment only. If this was a life support device, yes lawsuit. If this was a critical server, maybe. A game console? Hell no. If the company is offering less than a week turn around on reparis, I'd say you have nothing to whine about. You can either accept that, or simply take the unit back (all units are less than 30 days old).
Talk about a lot of fuss over an entertainment device.
Whatever, calm down. I've been playing mine for sometimes 6+ hours a day since Nov 22nd with the power supply sitting on the carpet. No lockups ever, online or offline. The brick on the floor barely gets warm, hardly enough to notice much less start a fire. Those folks who are having problems probably have defective consoles that should be replaced, but by no means does this mean that they all are broken. Most of the 360s sole are working just fine.
Fiznarp
I think there are too many lawyers in the world.
This is just pathetic. Things go wrong. Life isn't perfect. Products have kinks. People who bring childish lawsuits should be sent to live on the sun. If they don't like the conditions there they can sue me.
Yet all of these things have happened. Not too mention a person's xbox locking up has much less dire consequences then the things you have listed.
Come on...sure it sucks to get your xbox home and find out it's broken, but really all you have to do is take it back to the store (that is if you don't trust Microsoft to fix it, which they are doing).
Try taking a bridge back to the store.
Yes, these lawsuits are stupid, but there are two things to consider here (speaking in general, I don't know the specifics of this case, but I can say that this person _deserves_ no more than a replacement Xbox and maybe $100 or a few free games to make up for missing out on the launch day fun. What they'll ask for/get is, I'm sure, another matter): firstly, if any of us can make a significant amount of money from doing very little work - why not? The system's broken anyway, others are exploiting it, so maybe we shouldn't be so hard on these people for joining in. If someone told you that you could have $1000000 for nothing except exploiting a system that's getting fucked over anyway, would you really be that bad for taking it?
That leads to my second point: whose fault is it that the legal and social structures are fucked (i.e. a judge doesn't throw out ridiculous cases _and_ a jury sides with these people)? Could it be the big evil corporations that tell people what to think? I honestly don't know, but the likes of Sony, MS, McDs etc. who generally get hit by these lawsuits are all partially responsible for the state of the 'developed' world anyway.
Maybe I'm feeling extra cynical today, but it just looks to me like the system's screwed anyway, so just make the most of it. Corporations are the epitome of selfishness, and many people are going the same way. Perhaps it's time to give up and go with the flow, because I'm losing sight of any other way to 'win' here.
Bottom line, were are be bombarded with crap. Dell and there "bad" capacitors, Apples scratching nano screens, Sony's PSP and now Microsoft's overheating XBox 3-POS-0 powersupplies ... and this has been in the past 18 months.
Many of these cases have to do with user issues. Nano's are small enough to put in the same pocket as your keys, do you're scratching them more often - you didn't do this as much with your bigger iPods. XBox 360's are working fine in the vast, vast majority of cases. There maybe be a few faulty units, but for the most part it is well known that these power supplies are hot and can not be placed on thick carpet. I'm all for the improvement of quality overall, and to an extent I share your sentiment that we need demand higher quality as consumers. On the other hand there are tolerances for faulty units and these tolerances are fairly low. They seem to affect so many people because you don't have 900,000 artciles on how the XBox worked, you only have one or two about a few people who are having problems. Without some tolerance for lower quality we would be paying through the nose for these products. Maybe the bar needs to be raised a little, but I personally do not want to be paying $1200 for a military grade Nano.
There is no longer anything that can be done with computers that is nontrivial and clearly legal. -- Paul Phillips