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Video Professor Sues 100 Anonymous Critics
Techdirt is reporting that the Video Professor Company is suing 100 anonymous critics of their company. The Video Professor is known for their television ads hawking DVDs that teach you various skills like how to use your computer. Most of the complaints center around how their "free" product offering automagically signs you up for a subscription. Instead of addressing the concerns the Video Professor has decided to take the litigious route.
One guy, from this link in TFA, says that he tried to order the Quickbooks tutorial from the Video Professor. The website gave a confirmation page that listed some product other than what he ordered. Then, they start sending me other tutorials, but he never requested those. On top of it, he tries to order the Quickbooks tutorial again a couple months later, but this time he calls them. They tell him he already ordered that one, but offer to send him is order for free, since it was supposed to arrive back in March. In the end, he never got the product he actually ordered.
Doesn't sound like a company I'd do business with. Ever.
My blog
"Instead of addressing the concerns the Video Professor has decided to take the litigious route."
No, they brought their claims to civil court under tort law. Tort exists precisely for the purpose of settling claims like this.
The original complaint, which is buried (thanks to linking to a blog, which links to a blog, etc...why can't you people cite original sources? Christ), asserts that customers, or a competitor, are maliciously posting reviews (ie, reverse astroturfing) with false information.
It's not up to a bunch of yahoos on the interbutt to decide if they meet the burden of proof in a civil case (which is much lower than a criminal case) on these two issues. The court decides whether to give them a court order seeking records on their posters.
It's also up to Video Professor to prove that the posts are false. If they are, guess what kiddies! That's libel, and yeah, shockingly, it is NOT legal to public false information maliciously.
In short, stop bitching and let the judiciary do their job, which is to dismiss the lawsuit if it is frivolous, or let it proceed to discovery, etc. Do any of you realize how stupid you sound complaining about tort law, which has existed as a key part of societies for several centuries, almost the world over?
Please help metamoderate.
That's pretty much the standard nowadays. Who is going to spend time and money making things better when you can just sue the whiners for complaining?
No. If you read the original filing, they're complaining that it is possibly another company posting comments in a campaign against them AND that the reviews contain false information.
Given that legal action is fairly expensive, I presume that they had enough evidence of both claims to at least satisfy themselves it was worth the expense, risk of countersuit(s), and potential fallout (ie negative publicity and such.)
Even if you sue someone, the court isn't going to just hand you a big check because you say "they made up shit about us!"; you have to prove that the claims were false and malicious to qualify for libel.
Please help metamoderate.
For online lessons, the same lessons are provided to the customer through streaming media. These lessons are billed on a per-month basis; access to all lessons is available for a monthly subscription fee of approximately $30.
The company has been criticized[6] for its CD-ROM sales and advertising practice. Some complaints center on an alleged lack of clarity regarding the nature of the continuity sales model and the "free" CD-ROM, and in perceived difficulty in contacting the company for refunds. Others are based on the lack of choice the customer has in subsequent offerings. The company says that such complaints are rare, and promptly resolved. As of September 2007, the company has a "Satisfactory" rating by the Better Business Bureau. Reading between the lines here, you can see how badly such a system can be abused. The online accounts I read about their business practices marked them as quite worrisome.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
Looks like they get your credit card number when you sign up, promising not to charge you for the "free" service or something, and then later charge you because you forgot to cancel their subscription.
Several credit cards now let you generate disposable credit card numbers on the fly --just go to the web site and you can have a new credit card number with your specified credit limit and date of expiry. I'd like to see how they handle that! Maybe they'll send a message: "Dear Sir, your credit card number is no longer valid and we were unable to pull that scam on you. Please go to the following web page and enter your new credit card info, so that we can scam you."
In fact, something similar happened to me. Near the end of the tax year, I decided to make a donation to a charity, and figured out how much would be best given my tax situation. I donated through a web site using a disposable credit card. Somehow, they ended up charging only about 40% of the amount I said I would donate.
Fast forward to three months later, well into the new tax year, I get a phone call from the charity saying that my credit card wasn't working. I said,
"What are you talking about? You're not supposed to be charging my credit card."
"Yeah, we are --you made a donation."
"But that was last year! You charged it already!"
"But we didn't charge enough."
"So you tried to just charge more now and have some bill randomly show up on my credit card bill? If you want the rest of the donation, send me a receipt backdating the donation to the previous tax year."
"I'm sorry, we're not allowed to backdate receipts."
"Well, then, too bad. I offered my money and you screwed up. Next time charge the correct amount. And don't make unannounced corrections to your mistake a few months after I've reconciled my finances."
404555974007725459910684486621289147856453481154 in hex is "You sank my Battleship?"
[GPG key in journal]
the problem is VP ads trumpet the "free cd" thing and do not mention that you will be paying for a subscription for X cds in this case the "fine print" is written on a stone tablet in the middle of the african jungle in an obscure dialect of sanscrit. (you ltierally only get the details after you have your "free disc")
Any person using FTFY or editing my postings agrees to a US$50.00 charge
I've read all the fine print on the CD order page and the User Agreement page and if some of the complaints linked to are true then it isn't just a case of not reading the fine print.
Some of the complaints are the inability to cancel the subscription. Being billed a few days after the trial and not getting a refund once they sent the discs back in. If you read the fine print on the CD oder page you have 10 days and only have to send in one disc to get the money back. The problem is they don't specify 10 days from order or receipt. This is important if it's sent via the postal service. I have had packages take 12 days to come in via that method. It also doesn't mention on that page that you will be subscribed to subsequent versions.
When I was younger I used the Columbia music club. They clearly stated the terms and conditions and I had no problem meeting them. I always had the option to write "refused, return to sender" if I forgot to tell them not to send me the current months CD picks. If I remember all I had to do was buy 6 CDs at regular price.
So no, this is not like the CD and book clubs because the terms they are holding people to are: not spelled completely disclosed. they aren't completely honoring the ones they do, and they aren't giving people the same time frame to return subscription shipments(Columbia was 30 days unopened.)
Here's one of the review pages listed in the law suit, there's certainly a lot of negatives....
Oh yeah, I only read Play Boy for the articles.....
You did consent to it, dumbass. They didn't start sending you a pornographic magazine out of the blue. You had to specifically respond to an offer to receive those three free issues which told you you would be billed if you had not canceled before your three issues were sent. The reason they didn't pursue it was only because the amount of money was so small it wasn't worthwhile. Not because they were in the wrong, you were.