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Apple Sued Over Potential Hearing Loss
freaktheclown writes "A man is suing Apple, claiming that the iPod can cause hearing loss for those who use it." From the article: "The iPod players are 'inherently defective in design and are not sufficiently adorned with adequate warnings regarding the likelihood of hearing loss,' according to the complaint, filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in San Jose, Calif., on behalf of John Kiel Patterson of Louisiana. The suit, which Patterson wants certified as a class-action, seeks compensation for unspecified damages and upgrades that will make iPods safer."
I had no Idea Stupidity was grounds for a law suit.
It has been known since before the dawn of portable audio that loud noises hurt your hearing.
Sticking headphones in your ears and putting it at full blast is obviously going to damage your hearing .
This is people trying to get rich off their own stupidity , which is hardly surprising as 90% of lawsuits are exactly the same.
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
People have been citing the McDonalds coffee lawsuit since it happened as an example of stupid lawsuits, and I don't know how many times I've had to point this out to people: McDonalds' had been very negligent about the way they delt with their coffee. http://lawandhelp.com/q298-2.htm has a list of facts about the case which you would be well-advised to read, including that McDonalds keeps their coffee significantly hotter than other restraunts and that they had privately settled more than 700 cases like this in the past, but had taken no action to prevent it happening again.
I knew someone would bring up the McDonald's Coffee case.
.. Other establishments sell
m cdonalds.htmo naldsCoffeecase.aspx
The knee-jerk reaction to any seemingly stupid/frivolous litigation (or patent) is to assume that the summary = the case, when in fact things tend to be more complex.
There are a lot of details to the McDonald's case that the unwashed masses tend to not know:
Some important points:
"McDonalds coffee was not only hot, it was
scalding -- capable of almost instantaneous destruction of skin, flesh
and muscle."
"[she] suffered full
thickness burns (or third-degree burns) over 6 percent of her body,
including her inner thighs, perineum, buttocks, and genital and groin
areas."
"During discovery, McDonalds produced documents showing more than 700
claims by people burned by its coffee between 1982 and 1992. Some claims
involved third-degree burns substantially similar to Liebecks."
"it held its coffee at between 180 and 190 degrees fahrenheit to
maintain optimum taste.
coffee at substantially lower temperatures, and coffee served at home is
generally 135 to 140 degrees."
http://www.lectlaw.com/files/cur78.htm
http://www.centerjd.org/free/mythbusters-free/MB_
http://www.atla.org/pressroom/FACTS/frivolous/Mcd
Every single set of headphones/earphones has a different sensitivity level. That is, feed the same amount of power to 2 different sets of phones, and one will be louder than the other because of the efficiency of the speaker drivers which convert electricity into vibrations.
Basically, at a given volume level on the portable player (say 75% of total) may produce 80 dB of sound output with Brand X headphones and 84 dB of sound output with Brand Y.
IMO if you damage your hearing it is your own damn fault. It is quite easy to tell if you are listening to something that is too loud. If your ears always ring after you listen to a couple of MP3's on your portable player, turn the freaking volume down, nimwit. Same deal if your ears bleed....
My spoon is too big.
I'm not taking any responsibility for what happens, but you might want to go and check out this here site. They offer a little program that uncaps the maximum volume restriction on European ipods.
Hank! White!
I'll start suing the manufacturers of the various amplifiers, receivers, and speakers I've had over the past ~25 years of brutalizing my ears.
Common sense isn't; apparently, it isn't a logical conclusion to think that plugging loud music directly into your ears could possibly lead to hearing loss. Who knew?
Oh, and from page 63 of the Apple user manual for 5th generation iPods:
"To avoid hearing damage, set your iPod volume to a safe level. If you experience ringing in your ears, reduce volume or discontinue use of your iPod. Warning: Permanent hearing loss may occur if earbuds or headphones are used at high volume. You can adapt over time to a higher volume of sound that may sound normal but can be damaging to your hearing. If you experience ringing in your ears or muffled speech, stop listening and have your hearing checked. The louder the volume, the less time is required before your hearing could be affected. Hearing experts suggest that to protect your hearing..."
Yadda yadda yadda. Basically, this guy doesn't have a leg to stand on.
Because you can only sue people that actually did damage.
I had earbud 'phones almost 10 years before the iPod came out. They're not a new idea, they're just trendy now.
120 characters for a sig? That's bloody useless.
The volume coming out of headphones is determined by the speaker impedance, not its size. In any case, all headphones are designed to work with the same range of signal, so if your headphones can't get loud enough, you know to blame the headphone designer....or maybe he is afraid of getting sued?
Earbuds can boost the signal by 20 dB. Lots of listening to loud music will cause, mostly, long-term damage, although it appears exposure when you are young causes more damage than the same exposure when you are old (kinda like smoking and cancer - risk of cancer is much greater for people smoking in their teens). You preferentially lose high frequency hair cells first because they are higher metabolism and get blown out more easily.
Now, obviously, the earbud designers should have known that
1) loud music can cause hearing damage
2) their headphones would offer a 20 dB boost
And so they should have made them higher impedance so that the noise was 20 dB softer when you use an in-ear headphone compared to a over ear headphone. Probably they didn't, and probably there is some liability there.
Luckily, I am not a teen anymore, and have little hearing threshold damage, so I crank it!
#1
No one, NO ONE else in that town or the surrounding area sold coffee anywhere NEAR that hot.
#2
If you spilt coffee on you from a restraunt or that you made yourself you would probably not even manage FIRST DEGREE burns These were THIRD degree burns, the kind your more used to seeing from actual fires and not boiling water.
#3
The city AND state had filed health warnings with McDonalds due to the complaints, which McDonalds prompty ignored.
#4
The lady inquestion only sued after McDonalds refused to cover her health expenses. (Which they HAD done in the previous two instances in this state.)
#5
A company memo existed that flat out said that it would be cheaper and better marketing slogun to be able to say they had the "Hottest Coffee" and pay off any lawsuits that would happen from burn victims then to lower the tempurature and lose the possibility of lording it over their competitors.
#6
And finally it was not the defendant who sued for millions, it was the jury who awarded it becuase it was "unspecified" and the jury specifically said 3million was picked because it was the sales for one days worth of coffee at McDonalds and the jury thought that they needed to prove the company memo wrong.
Because Apple pionered the idea of earbuds or at least popularized it of course.
Are you kidding? And let me guess: Linux invented the command line, Google invented XmlHttp, and BeOS invented the graphical operating system.
Earbud headphones have been around, and popular, for DECADES. Just because you weren't looking doesn't change reality.
Did ANYONE read the article? The guy's hearing wasn't even damaged - it specifically says that in there. He is suing because he thinks his iPod MIGHT damage his hearing if he keeps turning it up so loud.
Also, he evidently can not control himself to lower the volume because the warning that Apple ALREADY ships with the damn thing is not sufficient to alter his idiotic behavior.
Oh, and as to the "now she's rich" part, that too is bogus. She initially asked for enough to recover her exact medical costs only. McDonalds refused so she sued for a larger amount. That amount was first granted, but then later was significanlty reduced. I forget what the final dollar value was but suffice to say it wasn't enough for her to go off and live a rich millionaire fantasy life.
-- I'm not a pessimist, I'm a realist. It's not my fault that life sucks so much. --
"In any case, all headphones are designed to work with the same range of signal..."
In a word, no.
Headphones span an impedence range of 32 Ohm (or maybe even less) all the way up to 600 Ohms and higher in the case of studio headphones. On top of that you have variations in the sensitivity.
This means that with some headphones you can deafen yourself with the output jack from an ipod, while others (AKG K-1000 for instance) you basically need a small speaker amplifier to drive them at reasonable levels.
20 degrees isn't all that much, you're still gonna get scalded. Would 20 degree cooler coffee had lessened the injury that much? Methinks the lawyers would still be happy to sue. Note they call this a "problem" with the coffee.
Spilled hot stuff causes problems. They are a gigantic corporation. That McDonald's had to "settle" cases more indicates fear of publicity driven by greedy lawyers than anything else. Unless an employee dropped the cup, or a pot, McDonald's should have no liability.
And the drunk who tripped on a curb broke his wrist. Being able to sue for your own stupidity is the whole problem.
Why should they pay for her stupidity?
Five year old children are aware of the risk of dangeriously hot things. That's why suing over this is so idiotic.
Congratulations. A lawyer convince a bunch of yokels with sob stories. This is hardly a desired outcome. And the notice that the original award, a staggering $2.7 million, was just 2 days' sales of coffee indicates how badly the drooling lawyers wanted to tag McDonald's.
Still $480,000 more than it should have been.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
The McDonalds coffee suit has NOTHING to do with frivolous lawsuits such as TFA. Here are a few important facts about the McDonalds case:
1. McDonalds coffee was held at temperatures at 180 degrees, 40-50 degrees higher than normal coffee, which is hot enough to produce a 3rd degree burn in as little as two seconds.
2. The plaintiff, a 79-year old woman, spent eight days in the hospital recieving skin grafts for 3rd degree burns covering 6% of her body.
3. There were 700 similar incidents, including some as serious as the plaintiff's.
4. She only asked for a $20,000 settlement; McDonalds refused.
6. The actual compensatory award was $200,000, the other $2.7 million (2 days of McD coffee sales) was punishment for McDonalds' "reckless, callous and willful" conduct. This was later reduced to only $480,000.
There are some stupid lawsuits, but most of them don't win. And if you're going to argue the point with anecdotal evidence, at least research your anecdotes.
Power corrupts. Knowledge is power. Study hard. Be evil.
How is this even an issue?? i take it the guy comes from the same gene pool as the woman who sued mcdonalds over the coffee being "too hot."
what's he want?
a big fat label on the back of his iPod saying "CAUTION...if ur a fucking idiot and turn the volume up too loud, you just might get Tinnitus"
My ancient 2nd Gen iPod has an option to enable sound check. I'd be surprised if there were any that didn't.
You are correct, however the reason this case went to court in the first place is because the injuries caused were NOT minor. One expects hot coffee to be hot, perhaps too hot to drink immediately, however you also have the expectation that it shouldn't severely injure you if spilled or consumed immediately. When coffee causes third degree burns, as in this case, that is a severe injury. It caused deep tissue damage to the woman's crotch area. That would indicate the product was dangerously hot. Incidentally the damage would have been the about the same regardless of location, sure the crotch is more sensitive nerve-wise but the skin there has the same burn tolerances as other uncalloused skin.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but making coffee, tea or any hot beverage requires boiling water, i.e. 100C (212F), shouldn't common sense dictate that it isn't a good idea to splash that liquid on yourself before checking to see if it's ok?
One, coffee is not brewed with boiling water by most modern devices, older percolating devices used boiling water, it is in fact recommended by the Nation Coffee Association that coffe be brewed at a temperature no higher that 185F. Also, as was testified by burn specialists in this case, water at 190 degrees F (which was the temp McDonalds was serving at) causes third degree burns in 2 to 7 seconds. In this case the temperature was so high that it would have caused immediate injury. The woman didn't splash it on herself to test the temperature, she spilled it. Now in this case the woman did a stupid thing by placing the cup between her legs. But what if it hadn't been the case? Let's alter the scenario slightly and say that a toddler in the seat next to her knocked the cup from the cup holder and into her lap. The temp was the same and she would have received the same injuries. The product was dangerously hot. There is a range in which coffee can be served hot but not be extremely likely to cause injury, McDonalds was knowingly operating above this range. (They had received over 700 complaints about the temp being too hot, they were aware they were 15 to 25 degrees above industry standard, and had not consulted an industry specialist to confirm the safety of this higher temperature.) Two links for you. A google search will find more information that corraborates these links as well.
-- I'm not a pessimist, I'm a realist. It's not my fault that life sucks so much. --
the medical profession now reckon that ANY overload of your hearing causes at least SOME permanent loss of hearing, so if you do regularly get a ringing in your ears, or if peaks of volume make your ears hurt, you're setting yourself up for big trouble later in life. My mother works at a charity for acquired deafness (people go go deaf rather than being born without hearing) and she says that whilst once hearing loss was associated with heavy industrial work with lots of noise, she's seeing younger and younger people develop the problem - it's no longer an elderly "disease"
So, moral of the story, resist the urge to increase the sound level as you listen - don't let it creep up. If you're listening in a noisy environment, consider noise-cancelling closed-cup phones, so you can listen at a lower level.