Slashdot Mirror
Man Sues Gateway Because He Can't Read EULA
Scoopy writes "California resident Dennis Sheehan took Gateway to small claims court after he reportedly received a defective computer and little technical support from the PC manufacturer. Gateway responded with their own lawyer and a 2-inch thick stack of legal docs, and claimed that Sheehan violated the EULA, which requires that users give up their right to sue and settle these cases in private arbitration. Sheehan responded that he never read the EULA, which pops up when the user first starts the computer, because the graphics were scrambled — precisely the problem he had complained to tech support in the first place. A judge sided with Sheehan on May 24 and the case will proceed to small claims court. A lawyer is quoted as saying that Sheehan, a high school dropout who is arguing his own case, is in for a world of hurt: 'This poor guy now faces daunting reality of having to litigate this on appeal against Gateway...By winning, he's lost.'"
Doesn't a new Gateway (or any other major OEM) also come with driver CDs, manuals, etc., that have the EULA in print?
"This poor guy now faces daunting reality of having to litigate this on appeal against Gateway...By winning, he's lost."
Bullshirt!!!
Seriously. Have you? Can you keep a straight face and tell me you read all those legalese crap? I didn't.
First of all, it can be summed up into "We may do everything, you may do nothing, essentially, you're a dork for using our software". And second, almost all of them violate our consumer protection laws.
So, why bother wasting time?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Sounds like sour grapes from a classless lawyer. Mr. Sheehan won, I have no reason to believe he won't win the appeal. Good on you sir!
you're fscked! Hire me!
All 'not saying / just saying' aside, this could prove an interesting testbed for EULAs of this nature.
How thoroughly have these agreements been tested in court prior to this event?
Nobody actually reads EULA's, right? I'd say at least 99.9% of EULAs are just clicked on through without any consideration for the implications.
Does the reality of 99.9% of cases over-rule the law?
I am government man, come from the government. The government has sent me. -- G.I.R.
It would be nice if he managed to once and for all break the legality of EULAs. Most likely won't happen but one can indulge in fantasy.
The whole concept of a contract no one ever bothers to read is silly. Not to mention that often allot of the clauses break the law.
Dont companies these days thing its a bad thing to sue their own customers? Let alone make headlines for doing? Really what do they gain?
B5 71 ED FB 55 D6 4E 68 07 25 E2 FA CA 93 F0 2F, is mine! All mine!
I'm sure someone will set me straight if I am wrong, but in small claims court, doesn't the complaintant always represent themselves? And that court is structured to deal with such?
"To those who are overly cautious, everything is impossible. "
This was actually a pretty big win for him, and it means that the case will not drag on for years as the article suggests.
In California Small Claims (which this case was just kicked down to), an employee or executive of the company must be present at the trial - not a lawyer, and not somebody hired specifically for the purpose of defending the small claims suit.
If the defendant loses, there is exactly one possible appeal. At the appeal (to superior court), lawyers can appear, but the case is still treated as a small claims case (i.e. you aren't going to get out of it based on a legal technicality if that technicality violates the basic fairness of the case).
If Gateway doesn't send an employee, the appeal is going to be much harder because they have some pretty serious explaining to do as far as why the appeal should be heard. If they do send an employee, it is still tough because no new evidence can be presented at appeal so they will basically have to say that the judge was wrong and why.
Either way, this guy will have resolution within 120 days at the far side - as the appealin California for small claims must be filed within 30 days of the case being heard and if the appeal is approved, they put it on the docket pretty quickly.
I believe that we may be approaching critical mass (in decades or centuries, not years) within the imposition of legal absurdity upon humankind. I expect that the populace will ultimately become so oppressed by the duress of corporate greed that uses legal thuggery as it's enforcer, that humanity will just quit accepting it and reject the entire premise of law.
If there is wisdom within the world of corporate law, someone will realise that this is approaching and will work for internal reform, before external reform arrives as a consequence of insults to humanity like this.
By reading this post you agree that you own me $10.00 payable by paypal.
Failure to pay will require you to forgot this post and pay a non-refundable $15.00 fee.
Failure to forgot this post will require a $20.00 payment.
How can we tell that the computer was indeed messed up while displaying the EULA? After watching Judge Judy, I would have to say that taking a physical picture of the scrambled screen would win or lose the case.
However good this guy may be, he's gonna have a hard time handling this without a computer!
Everything and everyone is an aspect of Gd. So remember to show proper respect!
poor guy?
Poor guy? Yes, create more pity for him. After all, you sold him a defective computer, then refused to fix it. Then let the situation make it all the way to small claims court. You've got him right you want him.
Being a computer user is really tough sometimes: Not only do they expect you to be a computer expert, but they also expect you to be a legal expert.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
Sure nobody reads them but we all know what they say: you will not sue us and we take no responsibility for anything.
The fact he didn't read it is irrelevant. Not to mention that by clicking yes you say that you have read and agreed, meaning if you didn't read you are lying and thus don't have a leg to stand on anyway.
> the EULA, which requires that users give up their right to sue
;) I don't know much about US law system but the whole idea looks awkard. In my country you can state whatever bullshit you wish in license agreement or whatever - but it is void unless it is valid with the law. So I could make a license that you own me your liver if you use my software while not drinking milk - but it would be pointless.
Is it even possible in US to get in such agreement? I am Polish.
It is possible in US to just make a license that disallows you to sue by the other party? That is kind of retarded - even if it is possible - what it is for?
I thought that you _ALLWAYS_ have a right to sue (fight for your rights) and nobody can take it from you?
Gee, I wonder which costs more? Give a man a win in small claims court, or spend about a bijillion dollars to bring in the attack dogs. Heaven forbid you should set a precedent where a customer actually gets what he wants, then everyone will want satisfaction. We certainly can't have that...
Ya know ... I'm not a big fan of lawyers and stupid lawsuits ... but I'm getting a little sick of giving up all my rights every time I turn around. I've seen this "agree not to sue, and instead, go to binding arbitration with an arbiter of the company's choice" on all sorts of things lately.
... EVER ... not just in respect to the immediate business. Hopefully that won't stand up in court.
The other day, the cable guy came out. He drops off my HD DVR. He hands me his handheld PC and says "sign here". The thing I'm supposed to sign says something like "I agree to all the stuff above". Of course, I can't scroll up and read anything. So, i ask what I'm signing. He tells me it's that I received the DVR. Grr. OK. So I sign. Then it prints out this huge receipt. Among other things, i've given up my right to sue them.
To make it worse, they often are worded such that you can never sue them for anything
Chances are, Gateway will not bother to appeal a small claim. Talking to a customer service supervisor is usually enough to be offered a discount similar in value to what he might get. Appeal would also most probably be rejected, since they are no complicated legal issues in this case. And if the case will ever get to a civil trial by jury, well juries have little sympathy for big companies with lots of money to award to the underdog.
i've always had the opinoin that eula's are not legal, and are just used as a bully tactic. i hope this guy wins.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
Abraham Lincoln would have been proud then.
And these blokes need to re-evaluate what they are doing in life
Having said that Abe Lincoln probably would have preferred to finish/receive an education.
Semi-automatic amateur armchair Australian philosopher; conjecture ready at any moment...
I'm curious if anyone has ever recieved their money back because they refused to agree to the EULA? Or is it a matter of choice after laying down $200 to $7,000, Maya and XSI are $7,000 and I use both, to not use the software and eat the purchase price when you don't agree to the conditions? If you have to use a certain software what choice do you have? Given most agreements are boilerplates and vary little is the choice to use a computer or not? The government has dropped the ball on the whole issue. There is zero oversight so the companies can do whatever they want.
So the take home lesson is that the little guys should never attempt to sue big companies? that even if they have a chance of winning, the big guns will put them "in a world of hurt"? this is how the legal system is supposed work?
From the article:
"On Monday, Attorney William Portello, a partner in a Concord law firm, and Sheehan, a high-school dropout who has argued his own case, faced off in a Cameron Park courtroom."
It saddens me that courts can be manipulated more by credibility rather than facts. I hope that the judge can look past the 'high-school dropout' and listen to the claims. I'm not sure why Hudson Sangree (Bee Staff Writer of this article) deemed necessary to introduce a David vs. Goliath scenario but I hope it won't influence the decision.
Also, why is there a quote from some unknown source given?
From the article:
"This poor guy now faces daunting reality of having to litigate this on appeal against Gateway," Palefsky said. "By winning, he's lost."
After reading the article, the writer shows many discrepancies. I've actually felt the need to dismiss the article and read up on this story from a different source.
Does anyone else get the impression that the way this article was written, the writer was laughing at Sheehan the whole time?
A black cat crossing your path signifies that the animal is going somewhere. -- Groucho Marx
The one thing I remember most from AP US History class was this image of protesters against the Brown v. Board of Education decision. One of them had a sign saying "COMMUNIST JEWS BEHIND RACE-MIXING". That sign made me realize just how ridiculous racism and anticommunism was.
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
Let's set up a tip jar for the guy. Don't know what this is all about, but anything to stick it to that lawyer dude sounds good to me.
From the previous link (an appelate court decision):
A contract need not be read to be effective; people who accept take the risk that the unread terms may in retrospect prove unwelcome.
A vendor, as master of the offer, may invite acceptance by conduct, and may propose limitations on the kind of conduct that constitutes acceptance. A buyer may accept by performing the acts the vendor proposes to treat as acceptance." Id. at 1452. Gateway shipped computers with the same sort of accept-or-return offer ProCD made to users of its software.
You can't have a one sided contract. Each party to a contract must receive something of value. The implication behind buying a computer and software is that they will work. The judge should ask what things of value were received by each party. The purchaser should have received, at a minimum, a working computer with working software. It sounds like that didn't happen. Gateway didn't live up to their obligtions. Therefore the contract is void. The EULA can't be enforced if Gateway didn't honor the contract.
Gateway is pretty voracious in a legal setting. Having sued everyone out of existence that used the word 'Gateway' or the 'Cow spot design'; I suspect this guy is in deep shit. Yes; Gateway sued dairy companies because people apparently associate cows with computers, not dairy products, and they wanted to keep it that way. I'm posting this anonymously so gateway doesn't sue me or try to take away my plush cow slippers.
HS Dropout or not and I don't care how you look at it he wins no matter what. Just for a lawyer to show it is gonna cost the company 10 times the cost of a new system. When you sue one of these big co's in small claims court they loose no matter what. On top of this ad the bad publicity and they loose 100 times any little monetary claim involved.
So he goes in and does a crappy job arguing his case and looses, well so what he still cost them
100 times the cost of a new system, goes home empty but still stuck it to them.
Got Code?
Seriously, seriously, its completely ridiculous that ANY document that binds you legally to do or not do something would TAKE AWAY your right to a LAW suit.
Its stupid, completely stupid and should invalidate itself for a company having the gall to take away someones rights so they can use their product.
crap.
Personally I would like to see some major tech websites, such as arstechnica.com or hardocp.com, tackle the EULAs of the big computer retailers (Dell, Gateway, Apple, et al). It's a ridiculous situation to purchase a computer, debox it, set it up, and then take the first 5 hours to read the EULA you are presented with. Can't Cliff Hillegas come back from the dead and hook us up?
I assume you are in the USA? So you should be able to sue for "wrongful death"? Surely?
How many escape pods are there? "NONE,SIR!" You counted them? "TWICE, SIR!"
Unfortunately, courts tend to approve EULAs (and even provide some logic for this decision):
http://www.badsoftware.com/hill.htm :
ProCD, Inc. v. Zeidenberg, 86 F.3d 1447 (7th Cir. 1996), holds that terms inside a box of software bind consumers who use the software after an opportunity to read the terms and to reject them by returning the product.
Customers as a group are better off when vendors skip costly and ineffectual steps such as telephonic recitation, and use instead a simple approve-or-return device. Competent adults are bound by such documents, read or unread.
I think that this site is relevant to the discussion about EULAs: http://reasonableagreement.org/
What is this bull shirt you two are talking about? I'm trying hard to understand the relevance of an animal shirt, but I still don't get it. Since it is your exact sentiment, would you care to explain the expression for me?
Think about it. The legal system is often not about right/wrong or justice. It's about business tactics and business advantage. And that's what Gateway's EULA is about, too. And Gateway doesn't have lawyers write them or defend them out of any sense of justice. It's all about business advantage. So, the weird question is how Gateway expects to win any business advantage. They've already lost a lot of good will on this issue alone. They used to be the underdog goodguy. And now, for any of us who cultivated any sense of denial that they've turned to the dark side, the denial is gone. Whether or not the plaintiff prevails, Gateway loses big. The EULA was the right cross, and the lawyer's intemperate remarks were the knockout punch. This is self-inflicted, Gateway. Bye bye. Sadly.
While it isnt a good idea to do so, you do not know why this person dropped out of high school. Possible health problems, financial etc. Either way, hes a human being and thats enough for me.
Here's an anecdote for you: my business partner (50/50) earns $USD 2,000.00 profit per day, every day, from our joint venture.
He's a high-school drop-out.
Nobody can "sign away" their statutory rights. You can't make a contract whereby you agree to be someones slave, because freedom is a statutory right - one granted by statute. Similarly, in a lot of places, consumer legislation gives you the right to sue any manufacturer for a defect - as a statutory right, you can't waive it, and any contract that includes such wording is void.
That's why you always see wording like "Any provision of this agreement that are contrary to local law are excised. You may have other rights depending on your state or province ...." You can't "waive" those rights with an EULA - even one you signed, never mind a post-purchase popup that you never saw and never agreed to.
Also, it'll be fun seeing Gateway try to appeal this one ... they're out of luck here. Asking people to waive their rights to redress just means you think your product is so crappy that there's a good chance that people will sue you out of business.
Stupid Gateway! Remember the old saying - a happy customer might tell 2 peope - a p*ssed-off customer will tell 100? Try a MILLION, because you can be sure that everyone's going to hear about this one - the competition will make sure of it, if nothing else.
Kevin Smith on Prince
You guys must sell a whole lot of weed.
subby needs a kick in the teeth for that title - he is sueing to get his money back on a dud pc
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
You're using her as bait, Master!
Man sues (company) because he can't understand the EULA!
They could use this case as precedent!
-- Toroyou'd see that he in fact, could not see an "I agree" button.
Even if he could have pressed that button, he'd still have a defective computer if that's all he could do with it. You can't sign a contract that violates the law any more than you can sell yourself into slavery.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
"This poor guy now faces daunting reality of having to litigate this on appeal against Gateway...By winning, he's lost.'"
What is the cost to Gateway in bad PR?
Either he got a replacement PC or he didn't - I would assume that on delivery someone would have needed to sign for it...
Rule out any shipping mistake or some hare-brained fraud on the customer's part and move on. Sounds easy. Why
send in the lawyers and turn it into a big deal?
Three words: Uniform Commercial Code, It's a modification to contract law that is intended to make in-box agreements legal.
Your state may not be so stupid as to have enacted that law. If they were, get it repealed.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
the idea that circumsision prevents STD's is a pathetic attempt to put a medical justification to reglious genital mutilation. And yes it DOES hurt, babies scream their lungs out the whole time you are butchering their bodies.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
In some states, one is not allowed to be represented by a lawyer in small claims court. In others, one needs special permission from a judge in order to use a lawyer. Who will Gateway send? Seems to me that whomever the plaintiff named in the complaint will have to represent their case. IANAL, of course.
By reading this sentence you agree to sending me $10,000.
You're missing the point: he's not suing because he can't read the EULA (that was just someone's attempt at a catchy title: remember that titles are almost always misleading, they're just there to get your attention). He's suing because he got a defective computer, and Gateway wouldn't fix it.
Why anyone would use bots to troll about circumcision, especially on /., is a mystery to me.
Mr. Sheehan has a good chance of winning in small claims court, because of the lack of lawyers. Gateway should be scared of this precedent. Some from Gateway, who isn't a lawyer, is now going to have to trek down to that court room and try to explain to the judge exactly why Gateway shouldn't have to replace the broken system they sold him.
Bearded Dragon
Unfortunately, the courts might tend to view a EULA as a Contract of Adhesion. In other words, it's "take it or leave it".
There's nothing that can be done about these types of contracts that force you into binding arbitration in the context of software other than what this man has argued and similar. In fact, your best realistic choice is to exercise your rights and use the option of not agreeing to the EULA, and shipping the machine back at their expense.
By doing this, the company incurs significant restocking and repackaging expenses and will eventually (hopefully) learn that such agreements are not worth the cost. This is especially true when you specifically tell them that binding arbitration terms are the primary reason you are returning the unit. Only in this way do we have any hope of stopping these kinds of unfortunately increasingly common practices (other than, of course, legislation).
The only real benefit of finishing high school is not getting stereotyped by morons like the OP. Myself, I dropped out of high school and started working at 15, as a Lotus Notes developer and network admin. Some people need institutionalized teaching, others find it far too limiting and stifling. If you need an institution to learn something, you really haven't learned anything.
In California, Corporations are supposed to be represented by an Officer in Small Claims Court. No lawyers allowed! That's why I love suing Corporations when their legal departments are complete assholes...
I like it even better when I don't give Gateway my money to begin with. Without sales, those asshole lawyers don't have much to do and might one day be forced to nice and earn an honest living. It's more fun to call them to you like this, "oh, waiter."
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Wrong! By fighting him, Gateway loses. This is nothing but bad publicity for them.
This, along with Dell getting sued by (is it?) New York, only goes to underscore the fact that any computer company that competes on price will give you an absolutely SUCKY product. If you want a decent computer, buy an Apple. Install Linux on it if you want, but buy an Apple. Install Windows on it if you really want, but buy decent hardware. (Of course, who'd want to install Windows as their main OS!? But that's another matter.)/P
I guess if we call Gateway at 800-369-1409 and say something to the effect that you're not going to buy a f**king Gateway PC because of the way they treated customers like Dennis Sheehan, I wonder if they'll rethink things.
Unlikely.... But I'm gonna call them anyway.... Just for sport.
Place nail here >+
What happened to the consumer rights for a product being fit for purpose?
Or dont you have that in the USA?
See my art -> http://herbevore.deviantart.com
Frank Herbert wrote a few stories about this. Best one IMHO is The Tactful Saboteur.
An excerpt:
"Before he begins training," McKie said, and his voice took on a solemn, lecturing tone, "the potential saboteur is shown the entire sordid record of history. The do-gooders succeeded once ... long ago. They eliminated virtually all red tape from government. This great machine with its power over human lives slipped into high speed. It moved faster and faster." McKie's voice grew louder. "Laws were conceived and passed in the same hour! Appropriations came and were gone in a fortnight. New bureaus flashed into existence for the most insubstantial reasons."
McKie took a deep breath, realizing he'd put sincere emotional weight behind his words.
"Fascinating," Bolin said. "Efficient government, eh?"
"Efficient?" McKie's voice was filled with outrage. "It was like a great wheel thrown suddenly out of balance! The whole structure of government was in imminent danger of fragmenting before a handful of people, wise with hindsight, used measures of desperation and started what was called the Sabotage Corps."
"Ahhh, yes. I've heard about the Corps' violence."
He's needling me, McKie thought, but found that honest anger helped now. "All right, there was bloodshed and terrible destruction at the beginning," he said. "But the big wheels were slowed. Government developed a controllable speed."
"Sabotage," Bolin sneered. "In lieu of red tape."
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Myself, I dropped out of high school and started working at 15, as a Lotus Notes developer
Wow. You should make a PSA. If that doesn't scare kids into staying in school, I don't know what will.
See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
I would say my high school friend but he only made it to 9th grade, owns his own plumbing business. He has been in business for 15 years, is up to 20 full time employees and probably clears at least 200K a year. He does new construction/remodel work and also repair of plumbing, drainage, and gas lines. He claims 80% of his non-contract work is via word of mouth and he spends very little on advertising. He also owns at least 15 commercial and multi-unit properties in the area that he rents out as well.
The "no warranty" part would be valid for the end user.
Funny how doctors face malpractice claims despite everything patients sign. Perhaps doctors' lawyers need to speak to Gateway/MSFT EULA Lawyers and learn a bit about EULAs :-)
Copyright 2007
The issuer of this contract allows users to enter into it by any of the following actions:
When the entrant to this contract commits one of the above acts they expressly enter into a contract for the entrant's soul. Once acquired by the issuer (ImaLamer, a subsidiary of ILP Inc Corporate Technologies and Weapons Manufacturing Research; herein known as ImaLamer/ILP) it can not be returned.
Get your Unix fortune now!
Regarding the comment that this guy is doomed because he will lose on appeal and he is a dropout. Never say never. Reminds me of Erin Brockovich who took on the power companies in California and eventually won and a movie was made about her starring Julie Roberts.
once, gateway had a reputation for service.
now they just suck. trashy hardware.
we used to have a standing order with them
(a state university in the midwest). we
buy nothing from them now.
And by just taking it up the wazoo, he has lost as well.
I find it hard to believe that the company would claim they sent him a second computer. Is there not a record of shipment? The plaintiff said he didn't receive a replacement computer. If he had signed for a delivery, surely he wouldn't be stupid enough to say he didn't.
But here's the thing I'm having trouble with: Company waste. They are paying their attorneys and the courts system way more than the value of system in question. Shouldn't someone be complaining to the board of directors over crap like this? Not only is the direct accounting of the situation bad business, but the potential for further loss through bad faith dealings and bad word of mouth (not to mention appearances on slashdot) presents such a negative value to the shareholders that someone on the board should be voting some executives out of a job.
I have heard it time and time again on slasdhot that corporations are required by law to create value for the shareholders. Well, here's an example of a corporation acting in a pretty aggressive and vindictive manner costing the company more in direct fees and probably 100 times that in bad word of mouth.
Yes but it makes it look bigger!
This guy is right to seek redress, but wonder if he might get a better result filing a complaint with the California Attorney General?
Wow. Lot of comments keep saying how Gateway has nothing to win here and it would just be a drop in the bucket to pay the guy off. This suit is HUGE for gateway. There's 2 pillars of their business on the line, not just a single defective PC. First, without an enforceable EULA, they have to change their entire business model (as would pretty much every other software and hardware manufacturer in existence); the entire concept of "Licensed" software under different terms than the original contract of sale depends on them. And I don't think that even most Slashdotters really want the severability of hardware and software agreements to go bye-bye. Just the number of comments suggesting installing Linux without ever booting the bundled Windows weighs pretty heavily. Second, although this is pretty minor considering there is already a Supreme Court decision (CIRCUIT CITY STORES, INC. V. ADAMS (99-1379) 532 U.S. 105 (2001)), binding arbitration clauses. Binding arbitration saves on the order of billions in litigation costs, even if the arbitrations go against the respondents. This case will probably never be heard in Small Claims Court. Gateway will appeal the Judge's decision to remand it to SCC, and probably, under terms of the UCC, get a Federal court to assert jurisdiction. Every hardware and software company around will either file amicus curiae briefs, or really want to, in support of Gateway. This remand to SCC is just a diversion, and not a real "win" at all for Sheehan.
when my son was born, i cut his cord. do you think i hurt him? how about when his mother squeezed him out of her nice, warm nurturing womb and into a cold, florescently lit hospital room- nurses around jamming suction tubes up his nose to clear the fluids from his sinuses and throat- do you think he minded all that too? i held my son when he was circumsized at 2 days old- slept through it- probably because of the topical anesthetic they put on him first. hes a well adjusted 4 year old now. if you want, i can ask him if he remembers if he felt anything, but im pretty sure he's gonna think your comment is moronic.
Sure he does. Because when you're making over $730,000 a year you have nothing better to do than post anonymously to Slashdot.
If he paid for the computer by credit card, he should have challenged the transaction on the basis of a defective product the company refused to make good on. It's a simple process, and the law favors him. Especially if he as a UPS receipt proving he shipped it back to them.
If he didn't pay with a credit card, he's an idiot for that.
How the hell do you get a small claims suit moved to a superior court? There's certainly no argument that aritration will be cheaper, because small claims costs less than $50 to file, and lawyers are prohibited. Gateway has already spent a hundred times what the computer is worth. The superior court judge, at this point, should be talking about kicking the whole thing back down to small claims.
inability of teh common man to even understand the terms of the EULA. AThe verbiage is getting to the point that without a lawyer present many people do not understand the meaning of what is written in the EULAs.
The only other comparable situation that many peopel would encounter is a mortgage/refinancing closing. Thank god there is a neutral ( well in my state anyay) attorney present, giving at least cursory description/explantion of what one is about to sign. In every case when I had questions, they where explained.
I do not think most people have a lawyer present when they try to read through these EULAs.
With enough anesthetic, you could cut his ear off at 2 days old. That doesn't mean it's a good idea, or that he isn't losing anything when you cut it off, or that you aren't violating his basic human rights by amputating a perfectly good body part when he's far too young to understand what's happening.
Seriously, if your son wants to trade the (questionable) health benefits of circumcision for the (documented) loss of genital sensitivity, he can make that decision on his own in a few years. Why were you in such a hurry to get it done before he was able to say no?
... the legal costs will leave him financially depleted. Hopefully, the cow box it comes in will be big enough for him to curl up into when he's homeless.
While it is true that the sales agreement is between you and the retailer, the license agreement is between you and the software maker. The retailer doesn't own the copyright on that software, and as such, may not distribute the software directly. He may only purchase a license to use the software and then sell that license to you, the consumer.
Personally, I dislike EULAs because they are:
- normally impossible to read before purchase
- Non-negotiable, and
- in the real world, nobody reads them
Regarding their enforceability, this has never been proved one way or another. On the one hand, given the reasons I listed above, it seems clear that an EULA is not a meeting of the minds, so how could they be enforceable?But on the other hand, the end user nonetheless indicated his agreement to the EULA by clicking "I Agree", so can we not assume that when a person says, "I Agree" that he, in fact, agrees?
Judges, in my experience, don't typically like to invalidate contracts unless a party acted in bad faith. But who would appear to be acting in bad faith in this situation? The software maker? Or the end user, who said "I Agree" but in fact, did not agree and further had no intention of following or even reading the agreement that he declared his agreement to abide by?
"Avoid employing unlucky people - throw half of the pile of CVs in the bin without reading them." -- David Brent
Of course you read the EULA.
And then click on the "Fuck Off" button.
It's the one labeled "I Accept" but everyone on the planet knows the words "I Accept" means "Fuck Off".
It's Universal Standard Engrish now.
And to any trolls replying to this post, allow me to be the first to say...."I Accept"
He did it was a joint venture.
READ CAREFULLY. By reading this post you agree, on behalf of your employer, to release me from all obligations and waivers arising from any and all NON-NEGOTIATED agreements, licenses, terms-of-service, shrinkwrap, clickwrap, browsewrap, confidentiality, non-disclosure, non-compete and acceptable use policies ("BOGUS AGREEMENTS") that I have entered into with your employer, its partners, licensors, agents and assigns, in perpetuity, without prejudice to my ongoing rights and privileges. You further represent that you have the authority to release me from any BOGUS AGREEMENTS on behalf of your employer.
Way back when, in a time when few judges used computers and the web didn't exist, a particularly slimey lawyer convinced a particularly clueless judge that you copy the software when you run it.
It's true at some level. You copy it from disk into RAM, and then into the CPU. Arrrrgh!!!!
(Plus there is the whole install-to-harddisk thing going on, but I think the decision is old enough that this could have been running a program from a floppy.)
So yeah, you need a license just to run the program.
Self-taught pros are a rare exception, most people would be completely helpless without some sort of organized brainwashing like the kind that happens in western schools. In any case, the classroom teaches social interaction (to some extent). It might result in highly social morons, but at least they're social :P People who are moronic AND antisocial are in tough shape.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
Not all that surprising: Major corporation: billions in assets; able to sequester our 'best minds' from our most 'enlightened institutions': Harvard, Yale, Columbia. These lawyers encrypt the most convoluted, technically dense lawerly material they can to exploit every nuance and crevice the 'law' allows. Versus this, the average man is woefully ill-equipped to fight for or protect himself. And if she tries; millions of dollars worth of time and money are thrown in her direction. The companies can afford it; the average individual doesn't stand a chance. I weep that our best minds are devoted to pursuits such as this.
No fucktard, he is a white fucktarded USian cracker who should slit his fucking wrists like all white fucktarded USian crackers should.4 M7GATEWAY.embedded.prod_affiliate.4.JPG
http://media.sacbee.com/smedia/2007/06/06/21/215-
"By reading this license, you agree to be bound by it."
Oh, and BTW, by reading this post, you agree to sell me your house and the land it sits on for $1000.
Well we all are reformed...
Doctors
Lawyers
CEOs
Scientists
Accountants
Boy Scouts
Indian Chiefs
Why shouldn't we be repeatedly modded up for our unquestionable expertise?
Read the actual article. (The Slashdot poster didn't get it.) The issue is that the customer did not agree to the EULA because the computer was too broken to display it. Thus, the customer has not waived the right to sue.
This is bullshit. Ignorance of the law or rights to therein are not the responsibility of the governing body. Meaning, if I write software, send out a EULA, it's not my responsibility that someone reads it or not. My lawful responsibility as a software developer is to simply make it available. If this dolt was in any reasonable doubt of the EULA, there's 800 numbers, printed materials, web addresses, etc that they could access. The lack of accountability is a trend, mainly with fuckhead young kids.
Tell me: What will happen if every time such a case comes up Gateway concludes that the system is worth less than the legal expense?
Absolutely on the money - the trend in this country has been to shift rights from the individual to companies. It completely sucks.
:-)
The only thing I don't get is when you say "because the people I've worked for have had THEIR clients force [the 'spare time agreement'] upon THEM". Companies don't have spare time. Only real people do
It's funny the lawyer sites the guy as a high school drop out. That's actually not necessarily indication that the guy is going to be incapable of putting the smack-down (technical legal jargon) on Gateway. I mean he is the guy who has already ended up with 2 Gateway computers for the price of one and is even still apparently winning in court.
You might as well change your vocation Mr. Harvard Lawyer..........
Please don't mod me down if this is redundant, but wouldn't Gateway have spent alot less money if they just replaced this guys computer, instead of paying lawyers for whatever it is they're doing?
They could be afraid of precedent, I suppose. This world is clearly already fucked, if that's the case.
Nevermind. This is the kind of case that makes me question my sanity. Or, if not my sanity, the state of society in general.
Best of luck to you all, or How I Learned To Love The Bomb.
He could have saved a lot of trouble by buying a PC from a local builder. The local builder would have apologized profusely and fixed the problem asap. Oh well, who cares right? Let's just do business with a faceless corporation that is enterprise-centric. It's ok though, because there is enough profit in the bargain bin shitpiece you bought to afford at least 24 hours of tech support from someone in india with a flowchart. You get what you pay for.
The same documentation that is written by someone in Taiwan who can barely put two English words together?
Documentation which has vague instructions such as "insert a screw into the hole", when you have 20 different types of screws?
Crowded diagrams/pictures where you have no way of knowing which hole the arrow is pointing to?
If people writing documents actually wrote them with the reader in mind, the prospective readers may actually try to read them. The problem is that manuals, licenses and documentation are NOT written in a clear, concise and easy to navigate method. They're user unfriendly, which is why no one attempts to read them.
Creative Commons has a concise checkbox/graphical version of their license. Anything more than that and the end user doesn't want to know about it. I certainly don't blame them either.
So, how do you decline a EULA?
Do you just send the item back to the seller?, who pays shipping?
Imagine if a few hundred people each ordered a new PC, and found they disliked the EULA, so returned them all?
In the UK we have the unfair contracts act also, to protect us from pseudo contracts like this that try to stick it to us. So even if they managed to argue that not returning the product constitutes acceptance of the terms, you can point to the unfair contract act, which entitled you to ignore the lousy terms and keep the product anyway.
l e-supply/unfair-contracts/index.html
http://www.dti.gov.uk/consumers/buying-selling/sa
"The Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977 limits the use of exclusion clauses in contracts.
"The Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999 (SI 1999 No 2083) provide that a term which has not been individually negotiated in a consumer contract is unfair (and hence non-binding on the consumer) if, contrary to the requirement of good faith, it causes a significant imbalance in the rights and obligations of the parties to the detriment of the consumer."
You think that when you start making money and become successful, you stop doing every day things? Do you think successful people don't use the internet, or read Slashdot? You're an idiot, with a thinly veiled jealous streak.
Now go file those TPS reports. Didn't you get the memo?
"This poor guy now faces daunting reality of having to litigate this on appeal against Gateway...By winning, he's lost."
The big loser is Gateway. Now, the company cannot win. Would you buy a Gateway computer after reading the Slashdot article? Not likely.
An appeal means that the case is no longer in small claims court. Both parties can then hire a lawyer.
An appeal means that Gateway exposes itself to more attention.
Gateway in the news: Jury finds former Gateway execs manipulated earnings.
a patern of lies delys and denils, i ordered a tablet and demanded a wacom sencor i as logged and confurmed and yesed to deth denyed and vilifyed by gateway and when they finaly released what i ordered i was not eaven on file i live in ny and my last name is sheehan i knew it wasn't a coincidence gateway just has it out for us sheehans
Take what we say with salt, for it is likely both hearsay and conjecture. Do your own research-come to your own opinion.
He's in this pro se, genius.
The trend of measuring success in dollars really irks me.
It's true that dropping out of high school doesn't necessarily doom one to failure. (It's still true that it's generally good to stay in school, so there's a dilemma here—people believe that dropping out dooms one largely because they've been propagandized to think so in order to stop them from dropping out.)
It's also true that you can earn whatever you like and still be a miserable person living a "failed" life.
"Success" in the sense of happiness will most often require a certain amount of money, but most people's utility function drops sharply after they've obtained a few basic luxuries.
All he has to do is go to court and say "I agree, now fix my dammed computer" There is no way they can say that's not agreeing to the EULA because he's doing it in court, in front of witnesess, and presumably under oath. So now you live up to your end of the EULA, "not responsible for any loss of hardware, software, data, life, or anything else that might go wrong." Dohh!
I'd say he's "won" already - Gateway has already cost itself more in bad publicity than the sale could possibly be worth. Plus it sounds like Gateway's case is really, really weak.
I'm too lazy to look it up because I don't care enough about slashdot, but I know the background enough to make a qualified statement.
Paypal had such a clause in its agreement. Someone in some other part of California sued for some minor amount in small claims.
Paypal appealed all the way through CA courts to a federal court. The federal court, interpreting CA law, and citing dozens of precedent cases, determined that forced arbitration and geographical constraints on the jurisdiction were an unfair practice in California FOR SMALL CLAIMS. That such provisions were designed not to protect consumers, but to insulate corporations from suits.
I make my first sentence a lie. http://pub.bna.com/eclr/021227.htm
I thought EULAs were required for software, because copyright law prevents you from doing anything at all with the software unless one is there. Eg, if you 'copy' (ie install) the software onto your PC, you're copying the software, so breaking copyright law. The EULA is a *LICENCE* which grants you extra rights (such as being able to use the software) which aren't otherwise allowed. The EULA can thus be used to restrict when those EXTRA rights are possible. It can't restrict things which are required to be allowed by law (eg it can't say 'if the CD is faulty, we won't replace it', because that's required by law in most places).
But, with a PC, you're not breaking any law by using it, so why do you need an EULA?
OK, you could have a CONTRACT, but that's not a LICENCE, so the mere fact that Gateway are calling this an EULA sounds like some lawyer somewhere has got it wrong.
By definition, a LICENCE lets you do something you couldn't otherwise do.
Interesting article but I would have to say that it hardly has any substance to back up the fact that some high school drop outs are successful. First of all, most of those dropouts in the article are people who dropped out at a college/university level. Secondly, could they only find 6 successfully dropouts? On top of that one of them dropped out of college in the 50s! Many people didn't even attend college in the 50s. I don't think that article could argue that dropping out of high school leaves plenty of opportunities in current times because in all reality, it doesn't.
Try getting a job without a high school diploma... I'll be seeing you at McDonald's.
If you look around on the internet, you will find a few reports from people who managed to return their copy of Windows directly to Microsoft and got a few dollars out of it. Usually in the case of preinstalled OEM versions.
;-)
But the same reports tend to say that it takes quite a bit of perseverance to get through to the right department. So even if you can technically return the software, it will cost you time and effort.
A problem that is best avoided by using free software where it is available
C - the footgun of programming languages
In Portugal, e.g., the law makes it impossible for you to accept a contract in which you give up on a legal right you have, so that if you have the right to court for some reason, a contract in which you agree NOT to go to court for that reason is automatically null. One should agree that the land of freedom still has a long way to go.
Tuntematon Muukalainen
Let me get this straight, they sent their corporate lawyer to small claims court? And they plan to appeal? Has it occurred to anyone at Gateway that they are probably spending 100x more on this lawyer than if they just gave the guy his money back?
With stellar business decisions like this, it's no wonder Gateway got wiped out by Dell.
-R
Gateway should just slap their vicious and arrogant lawyers, tell them to STFU and just pay the guy instead of pushing this to a multi-million dollar loss in public image.
When will companies ever learn? If I were the guy, I'd contact every media outlet that needed a story...and which one doesn't?
E Proelio Veritas.
The EULA is a *LICENCE* which grants you extra rights (such as being able to use the software) which aren't otherwise allowed. If you buy something, even software, you have the right to use it. With software, what you don't have are copyrights - that is the right to copy and distribute beyond your own personal fair use. Copying the software to your PC - even more than one, if they're all yours - is fair use. It's the software companies that want you to think that you can't legally make more than one copy. You're limited to one copy by the EULA, not by the law.
What software companies call a "License Agreement" is a contradiction in terms - a license does NOT require agreement. A true license is (as you said) a granting of rights that are otherwise illegal, but you omitted that the grant is unilateral - only the owner of the rights has to agree.
Here's an example: I own a barbecue pit. I hereby grant you the right to use it on the next February 29, provided you can find it. (If you do, tell me...my garage is, well,...) See? You didn't have to agree - it's my BBQ, I'll let you use it if I want. Whether or not you use it (or even find it) is up to you and the lords of chaos that rule my garage.
A software "EULA" is actually a contract. Contracts require "agreement", so a "End User License Agreement" is a contract. They grant you nothing you wouldn't already have the rights to (via purchasing the software), and in exchange, you give up all those pesky rights that the vendors don't like. "License" doesn't actually enter into most EULAs - really. Pick one, read it and see if it lets you do *ANYTHING* that you wouldn't have the right to do just by purchasing the product. Even software doesn't need a EULA.
Pavlov wouldn't be so famous if he'd used a can opener instead of a bell.
The education system is highly over rated by those who are products of it.
There is always more than one way to skin a cat.
The first job of a school is to convince you to give them your money.
The second job is to convince you to tell others to do the same.
Actually teaching you something falls somewhere below that.
Cynicism is the most advanced stage of idealism.
Nothing is foolproof, fools are too ingenious. - Murphy
ask any DJ/radio personality if contracts matter, they dont. judges dont look at contracts and say 'well, it says you do this, you do this.' they let lawyers argue invalid points and let companies fail to live up to their word.
EULA's are complete BS; they are not a legally binding contract. Period.
heh, why not sue because an EULA is unreadable nonsense?
Who is the dumb ass at gateway that didnt just replace the guys computer and make this go away?
If a company were litigating via appeal just because they felt they would be able to bury the plaintiff in enough paperwork to make him unable to continue prosecuting the case, couldn't you very well file an anti-SLAPP to their appeal?
I know it's normally used only at the beginning of a case but I would think he could definition file a motion for leave to file the anti-SLAPP and see where that gets him.
looks like a nigga to me
Try getting a job without a high school dimploma? Heck, try getting one with a high school dimploma.
You must be new around here.
I dropped out of high school, and I'm doing better than most folk - there are other avenues to education, thanks very much.
Wait.... What?
Judges give latitude to defendants without law degrees in small claims court. I wouldn't be surprised if he won.
Just typical of a lawyer pointing out the problem and not offering to help. Maybe the lawyer could take on the case pro bono? Maybe the EFF should get involved with this one?
My mom always said, "Jim, you're 1 in a million." Given the current population, there are 7000 of me. God help us all!
The concept of "proper notice" is a matter of state code and prior court rulings. It is not what you as an individual think proper notice should be based on a logic or critical thinking. Logic is not used in the court systems and it gets arm chair lawyers in trouble all the time. For example, in my state if I hand my car over to a valet I get a ticket that says if they damage my car or if my items are stolen out of my car then it is not their fault and I can't sue. Well, if I never bother to read the notice or if someone doesn't show me a large sign that has the notice on it and tell me to read it before I hand my keys over, the notice is not enforceable. Just including a notice with a product or service doesn't suffice in most states. The law is not logical, it is written in code and enforced in the most illogical ways though past court rulings. The court will ask you if the notice was properly displayed and if you read it. If I never flip that valet ticket over and read the notice guess what, it isn't enforceable - in my state. Other states have different laws concerning notices.
....sorry...that's all....I was feeling left out.
Until a few years ago I worked in the sales department at Gateway. If one of my customers called with a problem like this, and tech support was unable to resolve the issue, I'd just replace his system. Systems do get damaged in transit from time to time.
The more enlightened people have realized already that the current system of education is designed to create a workforce of employees, not leaders. The fact that some leaders emerge from our educational system says more about their individual resistance to 'training' than their benefit of it. After all, if education were responsible for their advancement, there would be a lot more advanced people than there are today.
Dropping out of highschool isn't necessarily to his detriment. He may not be able to "get a good job" but he may be able to give you one!
Heck, try getting one when you can't even spell diploma.
Promote proofreading. Don't mod up sloppy posts.
Presumably you left before the bit where they teach what anecdotal evidence and statistical significance are?
Only three things are certain; death, taxes, and apocryphal quotations - Ben Franklin.
If i was to be building computers and then sell them to the general public i would certainly want to help them out if they was to get in any kind of trouble.
If Gateway now have had their ways to look at customers rights changed lately, i believe it is up to them to scrutinice their own EULA's and maybe change or remove some of the texts. One reason to why companies today tend to not even concider helping their customers are because they are so big a business that there are no thoughts left to their customers, apart from building the biggest and fastest machines and making great commersials. And let's not forget the profits growing through the roof, and even then it's not enough.
If the machinery tend to crash, or in this case, not even start up correctly the first time you hit the switch, they want nothing with it to do. There's so many people in the world that they don't have to care if they lose a copule of customers because of faulty machinery.
Theres not even any kind of guaranties that the machinery will work, and because of those EULA's the company can clear their back of any guilt to what may happen if you decide to use their machinery. If you happen to get blind because of the monitor exploding, get electricuted because of faulty wiring, or drop the package on your feet because they are to heavy, it's not the companys fault.
But then there's one question left. Should the EULA's even be regarded as legal documents?
I don't think so, because they are documents made up by well payed layers (mostly anyway) who get their salary from the company, and they are not in any way tested against national or international law before beeing applied to the customer. There's not even guarateed that theres lawyers writing the texts. I have seen examples of such texts so badly writteh that my dog could do a better job.
I've never understood why uneducated people wants to defend themselves. I guess they have seen too many court shows on TV and think they are a stellar lawyer.
Think about it, is he going to do surgery on himself too? When you, an uneducated dufus, defend yourself in court, the chance of loosing is 100%.
If you mod me down, I *will* introduce you to my sister!
I dropped out of high school. I am by no means rich, and don't have the standard internet success story of 6 cars, 2 wives, 3 houses and $100,000 a month income as claimed by 90% of all 13 year olds queried.... but I ain't hurting. Now, I did, after 10 years, go ahead and grab a double major in Computer Information Systems and Business Administration.... but that was to get past a glass ceiling I was encountering. When I started in IT, there were no relevant degrees, and we were all self taught. A few had degrees of some field or another, and they moved a little faster. Times change, there are degrees in the field, and us old dinosaurs, no matter how many years experience we had, found advancements being filled by PFY's fresh out of college. (And, as it turns out, hand-holding them through a job that the company decided we weren't qualified to do... yet we were good enough to do our won job and this inexperienced punk's as well)
I can't have pesky studies getting in the way of my porn consumption and linux fanaticism! I *know* I'm better than everyone else, so everyone should just shut up and be more like me.
In the area of Torts, Person A buys a product from Person B. Person B has stated repeatedly that the product works. Person A bought the product with the understanding that the product works. Person A powers up the product, and discovers that the product is "Broken". EULA rules, or not, Person B has not "Performed for Compensation"; Or, if Person B knowingly sells crippled or broken machines, never had a "Meeting of the Minds" with Person A. Because of this, could it be that the EULA for Person B never became effective?
Another satisfied customer.
I used to not read them. After seeing this, I do a quick once over now.
You're thinking of UCITA, which only ever passed in Maryland and Virginia. The UCC itself long predates the sale of commercial software.
... and so it's UCITA that forces shrink wrap licenses and few states have been dumb enough to pass it.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
All of the most successful people you personally know of are probably dropouts (either high school or college).
Michael Dell is one of them.
The American public school model is meant to grind out factory workers and soldiers. The people that we stole it from don't even use it anymore.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
What makes you think the kid from legal aid is going to be any better? If you're lucky, that kid will have at least had "classes in school" about what he's doing. More likely than not, he won't even have that really. Expecting that he's got actual experience is too much. He will also more likely than not have sufficient time to devote to your case in particular.
You don't have the money for a competent lawyer like OJ Simpson would.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
My second guess would be German, but I hear they actually have developed a sense of humor (after many false starts that ended in utter tragedy). My third guess would be Aspergers but that's not really a place of origin.
In none of these cases, be they printed or on-screen EULAs for hardware or software, does the buyer have the option whatsoever to read the contract before closing it. Sure there may be some verbiage to the effect of "if you don't agree you can send this back for a full refund" but even that is not seen until they already have your money. Basically they're unfairly/unexpectedly springing extra contracts on you after the deal has already been done. I could equally send them a post-purchase letter saying "by keeping my payment for this product you hereby grant me all rights to the material purchased, including reverse-engineering & copying and relief from any DCMA issues; if you do not agree, send me a full refund plus postage-paid return packaging"; not really any different, is it?
Can we get a "-1 Wrong" moderation option?
...don't tell my kids I told you this. Game stores have strict rules about returning games. They won't take them back if they're opened. They will, however, give you a fresh copy of the game if you tell them yours is broken by no fault of your own. They won't check to see that this is the case. Then you can come back later with the new copy and return it for a full refund. It's probably safer to do this when a different set of employees is present or go to a different location of the same store.
Read my short stories - You won't regret it.
Maybe it would happen like this:
Someone meets Zarf (Slashdot member number 5735) at a party, learns that Zarf is involved with computers, and says, "What computer manufacturer do you recommend?" Zarf says, "Above all, stay away from Gateway."
see title etc
because as this becomes widely known inside and outside tech circles (please feel to read that as "he should call eyewitness hometeam action news alert at the phone number on the bottom of your TV screen...") Gateway will lose a boatload of sales. this one is bizarre enough to make the international wire services.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
Sheehans are notorious for long protests when they're unhappy.
The ultimate goal of science is to unify all forces of nature to a single law that can be silk-screened onto a T-shirt.
Getaway includes all the papers in the paper form in the box.
As for if contract is made when money change hands, you'd better not ask me or Slashdot. Read the appelate court decision. They ruled on this point too:
--The question in ProCD was not whether terms were added to a contract after its formation, but how and when the contract was formed -- in particular, whether a vendor may propose that a contract of sale be formed, not in the store (or over the phone) with the payment of money or a general "send me the product," but after the customer has had a chance to inspect both the item and the terms.
And gave some logic to it:
--Customers as a group are better off when vendors skip costly and ineffectual steps such as telephonic recitation, and use instead a simple approve-or-return device. Competent adults are bound by such documents, read or unread.
See... this is what I don't understand because I'm not American.
Where I come from, he could have picked that best lawyer possible and the lawyer would have been paid a pre agreed upon fees for the job by the government. Just because you are poor shouldn't mean you can't get good defense. Here, you are basically left to rot in prison just because you don't have money. We work from the principle that everyone is equal to the law and as such has the right to equal treatment and defense. Money should not be a reason why you can't be defended.
I guess it's just a country that cares more for it's citizens and actually have equality in regards to laws and where money is not a deciding factor.
If you mod me down, I *will* introduce you to my sister!
"Dude, you bought a Gateway!"
Gateway has been on the verge of bankruptcy for what, the last ten years? Their stuff is overpriced and underpowered and I've never spent more than a minute examining their marketing material before concluding that they are way behind everybody else in the consumer PC sweepstakes.
Desktops are commodities. Buy them that way. Go to a storefront run by some Chinese guys and buy a white box. You'll get a straight up Taiwan clone with standard parts, a nice Windows full install CD (none of that "recovery partition" bullshit) and no crap on your desktop.
Anybody who buys desktops from Dell, HP, Gateway or any of the other losers is one. Oh, yeah, Dell might actually be able to undercut your local store by $50 or so on the price - but you'll spend that much removing the crap from your desktop - and when removing the temporary McAfee AV hoses your Windows, you'll spend a lot more fixing that problem.
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
Tank yoo sirr for te flaterry. i cann't spell, butt i'am an selv-taohgt pro
Error #13: No coffee. Operator halted. Please place boot device at bottom.
He isn't defending himself, he's the plaintiff, and as a real person he's not allowed to bring a lawyer into small claims court.
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.
He was a man of integrity and behaved in a manner worthy of great respect. He wasn't perfect but the fact he was a US citizen should not mean he is lumped with those who continually denigrate the formerly good reputation of the said citizens.
That said, I am currently find it difficult to say anything good about current (past two decades) administration. Then again, I have never met an US citizen I didn't like. (There was one Texan who came close though...)
Semi-automatic amateur armchair Australian philosopher; conjecture ready at any moment...
Hey cut me some slack. I'm a PHP developer.
1. Make sure the bios is set to boot from cd rom
2. install linux on whole HD
3. replace box stickers (gateway or whatever) with your own customized ones
4. resell the computer as something else.
Well the thing is, college teaches you submission. An old-school tech wizard will know a LOT more than the college kid, but at least from what I've seen, we come factory-built with bonus BOFH attitude, while the new kid is utterly useless but very polite about it (to middle management). When the going gets tough, the tough complain while slurping sounds start emanating from the college kids' cubicles. Fast-forward ten years, the guy with a degree is now your bosses' boss, while you're still maintaining the same old Novell cluster you've been loathing since you got the job.
It's an ass-kissers market, and what better way to kiss establishment's ass than to spend a quarter million on a shiny degree ?
-Billco, Fnarg.com
This presumes that people listen to me at all. Most people ignore me. Has something to do with my being a Linux geek.
[signature]