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The $54 Million Laptop
Stanislav_J writes "It happens to the best of us: you drop off your laptop at the local branch of some Super Mega Electronics McStore, go to pick it up, and they can't find it. Lost, gone, kaput — probably sucked into a black hole and now breeding with lost airline luggage. It would make any of us mad, but Raelyn Campbell of Washington, D.C. isn't just mad — she's $54 million mad. That's how much she is asking from Best Buy in a lawsuit that seeks 'fair compensation for replacement of the $1,100 computer and extended warranty, plus expenses related to identity theft protection.' Best Buy claims that Ms. Campbell was offered and collected $1,110.35 as well as a $500 gift card for her inconvenience. (I guess that extra 35 cents wasn't enough to sway her.) Her blog claims that Geek Squad employees spent three months telling her different stories about where her laptop might be before finally acknowledging that it had been lost. For those who follow economic trends, this means that a laptop's worth is roughly equivalent to that of a pair of pants."
She's not the loon that the submitter tries to make her out to be. There are a bunch of mitigating factors here, and I highly suggest anyone who complains about her actiosn dig a little deeper.
The thing that really ticks me off more than anything is that the lady paid $300 for one of those ripoff store warranties. This kind of money is normally pure profit for companies, since very few people actually collect on it. However, when someone does have a problem, I expect them to fulfill their obligations on it, not lie and jerk around the customer who bought it for THREE MONTHS. To fix a friggin' POWER BUTTON.
Also, please keep in mind that she admits that she does not expect to actually win $54 million. The reason she chose that amount is because, as stated, they've been lying to her and jerking her around for three months, and this was the only way she felt that it could get any attention.
Normally, I frown upon these cases myself for being a drain on the system and a waste of time. But seriously, read what she's gone through before deciding that she's out of line for trying to punish them for how stupid they've been. She may not be 100% right here, but I don't think that she's 100% wrong, and I have to admit that I hope she gets a pretty high payout to strike a punitive blow against the company for its practices.
Last i heard service companies ( unless they explicitly have a contract with you stating otherwise ) aren't liable for your data other the 'best effort', so i don't see how that applies.
If she had sensitive data on there, she should have pulled the HD first. Sux to be her.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
...then I have no problem with her claim.
We have always been at war with Eurasia!
Was that what Best Buy did was illegal. From ars technica:
"Campbell's tax returns were on her laptop, and Best Buy apparently violated Washington, DC's security breach notification laws by not telling her about the potential data loss. And the potential for data theft as a result of missing equipment is no laughing matter: the state of Ohio, TSA, IRS, US Department of Transportation, and the Veterans Administration have all lost equipment (often laptops) that have forced them to alert millions of citizens to watch out for identity theft. Campbell says that she still hasn't heard from Best Buy on that particular issue, and has been forced to incur extra costs to monitor all of her accounts for suspicious activity."
On top of that, the victim also notes that she herself thinks 54 mil is too much, but thinks it is necessary to get the media attention to make Best Buy do the right thing.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080212-victim-54-million-best-buy-lawsuit-stupid-but-necessary.html
Scorta futuere amo!
Blogging is a creative art.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
A friend of mine had a similar situation with Best Buy. He bought a computer from them, with warranty, and something (I can't recall what) went wrong, so he brought it in. He waited some two months and it never came back, with the geek squad continually telling him "this weekend we'll have it!" and each time he drove down there they'd go "nope, not yet, try next weekend." Finally, I went with him (knowing a thing or two about retail) and pulled aside the manager, and made it clear to him that we were extremely unhappy, and explaining that this simple maintainance had taken over two months. Finally, after hearing at least 10 different stories and being asked to call 5 different numbers for other people who were supposed to know where it was, we finally found out that it had been lost into the void. One would then think the problem would be resolved; but no! Apparently Best Buy and whoever shipped the laptop off to be fixed were arguing over who's fault it was and who should buy my friend a new laptop. Thats why when my stuff breaks, I fix it. Then I know where it is and how long it'll take, exactly.
GCS/MU/P d- s:- a-- C++++$ UL++ P+ L++ E+ W++ N o K- w--- O M+ V- PS+++ PE Y+ PGP t+ 5- X R++ tv+ b++ DI++ D++ G+ e++ h-
Because it's a slow news day? Because the magic faeries said to post it?
Why does anything get posted? Because the editors think it's worthy of getting posted, that's why.
Mr. Hu is not a ninja.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I disguise all of my important data as kiddie porn. They'll never think of looking there!
I prefer Flambe as apposed flamebait.
You mean she belongs to the Clowns Unionist National Team?
Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.
Even if she eventually settles for legal fees + 5-10K the damage to Best Buy's rep has already been done.
"Life's short and hard, like a body building elf." -- The Bloodhound Gang
I don't disagree that she deserves more than a few thousand dollars and gift cards from Best Buy, but the woman herself said:
I will agree with you on one point: $54 million dollars is not a reasonable amount to request for a stolen computer and related expenses. However, I want to make clear that this lawsuit is not simply about compensation for the expenses and time I have had to expend as a result of Best Buy's negligence and irresponsible practices. It is about motivating Best Buy to do what it should have felt compelled to do on its own, i.e., address the blatant, company-wide breakdown of privacy protection policies that I experienced, so that future customers do not have to endure what I have - or worse.
I'm sorry but suing for an incredibly large amount of money just to make a point is a bit ridiculous and when you publicly admit that you're doing it mostly out of spite, it makes you look like an ass.
Best Buy is liable for actual damages for:
The value of the laptop and all software that was pre-installed on it.
The cleanup costs for not following the data-protection/lost-data law.
If they did not tell her that her data might disappear, they might be liable for reasonable and actual commercial value of the lost data, including registration keys for downloaded software but not including "sentimental" value for irreplaceable photos and other documents. I can just about guarantee the fine print said her data might disappear.
If they promised or implied she would get her computer back within X weeks or X weeks is "reasonable" for the repair, she may be entitled to the cost of renting one for any extra time.
Now, as for punitive damages, part of me wants to say "go girl!" but the rational part of me says an injunction against Best Buy ordering them to be reasonable with their customers makes a lot more sense. If anyone should get big bucks in a punitive-damages claim, it should be state attorneys general, on behalf of all customers.
I bet the technicians were A+ certified and that Best Buy gets to put up a "We are CompTia A+ Certified" sign in their stores. Too bad COMPTIA won't yank the company's credentials for being a jerk.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
... the damage to Best Buy's rep has already been done.You mean, "free advertisement for Best Buy has already been done"
With the current reputation of Best Buy or PC World it is not like you can damage it any further. That will require using irrational numbers and complex math to compute it.
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
And if she had sued them for $10k would it have been posted on slashdot? Somehow I doubt it. The reason she put such a big sum up was specifically so the media would pay attention to the case and not let BestBuy slink away. Even if she settles out of court at this point she's accomplished her goal.
Curiosity was framed, Ignorance killed the cat.
When I finally filed a complaint with my state's attorney general the runaround ended (within a week) and I got a very prompt replacement, a written apology, and a substantial gift card. I'm upset though that my six months of $2500 television hell were only worth $200 compared to this lady's two months of $1100 PC hell being worth a $500 gift card.
...
Maybe I should sue Best Buy for their disciminatory ass-kissing policy
Get off my virtual lawn, you damned virtual kids!
The local store lying about how they know where it is and they'll get it back to her Real Soon, on the other hand, and not taking responsibility for compensating her for losing it, is much closer to malice than incompetence, and they should get spanked for it. The traditional legal spanking is "triple damages".
On the other hand, she really _should_ have had backups of her data - not only do stores occasionally lose computers, but so do shipping companies, and computers break, disks crash, controllers scribble, etc., and external USB drives are cheap. The obvious first question from the store when she brought it in, after generally finding out what's wrong, should have been "Do you have backups? Let's burn you some DVDs now!"
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
[quote]Campbell said that she doesn't really expect to get $54 million, but chose the amount to attract attention to her case.[/quote]
When I saw the total in the summary, I immediately thought "What's the big deal, she's trying to get punatives." Then read the article and saw that it wasn't even that. As usual, if you read just a few more paragraphs beyond what is quoted in Slashdot's article summary, the whole story is skewed much differently differently.
However, there is still room for debate on the issue of whether she was treated fairly. FTA, "Best Buy spokeswoman Nissa French said in an e-mail that Campbell "was offered and collected $1,110.35" as well as "a $500 gift card for her inconvenience." The reasonable market value of the laptop that was stolen (in all likelihood by a Best Buy employee!) + $500 in merchandise? That seems like a reasonable way to try to dispose of any claim--especially since Ms. Campbell already accepted these items.
The "identity theft" argument is incredibly specious. Unless she has done something foolish that would contribute to the insecurity of the machine (credit card numbers as a text file on the laptop hard drive) or failed to backup any important data--itself a cardinal sin--then how is Raelyn Campbell's situation any different from anyone else's who has had a computer stolen from them? You know, except for the crazy, welcome-to-the-land-of-summary-judgment lawsuit that she's filed after accepting fair compensation for her loss?
You can't claim stupidity if the person didn't even know that such a thing existed, and had almost no way of finding out how without going to some tech website that he or she hasn't heard of either. I can count on one hand the amount of people I personally know who have even heard of TrueCrypt.
This is one of the reasons I took the HD's out of my laptop when sending it in for repair. (that, and I just don't trust the repair guys to leave the data alone) Granted, this doesn't work for a lot of problems (of course, most of the problems for which it doesn't work are best fixed by re-installing windows). Also, you do have to send it with some sort of boot-CD. But, to fix a power button, there is no way I am letting them touch my HD.
On the other hand, I think her lawsuit is fairly justified. Punatitive damages just seem to be the only way to get corps like this to behave themselves.
I do agree that this is a valid case, however the money cannot be justified. Yes, she should receive money covering the cost of the laptop when new, and money for the cost of her time and money spent protecting again fraud resulting from the loss of her data, but this surely this still does not amount to $54m. For that kind of money, she could start a new life, with a new name, and not have to worry about the loss of her data.
See definition 3 from the Random House entry, the one at the top.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
So crime is okay because victims should protect themselves? It is the duty of the weak and/or ignorant to bear aggression from those stronger or more informed? What a nice lawless society we should have! I don't know why I didn't see this before. Clint Eastwood's westerns taught us all we need to know about civilization.
I'm sorry but suing for an incredibly large amount of money just to make a point is a bit ridiculous and when you publicly admit that you're doing it mostly out of spite, it makes you look like an ass.
I don't think it's ridiculous at all. First of all, it's working - she is getting media attention. I doubt she could have hoped for the same attention if she wanted to settle this in a small claims court (she was willing to do so at one point, but Best Buy seems to have repeatedly ignored her). Secondly, it seems to be common practice to sue for an enormous amount of money, realizing that the court will rarely ever award that much. As for being an ass, it looks like Best Buy is the one you should really accuse - they're playing all sorts of legal paperwork games, contesting every move (read her response to Best Buy's lawyer's claim that none of the defendants were served).
"Anyone who [rips a CD] is probably engaging in copyright infringement." - David O. Carson
Yeah $54,000,000 sounds absurd. But did she have any original content on that computer? Photos, songs, stories, spreadsheets, etc.? If she created it, she owns the copyright.
I ask because, if the courts allow the MPAA to sue kids for tens of thousands PER SONG for simply sharing a copywritten work, then why not let her sue for tens of thousands for each of HER original works? After all, her damages are much WORSE than those claimed by the music industry -- her content has been permanently destroyed/lost, while the music industry still has their content and can continue to sell it.
(Frankly, I don't think either case deserves what they're asking. Reimburse market price or some small multiple of *actual market price* as a punitive measure -- $1100 for the laptop lady. $.99 per song for the music company.)
The guys at [headquarters|vendor] like to erase hard drives. I'm sure you don't want anything to happen to your disk. For only $99.95 plus $49.95/DVD we can back your data up before we send your computer out for repair. Just sign here.
I made the $-figures up but I'm probably not far off.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
I work part-time as a Geek Squad Agent within a Best Buy location (posting anonymously for obvious reasons). I have been told first-hand by more than one manager on more than one occasion to lie to a customer when it comes to damage and/or loss to their products that is the fault of Best Buy. On the numerous occasions I have protested this type of "customer service" I have been told that to admit anything is to open the company up to liability.
I roll my eyes at a lot of the complaints leveled at the company b/c I stand on the other side of the counter. However, this one is completely true and happens frequently on a wide-spread basis. I hope she wins this case and forces corporate to change a blatantly anti-customer policy.
Good for you collective Slashdotters that happen to know better! I know better too! I run Linux on my Dell computer, but I kept the originally shipping hard drive in an anti-static bag in the event that support is actually needed on the hardware and they choose to run me through those ridiculous scripts. (Yes, I actually run Linux...)
Most people simply don't know better and they certainly don't know what they are signing when they sign various release documents. What they know is what they are being told and little else. Further, I have seen various cases where signed release documents filled with fine print left plenty of room for doubt in the minds of various parties including judges in cases such as these.
The plain and simple reality is that people expect certain things to happen, regardless of any release papers signed to the contrary. They buy warranties, they expect them to be honored and appropriate actions taken in a timely manner. Those simple expectations should be met and should be read in as part of the contract whether it is expressly written or not. This is the biggest reason why EULAs are too ridiculous for anyone to take seriously, because if they did, they'd never buy a license of any software at all. Many states have laws to protect against "abusive legalese" such as EULAs or anything similar.
Big companies such as Best Buy are infamous for being abusive to consumers. The more "monopoly" they become, the more flagrantly abusive they become. There are very few warranties I will actually buy: one is from Dell because regardless of how abused by some they may be, they always seem to honor them very very well and consumer trust is incredibly important in my opinion. But to buy a warranty from Best Buy? NEVER. Conn's? Not on your life. Anything I buy from those people I consider to be "disposable."
Best Buy lied, yes accidents are normal but there is justification for jerking her around.
Truecrypt for all intents and purposes, is difficult for joe luser to use.
What usually gets over looked in these arguments is the reason for punitive damages.
It is not about compensating her loss. It is about forcing the company to change its ways. You award enough money to affect the company's bottom line, which punishes the stock holders, which puts the heat on management to stop the offending practice.
If there is not a change in practices, the clearly the award is not high enough.
So don't think of it as her getting 54 million for a laptop and aggravation, look at it as getting through to the company in the only language it understands...money.
Look at Ford and the Pinto episode. I don't think it was a high enough award. Ford should have been brought to its knees financially just to make it clear that the cost/benefit analysis of dead/burned people to lawsuit costs was waay off.
Ugh her blog made me facepalm hard. The Best Buy logo with "WORST" scrawled over it really puts the nail in the coffin.
Assuming that Best buy only loses 1 laptop per hour, that is less than 2 million dollars a year, probably mostly tax deductible. Such a policy may even provide a competitive advantage as it will clearly indicate that Best Buy is dedicated to customer service and will not jerk their customers around. We know that the opposite is true, but such a gimmick could change this.
In the end best buy will prefer to spend 2 millions dollars on lawyers rather than establish protocols to increase customer value.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
True, not to mention the fact that she seems fully aware that $54 Million is an unreaslistic sum that she'll never get. Suing for that amount did get one thing though...media attention.
Not only did suing for $54M get media attention it did another important thing.
It got the attention of Best Buy. When someone files a lawsuit against you for $54M you cannot ignore that. That's the legal equivalent of a shot across your bow. By an Iowa class battleship with a 16" gun.
Fine the lawyer 1% of the difference between $54,000,000 and the part of final settlement that doesn't go to legal fees.
If they settle for $100,000, the lawyer's fine is $539,000.
Hmm, come to think about it, that would deter a lot of frivolous filings and showmanship: Fine the lawyer a small fraction of everything he asks for but doesn't get. For claims of "unspecified damages" set the amount at some ridiculously high number so the lawyer will be out over a million if he loses entirely.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Yeah I love how she throws in the cost of music and video on her lost computer into her justification for suing for so much. What did she buy enough to fill up an iPod? :)
And if she had sued for $10,000, Best Buy would have just paid it out of court, and not change any of their actions or policies or seek to fix problems. Even if they settle out of court for a far lesser amount, you can be sure Best Buy is going to be doing a lot of shouting and yelling at the Geek Squad Goons. For a mere $10,000 it's not worth it to waste someone's time to shout and yell, or even create "How to Smile at the Customer" training pamphlets.
That's the whole point of punitive damages: to make the penalty large enough to hurt instead of being a mere business expense.
Is she wins even a fraction of the lawsuit, no one will be able to dispute it was a "best buy."
Why look here, no interest for 18 months on a Gateway computer:
http://bestbuy.shoplocal.com/bestbuy/Default.aspx?action=browsepageflash&storeid=2413107&rapid=512596&pagenumber=1&prvid=021008BA&promotioncode=021008BA
That's one laptop, one pair of pants, or in RIAA-land, that's 36 CD, cheap half empty CDs at that.
Simple enough to figure out. That's why there's tracking numbers for UPS and Fedex.
Technology -- No Place For Wimps! Grateful Dead and Jerry Garcia Chatroom -- http://www.wemissjerry.org
interesting - mod the parent up
is worth exactly zero
.ACMD setaloiv siht gnidaeR
THIS.
Best Buy gets to benefit from the additional profits made by the RIAA for suing people for thousands of dollars per stolen copyrighted song. They want to reimburse exactly nothing per copyrighted file owned by their customer after stealing her laptop. They don't get to have it both ways.
Well, more than $1100; she did have to live without that computer for several months before she got offers of compensaiton. I'd call Best Buy's offer of $2000 with NDA reasonable, and $10 per song reasonable for the RIAA- there have to be punitive damages too
From what I understand, the amount has nothing to do with the value of the laptop...
It has everything to do with a refusal to acknowledge they'd lost it, making constant excuses for a long time, followed by a refusal to pay up promptly even what it was undeniable.
It was only after she threatened to sue for the large amount that they finally got around to paying the smaller amount. Until they were in danger, they weren't in any hurry to deal with it.
There's often minimal incentive to avoid repeating the mistake if all you ever have to pay is actual physical cost, ignoring value of lost data, and you can get away with postponing making that payment, requiring endless forms of validation, follow up calls where they sit on hold for hours, etc. until they give up.
The idea of punative damages is that it's accepted that a bare minimum effort doesn't come close to being adequate and a dramatically higher cost is required to spur them in to acting in the way they knew they should have in the first place.
If BestBuy had got on and acknowledge the loss, promptly paying up, they likely wouldn't be facing this. Instead, their responding only when threatened with large punative damages, demonstrated that that's exactly what's necessary to get them to truly fulfill their obligations.
Had she asked for millions the instant they lost it, she'd get laughed out of court. That they demonstrated a complete unwillingness to address the issue until they were faced with that kind of a threat is going to get noted in a court case.
She'll unlikely see the $50m+. She'll be lucky if she sees $5m that gets reduced to $500k on appeal. But the pain of facing that, getting lawyers involved and all the rest of it is going to make an impression on BB policy for the future far more than any number of angry letters will.
Well, we as the whole of slashdot's community should join in this lawsuit.
Geeksquad gives Geeks (like us) a bad name.
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
The thing about the term "Punitive" is that it means to punish. Now if she were only sueing for $100,000 that wouldnt actually qualify as punishment for an international megacorperation like BestBuy. On a good week a single bestbuy store could easily bring in $100,000 and completely swallow the loss. So as punishments go thats akin to sentincing a three time convicted car thief to a week of comunity service. 54 million is alot closer to something that would actually punish them. Clearly she thought this out and from reading her timeline I feel that she gave them more than ample time to properly rectify the situation.
If you think it thru she started by being quite reasonable and not getting any response. Then the response she got was close to criminal. And now they are trying to make her the badguy. I hope BestBuy gets p0wn'd.
What about her files, what about her passwords? someone could use the info on the laptop to post as her. "identity thief Is quite accurate
After all the jerking around and BS she put up with, on top of the fact that Best Buy broke the law by not telling her sooner they didn't know where it was, AND in addition to them being unwilling to discuss the matter further with her. She was probably going to have to sue them eventually anyway, so why not shoot-the-moon with the amount of compensation she asks for in the suit for the sake of media attention.
If she had only asked for 5 or 10 grand, we wouldn't all be talking about it, and thinking about how crappy Best Bork's customer service is!
I have for many years limited my purchases at Best Buy to things that have a low likelyhood of breaking (blank media, etc.), or things that I know I can get warranty support directly from the manufacturer on. In fact I don't even buy pre-built computers (except for laptops obviously) at all anymore, and I buy laptops on ebay because then I'm saving money on not even paying for the factory warranty which is rarely worth it in the first place (they will try and blame you for breaking it regardless of what it is, and try to not cover it). If it breaks I can get all the ultra cheap used parts and service manuals I will ever need from the same convenient outlet (ebay).
Consumer tech support is a terrible terrible racket anyway. I have a friend who works for Geek Squad and he gets $11/hr and says he routinely makes the company in excess of $4,000 per shift, just on the service calls he personally responds to and collects on. He tells me that if he wasn't up for a promotion to management he would have quit after a year, we'll see if that promotion ever pans out...
Keep in mind that she probably signed a standard Geek Squad form stating that she had made her own backups and absolving them of responsibility for lost data.
Try buying ONE of those per child. It would run off its own nuclear power (sorry Iran you can't have one), the case would be made of something expensive and virtually indestructible...carbon nano tubes? Terabytes of RAM, multiple multi-core cpus, and a nipple because no self respecting laptop should be without one.
First, @drcagn:
When you bring a laptop in for service at a Best Buy (which I have done), it says right on the service receipt data may and probably will be lost. They offer a back-up service for a fee. So she can pound sand about losing data (and so can Washington DC.)
Second, if she had sensitive data on her laptop it is her responsibility to encrypt and back it up. Having someone steal your laptop or losing it is an issue whether you take your laptop in to service or not (not to mention the info just getting stolen via some other means, i.e. trojan.)
Third, if she lost other peoples data because her business involves it (which I don't see asserted) then it is definitely her responsibility to encrypt it. I work with sensitive data and my company requires full disk encryption and a bios driven password to get at it.
Last, many laptop mfrs require that you send the unit back to them for repair or no parts for you! Now you have UPS and a third party involved. The thing will likely go on tour and take forever to repair. In that time, sh#t happens. Not to mention, the mfr will almost always restore the drive even if the repair had nothing to do with it and you tell them not to.
They effectively offered her a new laptop with a cherry on top, what else would they do?
People applaud this type of BS and fail to recognize that frivolous lawsuits like this just drive up the cost of doing business.
You don't think that cost is passed on to you?
$54 million lawsuit was supposed to do what? Open our eyes to poor service? That people being paid 8 bucks an hour screw up? Wow, thanks for opening up our eyes. It seems she is just another friggen media whore, out for more than she deserves.
Even if you accept what she says as truth, she's off her rocker.
Disclosure: I have purchased three laptops at Best Buy. I always buy the warranty, because I actually use my laptops for travel. I have had all three laptops serviced under the warranty, due to what I would consider wear-and-tear issues (which are covered).
There are several problems with this lawsuit.
First, Best Buy has no responsibility for the data lost. We all know that when you send in your computer for repair that unless you have some ueber data protection plan, data is not the repair shop's responsibility.
Second, I don't see where best buy has any responsibility for any privacy implications either. It's not like someone broke into Best Buy's database and accessed information collected and stored by Best Buy. Someone stole a customer laptop with the customer's hard drive on it. Best Buy has no way of knowing what data is on that hard drive, and frankly, if there IS private, sensitive information on the hard drive, that is again the customer's problem, not Best Buy's. Best Buy can't be responsible for the contents of a hard drive they shouldn't even be looking at the contents of. And, there's no reason to notify you that your data is on the loose when you already know you gave someone your hard drive with data.
Third, the warranty terms are pretty clear on what the warranty is good for. Replacement of the laptop with a like laptop. So no matter how broke or lost her laptop is, all she is entitled to is replacement of the laptop with a similar model.
As a consumer, there is also an obligation to endure inconvenience in the event of a problem. It definitely sucks, but if you have something that breaks, you're going to have the inconvenience of missing that item for a while while it is fixed and/or replaced. Go buy a computer at Dell - you get a basic warranty for free (1 year parts and workmanship) and then if it's important to you, you can PAY for additional coverages like next-day replacement etc. That's a good thing - it let's the people who don't need that reliability get laptops cheaper and lets the people who do need it pay for it to have it.
So it seems like what we're really talking about here is some best buy employees did not act in the best manner. It took the woman longer than it should have to get her laptop back. The flow of information is poor. She was given a bad customer experience. A $500 gift card for a bad customer experience seems to be entirely reasonable compensation. For example, I recently had a plane flight canceled by the airline for operational reasons. They didn't communicate the situation to me very well, causing me to spend an extra 8 hours at the airport. They gave me a free, extremely restricted, travel voucher, worth about $250. I found this to be reasonable - enough for me to believe that I had experienced an isolated customer service problem, because if the airline gave out $250 and this happened often they'd be out of business.
$500 to me says "We know we screwed up and we're sorry."
$54 million says "I'm a self-centered bitch." Best Buy doesn't need to address their customer privacy issues - they already have a perfectly good system in place. The system is "If you have data that is important to you on your hard drive, back it up or don't give it to us."
paintball
Frustrating someone for 3 months and promising them that they'll get their stuff back "any minute now" should cost what you take from that person -- their peace of mind for that time. Oh, and that judge didn't sue for the cost of the pants. He sued because the store provided lousy service and yet kept lying about it by keeping "satisfaction guaranteed" sign on the storefront. The material things in question are not the only part of the cost. Taking away from people the time of their lives is the biggest cost. And those who do it and then lie about it on such a massive scale (as the store in question) should pay for it. Lawsuits are supposed to compensate for the damages suffered -- not just the material things lost. To say that only the material things can cost money is to say that human beings and time of their lives is worthless.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
...she gets 54 Million and 1 cent.
This is not the same as "crazy pants guy". Let's count a few ways quickly:
...And so on. Like I said, this is a completely different situation.
Well, I read her blog. Most people, her included, tailor events to fit their memory. That said, nothing in her account suggests that she was in the wrong.
I would challenge the statement about the Best Buy employee creating a false repair record; how does she know that for a fact? That'll be a point in any instance where she has to provide evidence to corroborate that.
Overall, she got hosed by Best Buy; they should 'fess up and settle.
Personally, I've had very good luck with Best Buy and the Geek Squad. 3-4 years ago, I bought a close-out HP tower...new, in the box. The thing started randomly locking up after a few days. Reloaded it twice, scraped the bloatware off, and so on. Still died. So, I took it back and had them put it on the bench. Of course, it ran fine during their short bench test. I finally said, "I'm a much bigger geek than you kids and either the motherboard is flakey, the RAM is flakey, or (my diagnosis) the cheesey 250W PS is unstable and causing the problem. The guy looked at me for 30 seconds and quietly went to the back, brought out another sealed box, and we swapped machines. Done deal. One trip...about 30 minutes total time. I still have the PC and the PS is a POS (died last year)...replaced it with a 650W Antec PS and it's sweet.
Also had a new iPod Classic I bought for the wife's birthday go TU after a week in October; the Geek Squad replaced it instantly, no hassle, no problem.
Not the same situation in either case as the lady's stolen laptop, but I still shop at BB!
I am my own gestalt.
I ask because, if the courts allow the MPAA to sue kids for tens of thousands PER SONG for simply sharing a copywritten work, then why not let her sue for tens of thousands for each of HER original works?
Because she gave them the hard drive with the works, and Best Buy made no representation that they would either preserve nor protect the data on that hard drive?
If the MPAA created a marketing deal where they handed out CDs with Britney Spears MP3s on them, and then you lost one, it's not like they could sue you for that either. Copyright law covers COPYING, not LOSING.
paintball
Obviously you didn't read the whole thing. She originally offered to settle for the cost of the laptop plus a grand to cover part of the cost of lost software, music, etc. She offered this as an alternative to her going to small claims and getting a judgment for $5k, which she probably would have gotten, given the time she's wasted getting them to even admit it was stolen in the first place, and the lies (and the fraudulently generated computer entries in their own system) to try and cover their rectums.
She agrees the amount she's asking is outrageous - and that she's doing so because maybe THAT is what it takes to get Worst Buy's attention, exp. vis. the whole "identity theft" issue.
I particularly like how she "bitch-slapped" the corporate lawyer's motion to quash.
That doesn't absolve them of informing her promptly that it's been lost and risking the chance that someone else would find it.
Campbell said that she doesn't really expect to get $54 million, but chose the amount to attract attention to her case.
She doesn't say her laptop / data is worth that amount, and she knows she isn't going to get that amount, she's being smart and hurting Best Buy before they get to trial, by bringing negative publicity upon them. The amount is a blunt instrument applied to an arrogant corporation.
Future shop (Owned by best buy) lost my laptop a few years back, i sent it in due to the same problem I paid $2300 for the laptop but was only refunded $1200 I would have pursued what i was owed but at that time in my life i needed it and didnt have time to argue (I spent 4 months just to get that)
Yes - she did accept payment, the gift certificate. That she donated it to charity is irrelevant.
1) Create some crappy original content
2) Save it to your laptop
3) Give the laptop to BestBuy
4) PROFIT!!!
First of all, it's working - she is getting media attention.
So what you are saying is, every time a customer does like the resolution to a customer service problem, they should file a multi-million dollar lawsuit to generate media attention so the company is forced to give them what they want?
Even if the problem is the customer?
Maybe instead of tying up thousands of dollars on lawyers, and hundreds to thousands of tax-payer dollars on court resources, the appropriate remedy for a poor customer service experience is not a multi-million dollar lawsuit, but instead taking your business elsewhere?
A civil suit is an appropriate remedy for redress when you have suffered significant harm* at the hands of another party. This lawsuit fails on both counts - the harm was not significant, and the other party is not responsible. (The legitimate harm caused (loss of laptop) was compensated with a replacement/refund, and the inconvenience was just that, and more than adequately compensated with the $500 gift card. The loss of private data was not Best Buy's responsibility.)
* By significant harm, I mean some harm above and beyond normal inconvenience encountered in the course of being a consumer - like having to wait an extra 10 minutes for your burger, or extra trips to the store because your laptop isn't ready yet.
paintball
Do you know, what her Job is and how many files have been on that hard drive? Do you know, how many unreplacable pictures could've been on that hard drive? IF IT'S TRUE, what she says, she's dammn right to sue them. What she really wants is 1) an explanation how this could happen 2) an explanation why this won't happen any more 3) 100k$ Well, that's still a lot of money - but given the situation, Best Buy deserves a little bit of beating. And negative Publicity, of course.
I dunno, the 'LOL ZOMFG PWND NOOB' argument seems to be pretty popular on slashdot.
Some nerds seem to have no problems sneering at the 'cattle' when they get in trouble through lack of technical competence, but I sometimes wonder how they would feel if they got the same treatment from mechanics whenever they needed their car fixed.
http://www.zombieapocalypse.tv/
Messed up and had a double negative, then messed up fixing it and had no negatives....
paintball
When I read the title I just thought: "Oh, God, don't tell me this is some kind of One Laptop Per Country initiative"
Yeah, but the waiver is for lost as in 'destroyed'... not lost as in 'um, we're not sure where it is'.
The second is potentially much more damaging. I'm sure some geeksquad employee stole it, probably reinstalled windows, and uses it to browse 4chan all evening. But we don't know that for sure.
Are they lost or stolen? I worked at a Fry's and had to turn in a fellow employee who was stealing laptops.
Anyone is allowed to sue anyone for any offense and any amount. I could sue you one billion dollars for making this post. Of course that will get thrown out pretty fast, but in general the courts prefer to decide based on the evidence presented in the courtroom, like they're supposed to. They let you sue for absurd amounts, but they don't necessarily let you win. Even when they do, the amount is often substantially reduced.
Sorry, just because the loon wants the law to cover what happened doesn't mean it actually does.
The law only covers data and systems maintained by Best Buy, it does NOT cover data and systems maintained by the customer.
paintball
She only had about 50 songs on there, but she was using the prices put forward by the RIAA's lawsuits.
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
There is the classic where if they resist your attempt to get a problem fixed most people will give up.
Thanks to technology this is going to change. I am currently working on an open project to empower the customer bases for example AT&T customers. It could even include Microsoft's customer base and every monopoly organization.
A company would be required to solve issues and maintain certain efficiency and quality, if they fall below this the customer base does not pay that months bill this cuts their cash flow seriously and gets attention and response. Of course the system will be designed to weed out "bad customers" and everyone will be required to read the manual which should help reduce business costs.
Actually the goal is to initiate a global revolution and transfer the power to the people, and give them collective control over the functions of government. It is called Participatory Self Government. The hope is to allow the citizens of the planet to take over the worlds governments.
There are the few that benefit to the detriment of the many and there days are numbered.
http://www.oneclickrevolution.com/ it is still in draft mode and the essential features will not be disclosed until working and ready
The large bureaucratic corporations and institution are no longer able to keep up with the rate of evolution and change. They are so big, inefficient and slow they will eventually collapse.
"an infinite player that has lost his finite mind" ~Infinite Play the Movie (it blends with reality)
That depends. If the valet company could prove that you always leave your car parked with the keys in it, they wouldn't be liable, because they would have exercised just as much care for your assets as you did.
And if you had $1,000,000 in diamonds in your trunk, the Valet wouldn't be liable for that either.
All we know is that SOMEONE stole the laptop. We don't know who stole it. The question is not, did it get stolen, or who did it get stolen from, the question is, did best buy have reasonable precautions in place to prevent theft? And one good way for best buy to show that their precautions were reasonable would be to show that they were AT LEAST as good as the precautions taken by the customer. Given that the customer apparently did not protect their own data, and freely handed it to a third party, whatever precautions best buy took are likely reasonable.
paintball
For people not aware:
The amount mentioned in the complaint has NOTHING to do with what a plaintiff will actually get.
Just because the complaint says she is seeking 54 million does NOT make this a 54 million suit. She would NOT win 54 million dollars even if she wins the suit, and I guarantee you her lawyer knows full well that she will win nowhere close to that amount.
She's just trying to bring visibility to a very bad customer service circumstance. The proble is, given some of the outrageous lawsuit amounts given (McD's coffee anyone?) it's unfortunately possible that she gets far more than she should. All it takes is 12 sympathetic idiots.
"Teach a man to build a fire, and he's warm for a day. Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life."
The rep of these retailers is pretty low to techies who know better. But to average power-user, one store is as good as another. I mean, their commercials tell you: "we're awesome". And who are you to doubt a pitch like that?
I judt got a nre Kinesis keybiartf so please excusr ant egregiou typos.
Of course compensatory damages should be awarded to the victim, however, the punitive damages should be awarded to the government.
This keeps with the philosophy that punitive damages are awarded to protect the public (represented by the government), while punishing the offender.
This also will reduce the number of frivolous lawsuits, since instead of the possibly winning millions, the plaintiff will at most get "fairly" compensated.
D6 63 0D 70 89 81 BB 8E 7B 7C 5F 5D 54 EA AB 73
Who died?
Best Buy has a very bad practice of their employees stealing data, and them trying to cover face. They've been busted using freeware for personal use only software to diagnose and repair their issues. They also have a horrible time losing laptops. I know, I happened to receive one, a laptop I never owned, and I never owned one back then. It was supposed to go to Cali, it arrived in TN.
Best Buy needs to have it's ass handed to them in order to get this crap to stop and force them to take more stringent security measures. I watch the Geek Squad work on machines, totally disobeying EVERY SINGLE ESD PROCEDURE and not even wearing ESD straps. I won't work at a Besy Buy purely for professional and ethical reasons due to what I have personally witnessed and experienced.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Best Buy Sucks. Just don't shop there. If you HAVE to shop there you better know what you want because it's not like you'll get help there. Most Importantly, NEVER use their computer repair department. Almost everybody knows somebody who's been burned there. My friend had a broken power button on his laptop and they formatted the hard drive!!! I shit you not. This happened. How many times do you people have to touch the hot stove and be burnt to learn not to go to Best Buy anymore?! Just say no to Best Buy.
Let's say I check into a hotel. I'm there before checkin, so I leave my bags at the front desk, and they are stolen. Ooops, I had my $1,000,000 in diamonds in one of those bags. Is the hotel responsible for the bag's content? Of course not. I'm an idiot for keeping $1,000,000 in diamonds in a suitcase.
The customer was apparently willing to keep unprotected private data on the hard drive of her laptop. Best Buy may be responsible for her laptop being stolen. Best Buy is NOT responsible for there being private data on the laptop when it was stolen. They exercised at least as good of care of her laptop as the customer did, and if it was good enough for her, it's good enough for them, even if the end result was different.
paintball
if the RIAA can sue for thousands of dollar per song shared, then if she created ANY original works, text documents, music files, photographs, etc , then BestBuy has lost her original works. Clearly losing the masters is far worse than sharing a copy.
As shown by the RIAA, the crime and fine do not need to match to be considered justice in America.
I hope she gets her $54M.
Raelyn Campbell.
> Yes - she did accept payment, the gift certificate. That she donated it to charity is irrelevant.
What part of "I tried to give it back, but they wouldn't take it" constitutes "acceptance"..?
Why do people still bring up the McDonald's coffee case? Go look up the actual facts of the case and then STFU!
The law applies to data and systems maintained by Best Buy, NOT data and systems maintained by the customer.
paintball
He has cost the company literally MILLIONS through his covering up and incompetence (which was done to INCREASE profits). Let this be a message to "best" buy managers everywhere...
I've read Slashdot for the last 5 years, and now I start posting... Go figure
...fix our own computers.
Support a great indie game: http://www.abaddon360.com
I work for a computer manufacturer in the EU, where we do, sadly, lose items from time to time. At the moment, lost items have been reduced to almost exclusively being lost in shipping en route to the customer's address (we ship it to their home address after repairs).
... far as I know, we offer a full refund on the purchase or an upgrade to whatever is the newest unit available (within reason - we don't swap a 22" TV to a 47" TV). The replacement unit then comes with a new full warrenty on it.
;)
We've changed the policy of our hotliners from one of "it's still in repairs" to "we'll look into it" (followed by consulting the higher ups).
This has reduced most of the cases turn-around time from problem discovered to problem solved to around two weeks (loads of paperwork involved), but unfortunately we don't have the capacity to run continuous checks on repair times (ie, we have these repairs which seem to take a long time) nor wether or not the shipping company manages to deliver properly, so most of these cases don't come to light until the customer asks about his/her product (we do more than just computers).
Best Buy seems to have no system in place for handling such cases, which is really bad practices, because ideally you want to know just where these problems are in your chain. If things dissapear in the store, en route to an external repair shop etc., you can figure out just where to extract the money you need to reimburse the client.
Sure, 54 million dollars is a lot. Yes, cost plus 500 dollars might seems like an "okay" compensation, but looking at it from my point of view, if they (as a chain) have one case like that a day, that's more or less pocket change. No need to spend money developing a procedure for handling, hirering people to investigate the cases (i.e. people would often like their data back with computers, figure out where the store gets its money back etc.). 54 million however buys you a LOT of of procedures and hires.
As for what we do
Then again, Europe in general doesn't have tort-laws as such. It's a good thing, as we avoid some of the completely insanely stupefying lawsuits you guys have. On the other hand you have them to get some kind of minimal consumer protections - we just have politicians with a brain
We do not live in the 21st century. We live in the 20 second century.
Two or three years ago, my iPod's (3rd gen) battery went out. I originally received this unit as a gift which also included some five extended warrant plan. So; I drop the unit off at Best Buy to be fixed, and proceeded to pick it up the following weekend. The funniest thing happened. You see... after the employee handed me the box, I opened it up to find....no iPod. They spent 30 minutes looking for it and even checked to see if it ended up as some store demo unit. Nope. It was gone and most likely stolen.
For me, I had a happy day for they gave me a brand-spanking new 4th gen iPod. Hell ya baby! I wasn't going to sit around and argue about it nor did I want to buy them any more time to find my original iPod. I took the offer without second guessing it =)
Life is not for the lazy.
This isn't a data-protection issue (her power button was broken by the way, how do you power up and back up your laptop then?)
This is an identity theft issue. Best Buy had a laptop with personal information. Rather than inform her in a timely manner and then pay for identity theft protection, they misled her and she had to get her own, as well as a lawyer to even get Best Buy to play ball.
So rethink your point: If this is an identity theft issue (with potential credit card and social security related issues), how much is the lawsuit worth?
GPL Deconstructed
That article linked to in the summary from the Minneapolis StarTribune is the worst piece of journalism I've seen in a while. It is in stark contrast to the facts of the article as reported in Ms Campbell's blogspot entry.
... said consumers need to get smart about protecting their data to avoid such situations." This is completely off topic.
For example:
"Campbell, who could not be reached Tuesday," - Campbell's whole point of this is to get exposure. I seriously doubt she intentionally avoided the call. How long did Jackie Crosby give Ms Campbell to reply? 10 minutes?
"Best Buy Spokeswoman said Campbell was offered and collected $1110.35" if you read Ms Campbell's story BB deposited this straight into her credit card account w/o prior discussion. Would have been nice if Ms Crosby mentioned this fact in her news story.
"Melissa Ngo, senior counsel with the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington, D.C.,
Fact: Moron spills coffe on themselves and gets 2 millions dollars for it. I dont care how hot it was, or what she was wearing. She ordered it, and spilled it. There are cup holders in cars you know. Its stupid for this lady here to say that she dosnt expect to get that much, and that she just wants some sort of justice by making it public is rubbish. Anyone who sues another for that much money is either really greedy, or the case is really really big. IMO she should get a replacement laptop and a gift card, o wait she did.... Punitive damages are a joke, compensation is all that is really needed.
Are you unable to comprehend what a law means? If the law says they have to cover it they have to cover it, no discussion. Tell your local cops that the speed limit law actually may not really mean you can't drive over the posted speed and watch them laff thier asses off and write you a ticket. She wins this point slam dunk. As far as identity theft, as I recall there are laws in some states (CA is one) where if your data is lost the company has to offer you ID Theft protection, thats all they would have had to do. IBM (an ex-employer) lost a data tape with my employment records and even though the data on the tap was encrypted and you'd need a mainframe tape drive to read it they gave me a years worth of ID Theft protection. Her point that BB could have settled this situation easily instead of jerking her around is perfectly valid. The lady deserves some payback for her lost time, her lost data, her lost music and possibly puntive damages as BB deliberately misled her about the status of her computer. Maybe 50K would do it, I don't know but the $54M did grab headlines, got her noticed, got 1000's of people to read her blog and gave BB a small black eye.
I know EXACTLY which law she is referring to, because she has a link to it in the left sidebar of her blog. It's the second item.
Again, Best Buy is *ONLY* responsible for personal, private data that *THEY* maintain. Quoted from the law directly:
"Breach of the security of the system" means unauthorized acquisition of
computerized or other electronic data, or any equipment or device storing such data, that
compromises the security, confidentiality, or integrity of personal information maintained by the
person or business.
"Breech of security of the system" is a required item for both of the subsections that require notification.
The data on the hard drive is not personal information maintained by Best Buy. Its the customer's own personal information maintained by the customer. Best Buy has no obligations to notify anyone of its loss.
I'm not saying she's out and out lying. I'm saying that in the rush to find a justification for her multi-million-dollar lawsuit, she didn't read the law correctly, and just because she SAYS Best Buy is liable doesn't mean Best Buy actually is.
paintball
#1 Her content shouldn't be lost. She had proper backups, right? RIGHT? R I G H T ?
#2 Why would Best Buy be liable for copyright violation? They didn't steal it.
Honestly, stupidity must be a natural, and undetectable, element in water or something.
If the law says they have to cover it they have to cover it, no discussion.
The WHOLE POINT is that the law DOES NOT SAY THEY HAVE TO COVER IT! Neither the data loss as in gone nor the data loss as in unauthorized access.
So...
ARE YOU UNABLE TO COMPREHEND THAT IF THE LAW DOES NOT SAY THEY HAVE TO COVER IT, THAT THEY DO NOT HAVE TO COVER IT?
We're not talking about whether or not Best Buy did the right thing. We're talking about whether or not th lawsuit is either reasonable or has merit. It has no merit, and is not reasonable. The appropriate remedy for a bad business experience in which you receive a full refund is to take your business elsewhere.
paintball
Irrational numbers and complex math are very good analysis tools. Both PI and E are irrational numbers. We use them to describe circles and logarithms, respectively. Complex numbers are essential to electrical engineering.
George W. Bush once referred to budget numbers he didn't like as Fuzzy Math. Well, Fuzzy Math is both a branch of logic and engineering. For example, he Ono Sendai trains use it to decide when to brake.
Why would an employee really steal it though? Would they expect nobody to notice? It very well might have been honestly lost, thrown away, or resold. The same waiver she signed about it getting lost *should* also cover any personal information on it. You dont have to be a techie to know that you dont hand something like that over. When the plummer comes over, do you leave him on his own? And since when does "lost" mean "destoyed"? To me being stolen falls under lost. You dont know where it is. As for BB leading her around for a while, Im not surprised. They very well might have been making attempts to find it. Would you rather have someone say the first time that it is gone forever or say we will look for it, come back tomorrow. BB screwed up, but not 54 million worth.
Its the customer's own personal information maintained by the customer.
Well, no, it's the customer's personal information maintained by Best Buy, because when they accepted a contract to repair her computer, they were maintaining it for the duration of the contract. If the laptop had simply been stolen in the parking lot, she wouldn't have a case. But it was stolen while in their possession, after they had accepted a contract that made them the "maintainers" of that machine.
I never have frustrations, the reason is, to wit:
If at first I don't succeed, I quit!
Maintainers of the machine and maintainers of the data are not the same thing.
paintball
Also, maintain and repair are not the same things either.
Best Buy agreed to repair or replace the machine. They did not agree to maintain the machine or the data.
paintball
You're trying to go all "forest" while having nothing to say about this particular, unrepresentative tree. This woman is the farthest thing from a "crusader against corporations," although to her credit, she knows that that's exactly the angle she needs to have to snooker the Slashdot crowd and try to engender support.
None of that changes the fact that: Filing suit to advertise and create a forum for your cause is extremely unlawful, and people who do it are rightfully punished. Why do you think we don't frequently see "Colgate vs. Gingivitis" and other assorted bullshit? It's because the courtroom really is Serious Business, and you check that kind of thing at the door under fear of pecuniary liability.
Plus, it doesn't matter how many courtroom dramas you've seen, BSing a judge and pleading grandiose "My voice must be heard!" nonsense is a great way to lose your case and owe the court a bucket of money, under the aforementioned sanction rules. I realize this is Slashdot, so people don't like to hear about how the little guy really is in the wrong in any particular case, but I assure you that's what's happened here.
I want to get my hands on that pleading, and I want to know exactly which attorney and firm took her case, if any.
then why not just sic the cops on them?
Engineering is the art of compromise.
Just thought I'd ask if any people have personal stories related to these big stores refusing to replace their laptops.
Normally I'd just read quickly over a story like this and feel bad for the person who got ripped off, but something similar happened to me recently..
A laptop I've had for only 1 and a half years just kind of died on me.. the screen would go black and it wouldn't boot up for a day or so, until finally it just wouldn't boot altogether. So I brought it to Future Shop, since I'd purchased the 3-year warranty. Maybe I'm naive to have bought it, but I know they just "don't build things like they used to", so for some reason I thought it would be wise to have the warranty in case something went wrong.
Anyways, I brought it in and they didn't give me any problems, but said they'd call me.. Finally they got back and claimed that they had found evidence of "liquid" inside the computer, and thus it is not covered by the warranty and I should pay them $650. (I'm not paying that of course, I'd rather just buy a new one for that much money.) But the kicker is that I was _really_ careful with it, and I never ever spilled anything on the keyboard. I tried to contest it, and they said they'd get back to me, so I have yet to see what happens.
But any ways, it has made me realize that, as a customer, there's not a whole hell of a lot you can do in a situation like this. From my point of view, they must be lying, since I never got liquid on it, but from their point of view, all they have to say is, "yes, we found liquid on the computer, which is outside the terms of the warranty. Here are some photos to prove it." Of course, if it's that easy to damage the computer, what good is the $300 warranty I purchased if it won't cover it. Bleah.. and if I'd taken it apart to take pictures of the inside to prove that there's nothing overtly wrong with it, I'd void the warranty. So it's their word against mine, and face it, they can afford better lawyers. Anyone know what I can do in a situation like this?
All I can think of doing is complaining to the manager, but I doubt that would get me very far.
Simple compensation doesn't create a disincentive.
I love how she throws in the cost of music and video on her lost computer into her justification for suing for so much.
As the RIAA has pointed out each copy of a song in digital form is potentially worth $150,000. She's only suing for about 360 songs worth. That's only 30 CDs, I'm sure she has that much in her collection.
We are all just people.
Under the law they don't have to maintain the data to be liable; they simply have to maintain the machine.
And they were maintaining it. That's implicit in the contract to repair it.
I never have frustrations, the reason is, to wit:
If at first I don't succeed, I quit!
That is not a fact. That makes you a retard, and what's worse you're deliberately and stubbornly ignorant. That puts you in one of the most contemptible classes of humanity, those who choose not to educate and better themselves.
Raehl, you've posted about 18 times about how she's a loon and BB didn't do anything wrong, and I'm noticing you sound defensive.
Did this incident break your streak of Employee of the Month?
Why do people still bring up the McDonald's coffee case?
because it's a classic case of wild, outrageous, or ridiculous lawsuits.
Go look up the actual facts of the case and then STFU!
I am quite familiar with the facts of the case.
Stella Liebeck was in the passenger seat of her grandson's car when they got coffee at a McDonalds. Instead of handling the cup safely, she placed it between her (pointy) knees, and pulled the lid off. The pulling caused the cup to rotate between her knees, spilling the coffee on her crotch. This resulted in severe burns to her groin.
The main argument was that the coffee was "too hot" at 185 degrees.. This is not correct. Firstly, the National Coffee Association (and who better to know how to properly prepare coffee?) recommends coffee be brewed at "between 195-205 degrees Fahrenheit for optimal extraction" and drunk "immediately". If not drunk immediately, it should be "maintained at 180-185 degrees Fahrenheit." Second, coffee makers you buy for your home use water at that same temperature. (I can provide links to some online coffeemaker manuals if you doubt me.)
Another arguement the plaintiff used was that there are (gasp!) 700 other burns reported to McDonalds. 700 sounds like a large number, until you realize three things:
1) That number includes burns of all degrees. From First Degree (red skin, like sunburn) to Second Degree (blisters) to Third Degree (skin coming off). Since the number was not broken down by degree, one can only conclude that breaking the number down did not serve the purposes of the plaintiff. ie: most of the burns were mild.
2) that 700 figure was for the previous 10 years
3) that figure was NATIONWIDE.
Also, that doesn't take into account how many cups are sold without incident. A McDonald's consultant pointed out the 700 cases in 10 years represents just 1 injury per 24 million cups sold! For every injury, no matter how severe, 23,999,999 people managed to drink their coffee without any injury whatever.
Conclusion- clumsy biatch dumped coffee on herself. It was NOT 'too hot', she was just clumsy. It was not "unreasonably dangerous", she was just clumsy. It was her own fault, McDonalds owed her nothing.
And why is best buy responsible for her failure to make backups? That hard drive could fail or the data be wiped at any momment, the fact the data was lost at Best Buy doesn't make a bit of difference unless she can prove the act of destroying it was malicious.
Hate Best Buy all you want, but that doesn't give her the right to clog the courts with nonsense cases. Here are her answers:
1) It was stolen. Given to the wrong person. Given to the right person who noticed the paperwork indicating it had been returned was not filed and is now demanding return of something she already has (seen it happen). Tossed in the dumpster as trash. Misfiled at some warehouse next to the Ark of the Covenant.
2) Simple, it will happen again. The cost of eating an occasional lost laptop is much less than the cost of a 100% error proof system. Deal with it, or only use Jesus for your computer repair.
3) And I'd like $1 billion dollars. But I ain't getting it either.
I'm surprised this story is getting any traction in this forum, guess the BOFH contingent is vastly outnumbered these days if Slashdot is siding with whiney users.
Let's look at 2 situations (yes an analogy):
Say a fire destroys your Doctor's office and your Medical Records are destroyed. Oh well, no harm to you.
Say the Dr's Office is Burglarized and *your* medical records are now missing, in the hands of some stranger.
A. Are these the same type of situation to you?
B. Should the Dr's Office notify you and all the affected patient's immediately?
Georgia Tech, the leader in Chia(tm) technology.
Most contemptible class? Those who hold other classes in contempt.
You only get that kind of money for copyrights that have been registered with the government, a process which many non-label artists forgo.
Just -1, Troll talking to another.
The problem is, given some of the outrageous lawsuit amounts given (McD's coffee anyone?)
Read up on the Facts of the case
The facts of the case, which caused a jury of six men and six women to find McDonald's coffee was unreasonably dangerous and had caused enough human misery and suffering that no one should be made to suffer exposure to such excessively hot coffee again, will shock and amaze you:
McFact No. 1: For years, McDonald's had known they had a problem with the way they make their coffee - that their coffee was served much hotter (at least 20 degrees more so) than at other restaurants.
McFact No. 2: McDonald's knew its coffee sometimes caused serious injuries - more than 700 incidents of scalding coffee burns in the past decade have been settled by the Corporation - and yet they never so much as consulted a burn expert regarding the issue.
McFact No. 3: The woman involved in this infamous case suffered very serious injuries - third degree burns on her groin, thighs and buttocks that required skin grafts and a seven-day hospital stay.
McFact No. 4: The woman, an 81-year old former department store clerk who had never before filed suit against anyone, said she wouldn't have brought the lawsuit against McDonald's had the Corporation not dismissed her request for compensation for medical bills.
McFact No. 5: A McDonald's quality assurance manager testified in the case that the Corporation was aware of the risk of serving dangerously hot coffee and had no plans to either turn down the heat or to post warning about the possibility of severe burns, even though most customers wouldn't think it was possible.
McFact No. 6: After careful deliberation, the jury found McDonald's was liable because the facts were overwhelmingly against the company. When it came to the punitive damages, the jury found that McDonald's had engaged in willful, reckless, malicious, or wanton conduct, and rendered a punitive damage award of 2.7 million dollars. (The equivalent of just two days of coffee sales, McDonalds Corporation generates revenues in excess of 1.3 million dollars daily from the sale of its coffee, selling 1 billion cups each year.)
McFact No. 7: On appeal, a judge lowered the award to $480,000, a fact not widely publicized in the media.
McFact No. 8: A report in Liability Week, September 29, 1997, indicated that Kathleen Gilliam, 73, suffered first degree burns when a cup of coffee spilled onto her lap. Reports also indicate that McDonald's consistently keeps its coffee at 185 degrees, still approximately 20 degrees hotter than at other restaurants. Third degree burns occur at this temperature in just two to seven seconds, requiring skin grafting, debridement and whirlpool treatments that cost tens of thousands of dollars and result in permanent disfigurement, extreme pain and disability to the victims for many months, and in some cases, years.
Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
You're quoting from the wrong part of the law. See sect. 28-3852(b): "Any person or entity who maintains, handles, or otherwise possesses computerized or other electronic data that includes personal information that the person or entity does not own shall notify the owner or licensee of the information of any breach of the security of the system in the most expedient time possible following discovery." (Italics added)
Of course Best Buy "maintained, handled or otherwise possessed" the data. When they sold the insurance, what would you call it, if not a maintenance contract? And did they not then take actual possession of the machine, when she called on them to honor the contract? With the specific intent of fixing it because it was broken? That sure sounds like "maintenance" or "handling" to me, but she doesn't even need to prove that. She just has to prove that Best Buy possessed the data, that they lost it, and then stonewalled about it.
I haven't shopped at Worst buy or Circuit city for 3 years now. And many more I know are doing the same. They are screwing the customers and the customers are starting to talk and not take it. (yes some take being anally raped 10-11 times before they get the idea, but those are our special ed people.)
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Unlike our fine readership here at /. most people reading this story will come away with two facts: some stupid woman refused to accept the purchase price + $500 for her computer that was lost by Best Buy, and that she's now suing them for the ridiculous sum of $54 million.
This will further reinforce negative stereotypes about frivolous lawsuits, people will shake their heads in despair, and move on. Best Buy's reputation will not be affected one way or the other. Most people go to Best Buy because they offer things people want to buy at a competitive price, and the store's not too far from where they live. That's all. There are no deep philosophical decisions about corporate practices and no self-righteous activism involved.
I am sorry she had to go through what she claims she went through. I won't judge the facts of the story, since I haven't heard Best Buy's side of it yet. That is for the court to decide. What I will say is that her claims (even aside from the $54 million in punitive damages) seem vastly over-inflated.
I also hope that if in case it turns out that she fabricated this story or parts of it, the court forces her to pay punitive damages in an amount significant to her means.
I thought Best Buy wasn't supposed to touch personal data. Which way do you want it?
One less laptop for the One Laptop Per Oligarch program and a kick in the teeth for their "Give one, get one" drive. Somewhere a russian oil billionaire huddles in his humble black sea dacha disconnected from his mesh of home-boyskis on the cloud - a tycoon without a voice. Meanwhile a philanthropic American software mogul sits in his throne made from the bones of his crushed foes and wonders if one trillionaire with a dream and, well, a trillion dollars, really can make a difference ...
Rahal,
Give it up. Other people have repeatedly shown that you're quoting the wrong part of the law. Just because you watched Perry Mason on TV doesn't make you an expert.
Also, we get that you don't agree with the lady. Your opinion is cute, but nobody cares at this point. Time to move to another thread.
One might think you work at the Tenleytown BB.
"McFact No. 7: On appeal, a judge lowered the award to $480,000, a fact not widely publicized in the media."
Which seems to reinforce the GP's assertion that the original judgment was unreasonable.
And apparently the reason McDonalds keeps their coffee hotter that other restaurants is that the hotter it is, the longer it can sit on the burner after being brewed without the flavor degrading.
So they saved money by keeping it that hot. And it was probably a LOT more than the reward in the lawsuit.
Hello little man. I will destroy you!
Look, we all know that our computer is important to us. I remember an earthquake in San Francisco where people were running out of their houses naked with only the computer in their arms because their entire financial lives were on it. When the earthquake hit, I reached over my desk and held onto my 21" monitor ($2,000+ in those days) because of how important it was to my business. Yes, I wasn't and many aren't rational when it comes to our computers because we all have a love-hate relationship with it (them). So, when you bring your computer to a "repair shop" you are entrusting them with something that they must take care of. Forget that the law says they were probably grossly negligent and just try and put yourself in the customer's skin. YOU WOULD BE TOTALLY FRUSTRATED. You would have pain and anger. I strongly believe that she should get an enormous amount of money for that. And please, don't tell me that people should back up and protect their identities with safe computing. We all know that, but many do not truly understand what it means to be safe. Once, I tried to get a NASA employee to spend the money on a backup system. She said she could not spend any more money. A few weeks later, she called me up crying. She was designing a cage to hold some animals in an early space shot and all the drawings were lost and not backed up - she felt that she would lose her job. I once had to go to a Senior Manager in a large, well-known company to advise him that one of his department managers refused to buy virus protection and the Michael Angelo virus was going to hit on a specific date (I forget the date). He thanked me, gave me a bonus, and fired his manager, but I took an enormous risk in trying to get them (in the olden days) to practice safe computing. So, the bottom line is. I really empathize with the customer and I hope that she gets all the money the courts are willing to give her.
So you say. I don't know, I don't drink coffee. What would YOU say is the 'correct' temperature, and why?
For what it's worth, the Coffee Association of Canada says "Restaurant and coffee shop machines are specifically designed to achieve water temperatures of 200oF (75oC)... ".
If you were having engine problems with your car, would you remove the transmission before you brought it to the shop to have it worked on?
That depends - is my tax return in the transmission?
How about....
If you were having engine problems with your car, would you take your bank statements, credit cards, and key to your safe deposit box out of your glove compartment before you had it worked on?
Might you not leave your laptop sitting on the back seat of your car when you turned it into the shop?
And if not, would you at least lock the glove box and only give the repair shop the valet key?
paintball
One of those is off - 200oF is around 93oC.
I thought this was the right crowd to do that sort of thing.
WARNING: Smartphones have side effects--most of them undocumented.
Oh Jesus... stop your mental masturbation, you bunch of lawyer wannabes. Who really gives a shit what your opinion is after having spent all of five minutes reading a statute you've never seen before and without studying any case history?
McFact No. 1: For years, McDonald's had known they had a problem with the way they make their coffee - that their coffee was served much hotter (at least 20 degrees more so) than at other restaurants.
::sigh::
Fact: McDonalds did not have the coffee 'too hot':
The National Coffee Association recommends coffee be brewed at "between 195-205 degrees Fahrenheit for optimal extraction" and drunk "immediately". If not drunk immediately, it should be "maintained at 180-185 degrees Fahrenheit." Coffee makers for your HOME brew at a water temp of 200+ degrees.
McFact No. 2: McDonald's knew its coffee sometimes caused serious injuries - more than 700 incidents of scalding coffee burns in the past decade have been settled by the Corporation -
Fact: 700 cases, in the last 10 years, nationwide. But that doesn't take into account how many cups are sold without incident. A McDonald's consultant pointed out the 700 cases in 10 years represents just 1 injury per 24 million cups sold! For every injury, no matter how severe, 23,999,999 people managed to drink their coffee without any injury whatever. Isn't that proof that the coffee is not "unreasonably dangerous"?
McFact No. 3: The woman involved in this infamous case suffered very serious injuries - third degree burns on her groin, thighs and buttocks that required skin grafts and a seven-day hospital stay.
Appeal to Emotion. It is irrelevent how severe her injuries were.
McFact No. 5: A McDonald's quality assurance manager testified in the case that the Corporation was aware of the risk of serving dangerously hot coffee and had no plans to either turn down the heat or to post warning about the possibility of severe burns, even though most customers wouldn't think it was possible.
Fact: McDonalds coffee cups have ALWAYS had a "Caution: Hot" warning on them.
McFact No. 6: After careful deliberation, the jury found McDonald's was liable because the facts were overwhelmingly against the company
The jury found for the poor little old lady with the great big, painful burns. It's called basign their decision on their Emotions instead fo the facts.
McDonald's consistently keeps its coffee at 185 degrees, still approximately 20 degrees hotter than at other restaurants
Wrong, wrong wrong.
http://www.coffeeserviceplus.com/perfect-cup.html
"Brewing temperature should be 195 to 205 degrees Fahrenheit. "
http://www.auniquecoffeeservice.com/brewingsystems.html
"205 F Brewing Temperature "
http://www.morekitchenappliances.com/asp/show_detail.asp?sku=ZOJ1066&PiID=2259383&refid=MP108-ZOJ1066_2259383#ProdDetails
"Heat Retention*: 169F at 10 hrs./136F at 24 hrs.
*Rating is based on water at a starting temperature of 203F (95C) at a room temperature of 68F (20C) "
http://www.bunn.com/retail/dos_donts.html
Do: "us[e] a brewer that keeps water at 200 Fahrenheit (the ideal temperature) "
also
Don't: "Re-heat for serving any coffee with a temperature below 175 F "
http://www.homeclick.com/1/1/13032-velox-travel-coffee-maker-yellow-7027y.html
"Just plug in and the coffee automatically dispenses at the correct 180 degree temperature"
Do I need to continue???? All these references show that the 'proper' temp for brewing coffee is around 200 degrees. Several references show that the coffee should be served hot, around 180-190 degrees (ie: Bunn says if it's below 175 degrees, it is too cold).
Replacement cost, plus a refund of the "warranty", plus the identity theft protection, would have been reasonable compensation if they'd 'fessed up and paid off as soon as they knew they weren't going to find it -- and if they had, we wouldn't be hearing about it now.
In this case, I think what she's entitled to is more along the lines of treble damages, plus the warranty cost, and identity theft protection -- and whatever punitive damages the court awards on top of that should be going to OLPC or something similar. The judgment should compensate her but not make her rich, but at the same time it should significantly sting Best Buy, so they don't just write this off as the cost of doing business. The money that falls in between (which would be the bulk of it) is a bit of a sticky wicket. It shouldn't go to the court, or they'll want to fine the fuck out of everyone for everything and keep it. It shouldn't go to the plaintiff, as she wasn't harmed THAT badly. It has to go to an uninvolved third party so there is no "woohoo, let's do it again! I'M RICH, BIATCH!"
Mal-2
How is the Riemann zeta function like Trump rallies? Both have an endless number of trivial zeros.
Come on, this lady is obviously educated and intelligent. You're telling me she has no backups or recovery files for her "irreplaceable" information. Not too bright by my thinking. Especially when she knew she was taking the laptop in for service.
This is the SAME scenario as I said with my employment records tape. Iron Mountain LOST IBM's data. There is not any way to know if unauthorized access occured but you have to assume it was. IIRC, BB admitted it was likely the laptop was stolen which is unauthorized access right there. What if all of a sudden her bank account was zero because she was stupid enough to let Firefox store her ID and password? Is Best Buy no longer liable as they didn't perform the unathorized access yet their lack of security faciliated the act. If she gets in front of a jury she'll get her money.
...then maybe that's a reasonable value to ask for. :)
Soooo....
I read the blog. It seems that after repeated attempts to find out the status of her computer, a BB employee created a false record of the 'phantom' computer.
The customer may not have brought in any laptop and just fabricated the story so that they can get a free laptop. What is to prevent me from walking into any BB or large computer repair shop and asking the status of my 'phantom' computer. The techy then attempts to look but finds not record of the 'phantom' computer anywhere. "What?! You have no record of it? Why NOT?! I brought it in 2 months ago! I have a receipt for it, FROM YOUR STORE EVEN! Is it LOST? STOLEN? WTF!!!!! ALL MY STUFF IS GONE!? GET ME A MANAGER RIGHT NOW!"
People will try anything to scam anyone if they'll get away with it, especially with large corporations where there is a lack of tracking and communication break down easily down the chain of commands.
It says PERSONAL INFORMATION maintained by the business.
Well, no, it says "person or business." Which includes the woman who lost her laptop, since she's a person.
There's simply nothing in the statue that appears to let BB off the hook, here, which is why even the local AG thinks they're not off the hook.
Obviously BB has liability here. I simply can't understand how you're reading the statute to apply only to data BB personally maintains; that's not what it says at all. BB's actions allowed "breach of the security of the system", period. It's those actions that expose them to liability, regardless of who was "maintaining" the data.
Try not just reading the part that you bolded. If you read the entire paragraph, as you seem loathe to do, it's obvious that it doesn't define liability, nor restrict it only to data BB personally maintains. It's simply a definition of the term "breach of the security of a system", and it's obvious that happened here. Because it happened by BB's actions, they're the ones who are liable.
I never have frustrations, the reason is, to wit:
If at first I don't succeed, I quit!
I quoted the important part, because it contains the definition for the term used in the part you quoted. The part you quoted is ONLY applicable if it meets the definition of 'breach of the security of the system'.
You quoted:
See sect. 28-3852(b): "Any person or entity who maintains, handles, or otherwise possesses computerized or other electronic data that includes personal information that the person or entity does not own shall notify the owner or licensee of the information of any breach of the security of the system in the most expedient time possible following discovery."
You are substituting a common English definition for 'breach of the security system', but you can't - the section includes a very specific, legal definition of the term 'breach of the security system', and that's the definition you have to use, which according to 28-3851(1) is:
"(1) "Breach of the security of the system" means unauthorized acquisition of
computerized or other electronic data, or any equipment or device storing such data, that
compromises the security, confidentiality, or integrity of personal information maintained by the
person or business.
Because there is no information maintained by Best Buy involved, no LEGAL breach of the security of the system happened, so there's nothing for Best Buy to notify the customer of.
paintball
Well, no, it says "person or business." Which includes the woman who lost her laptop, since she's a person.
Nope. The phrase 'person or business' refers to the person or business maintaining the data. Read subsections (a) and (b) which use the term breach of security - it reads that a person or business is responsible for disclosing the release of information maintained by that person or business. So if you use person as in the customer, than she is also the one responsible for the data, not best buy. Can't have it both ways.
paintball
The employment records lost were ABOUT you, but they were OWNED and MAINTAINED by IBM, and they were apparently lost by a contractor SPECIFICALLY CONTRACTED TO HANDLE CONFIDENTIAL DATA! (That's what Iron Mountain does).
The records on the customer's hard drive were OWNED AND MAINTAINED BY THE CUSTOMER. She then gave them to Best Buy (who was not contracted to handle confidential data, by the way), and Best Buy lost them.
So, your scenario:
Data is about: you
Data is owned and maintained by: IBM
Data is given by owner (IBM) to company informed of confidential nature of the data and contracted and paid specifically to handle confidential data (Iron Mountain).
Data is lost by: Iron Mountain
Responsible party: IBM
Best Buy scenario:
Data is about: The customer
Data is owned and maintained by: The customer
Data is given by owner (The Customer) to company NOT informed of the confidential nature of the data, who specifically tells you they are not responsible for data, and is contracted to fix power switch (Best Buy)
Data is lost by: Best Buy
Responsible party: CUSTOMER!
So the customer should buy herself some identify theft monitoring.
Thanks for making my point though.
paintball
Considering it was Best Buy's negilgence that CAUSED the loss of the information in the first place, yes, it is their fault. If they had actually taken the proper precautions to ensure that this sort of thing didn't happen, it... wouldn't have happened. And then to jerk her around like this, that's just shitty service, guys.
Show this to your friends and family that don't know what a real hacker is
That's not true for two reasons.
One, the computer was stolen. The presence of confidential data on the computer that was stolen was due to the customer.
Two, you're engaging in a logical fallacy when you argue that the proper precautions must not have been taken merely because the laptop was stolen. One does not necessarily mean the other. You can take the proper precautions and bad shit can happen anyway. We don't know if proper precautions were taken or not. But even if they were not taken, Best Buy is only responsible for the laptop, not the data on it.
paintball
Why say 'burglarized' when there's a perfectly good English word 'burgled'?
Tubal-Cain smokes the white owl.
You can lie all you want. It's not fraud unless you gain from it. No amount of lying was going to change the fact that Best Buy owed her a replacement laptop.
Now, if Best Buy attempted after the fact to say that the terms of the warranty were different than they were at signing, or attempted to say the laptop lost was not the laptop under warranty, or represented that the replacement laptop was similar when it was not (less memory or something), THAT would be fraud.
But saying the computer isn't available because (whatever) when it's not available because it's stolen isn't fraud. It's bad business practice and dishonest, but not fraud.
paintball
Why say 'burglarized' when there's a perfectly good English word 'burgled'?
I love this word "burgled" ever since I read that story about the British columnist who wrote a column complaining about "burglarized" (and the American response "You're right, we appogle.")
I mean, it make perfect logical sense the a burglar would be "one who burgles", but come on, "burgle". Burgle ! It sounds like something out of a Doctor Suess book ("they tammed their tam-tamlers and burgled their burg-bugles"). It never fails to give me a chuckle.
Hehe, burgle!
There, you answered your own question! She had some RIAA songs on that computer, that's where the $50,000,000 comes from!
Those who hold other classes in contempt are the most contemptible? So if you hold the class of paedophiles and mass murderers in contempt, you are more contemptible than they are?
I don't know if it's the most contemptible class, but people who engage in specious reasoning and crude, exaggerated statements that collapse at the slightest analysis are pretty contemptible, too. Contempt is a valid mechanism for establishing values and criticizing behavior.
OK -- I just read this. Here is what I got out of it. BB definitely handled and possessed her confidential computerized data. They didn't own the data, but the law "includes personal information that the person or entity does not own". So doesn't matter if the data was somehow generated by BB and owned by it. They merely need to have it.
... [of] equipment or [a] device storing such data" because a) if the laptop was stolen, she certainly didn't authorize that and the robber acquired it, or b) if the laptop was lost by BB, then BB acquired it by rendering the computer not findable in their storage room. Certainly she did not authorize BB to lose the computer but because it did, it arguably acquired the device ... it must be there somewhere if it is simply lost. If it went out in the garbage, then the garbage collector acquired it. Plainly, some entity not the original owner has acquired the laptop. It may be under 5 tons of rotting lettuce, but someone got it. It's important to note the law does not require the acquiring entity to misuse the data -- only to be an unauthorized recipient.
Then looking at the "breach of the security system" definition, plainly there was "unauthorized acquisition
Anyway, if she had banking info on there, and everyone does, that would clearly compromise "the security, confidentiality, OR integrity" of the data. Pick any of these, not all are required.
Returning then to the earlier part, if BB did not tell her in the most expedient fashion possible that her data was at risk, then they're liable.
Don't get hung up on "maintained" as in "made backups and stored it securely on tapes in someone's car". All BB had to do was possess the device -- which they did, allow it to be acquired by an unauthorized entity (including themselves), and then not tell her about the loss quickly.
You aren't by chance a shill poster for BB are you?
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
Fact 0: Regardless of whatever temperature other places serve coffee, everyone who has a kettle at home makes tea and coffee at just under 100 C. It's just not possible for McDonalds to server coffee significantly hotter than it would be at home.
Despite the litigation culture, most people accept that spilling your coffee is *your* accident - unless they've served boiling hot coffee to a 3 year old, it's an unfortunate accident for which no one should be liable.
as a technician i endorse the idea that customers like being informed about the progress of the repair, especially when those reports on progress are not contradictory. triage is essential. it's good to be in agreement about warranty status at first, it's good to call when work is started, if extra costs are going to be involved and of course when it's finished. the opposite can be very frustrating for non-technical people when they are already putting their faith in you for a service.
stolen? and subsequently covered with a bogus paper trail? now that's not good service at all.
i once borrowed a dual-core laptop for two months without permission. the customer left the unit in our service department for over six months after our repair was complete. we had called numerous times over the months, including call by our accountant, to tell them it was fixed and to pay up!! mysteriously, they did not appear to collect their laptop nor did they return our calls. anyway... 6mo l8r... i installed linux on the second, unused partition and promptly forgot about the ntfs partition. it's contents were not of interest to me and even though i had ntfs-3g, the partition was not specified in my fstab. i did not delete the original partition, because the laptop was not mine. but i completely messed with the MBR and the second partition on their HD, tailoring a gentoo install to the gills. i spent those months compiling a nice 64-bit SMP world. i was just beginning to actually USE the laptop to do things other than compile- when: the customer then promptly appeared in accordance with murphy's law, having rustled up the additional money for their LCD screen replacement bill. luckily i was able to quickly return it to them in it's original (but now repaired) state with a freshly written MBR now lacking grub and a happy empty second NTFS partition. the customer was pleased and went off to play solitare on XP Home. i'm thinking: sure, some of us can revel in the non-destructible nature of our massively parallel-processing crc'ed calculators with journaled backups spanning numerous volumes on several continents, but the average user is processing with faith. it's just supposed to work for n years, especially when you pay $300 extra.
i could have been a jerk and quoted the fine print, which states that we're not responsible, blah blah blah. but i live in a small community where word of mouth flies faster than photons along fibre and putting my data somewhere else was only a few orders of magnitude slower than that.
it was probably that damn butler who hangs out in the electronics department all the time who actually ripped this lady off.
The law is not much different than code. It's written the same way. When there's an AND operator, and that and operator is false, none of the other operators matter.
All sections of that law require "Breach of the security of the system". No breach of the security system, no violation. And breach of the security system requires "personal information maintained by the
person or business." (and remember, person here means provider of the service, not the customer)
Everything else in your post doesn't matter, because we have a 0 for 'personal information maintained by Best Buy', and once you have 0 in an AND, you've got 0.
You do have the best argument in that Best Buy did actually 'maintain' the data (as opposed to all the other arguments that are rendered entirely irrelevant as long as the maintenance issue isn't addressed), but I just don't see how you can argue anyone 'maintains' something that they are not even aware is there, did not want it, did not accept it, and are not even supposed to look at it.
paintball
$54 million is just plain ridiculous, I would have asked $72 million.
However, the fact is, this duplicitous woman won't make it past summary judgment and should also be sanctioned. That's absolutely factual. What's that, you say? How dare I not side with the poor little downtrodden woman? Well, I laid out in another post how her case will meet the same fate as the judge with the multi-mullion dollar dry cleaning mentioned in the article. For those who don't keep up with these things, we're looking at a judgment of ZERO dollars and she will get to pay Best Buy's legal fees. In fact, I explained, if I were counsel for Best Buy, I would push to sanction her, her lawyer, and her lawyer's firm as well.
I won't go into the specifics and rationale again, though, because we're fast-approaching the point at which somebody should just pay me for my time. Furthermore, that earlier post got modded "Flamebait" because 14 year-olds who hate their parents and win the Slashdot mod point lottery don't really cotton to actual lawyers, with all their "statutes" and buzzkilling "rules"--just the less prickly and more fakey variants who put on the big boy pants and Google a few statutes. So instead of laying out that prior post verbatim, let me suck up to Slashdot readers at this late hour, sip some Kool-Aid*, and pretend, pretend, pretend along with you. Let us forgo all knowledge of civil procedure and join you on your journey. I will try, at least:
RTFA - the laptop was stolen from Worst Buy, most probably by an employee, as it was in a "secure area". As such, they are liable for the contents - it has nothing to do with any warranty or protection plan.
Yes, there is an incredibly boring rule we inherited from the English in the year of god-knows-when that relates to a duty of care when you entrust your property to another in this fashion. There was clearly a breach of that duty. But as a nod to the elaborate game of connect-the-dots plaintiff's counsel has tried to play to create a juicer damages claim for what was on the laptop: Those laws don't apply to bits and bytes. At all. Next please.
Worst Buys' sloppy procedures and/or dishonest employee(s) are the proximate cause. They're liable.
Uh oh! Somebody's seen at least one courtroom drama on television and possibly even two. The "proximate cause" of what exactly? The loss? Yes, and? She's already been compensated for the laptop, thinking it clever to give away the gift certificate as well. That's not how that works at all, and she's in for quite a surprise at trial. I feel like this is leading up to something. Extra points for calling them "Worst Buy," too. That's almost as clever as "Micro$oft." OK and then...
She's entitled to be made "complete" - and that involves compensating her for the laptop, its contents, and her lost time while they lied to her about it being stolen.
We say made "whole." Your way sounds pretty dumb, ours sounds a little more mysterious. You're also not right at all. Plaintiff is "entitled" to compensation for the laptop alone. It ends there. Yes, seriously. P doesn't receive damages for the oh-so-precious data, nor is P compensated as a matter of law for the time unreasonably wasted trying to retrieve her property using the least effective means available. If you want an amplified response, and a full explanation as to why, I'll need a PayPal payment. You see, I am a deposed Nigerian Prince...
They originally offered her $750.00. Not even the price of the stolen laptop. And that's only after months of jerking her around.
This is just you re-telling her story. Damnit! I thought for sure you'd go down some elaborate, winding road of on-the-spot legal judgments. But alright. To cast doubt on how this person handled the situation:
Most reasonable people don't mess around with phone calls and friendly reminders for this l
You're a horrible troll.
Bunn does not say that 175 is too cold. They say "Dont reheat it".
And the rest of your articles give brewing temperature, not serving temperature.
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
You mean, "free advertisement for Best Buy has already been done"
I'm not so sure. I tend to get a few new customers after each incident like this.
I am a science fantasy fan
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
Did your source not seem reputable enough to link?
"National Coffee Association" my achin' ass. Anyone claiming no liquid that won't burn your skin is worth putting in your mouth is, by definition, a tit.
another article suggests industry standard is 160 to 185 degrees...in the early 1990's home coffeemakers only brewed up to 130-140 degrees...Stella Liebeck suffered terrible third-degree burns
Whether or not you have teflon lips that allow you to drink liquids at the "expert-recommended" just-shy-of-boiling, only an idiot would suggest McDonald's coffee and proper brew temperature have anything to do with each other.
McDonald's took responsibility when one of its employees spilled coffee on a customer and settled cases of burns from such spills
Either this guy is the clumsiest burger-flipper in world history, or the article's authors have an axe to grind.
you can have my violent video games when you pry them from my cold, dead hands.
Prime UID Club
i believe i speak for all of us when i say "fucking pwned raehl. gg."
She was holding a scalding hot cup of coffee between her knees in a car, what else was going to happen? I can't remember if McDonald's didnt have lids then, or if she'd taken the lid off, but seriously it still takes the piss that people aren't supposed to use common sense even if McDonalds do distribute unreasonably hot coffee.
which is totally what she said
In other news, handing the masters of anything to unqualified clerks who probably even make you sign an agreement about not being liable for any loss of data is far beyond stupid, probably somewhere in the range of criminal negligence.
Should she get the laptop's purchase price refunded? Of course.
Should she get an apology for the inconvenience caused? Pretty much. Should she get some kind of compensation (three months is quite some time, maybe $3k-$5k, maybe a badass gift cert., maybe best buy's current top-of-the-line laptop offering? Would be a nice gesture and they'd probably keep her as a customer.
Should Best Buy be investigated and probably fined for lack of protection of their customers' devices and data? Yeah!
Should she get $54m (equivalent to some 1'200 average american annual incomes!) for some inconveniences during three months? No!
Yeah, ok, I've been slacking off on that too. The other way you do it is you pop the disk out of the laptop and into a disk-to-USB adapter which the store keeps on its DVD-burning machine. Unlike doing my backups regularly, I *have* bought one of those
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Open up a C, C++, or Perl file, and use your ctrl-f, and see how many ANDs you find.
What? No ANDs there either?
That's because in those languages, AND is represented as &&. And in english, AND is also represented as THAT.
So use your ctrl-f, and search for 'that'. Everytime you find one you've got a logical AND.
I can't tell if you're not smart enough to understand this, or just aware that you're wrong so attacking the syntax only, but I'll break it out for you either way:
if ((Any person || entity) && (maintains || handles || otherwise possesses) && (computerized || other electronic data) && includes personal information && (the person || entity) && !(does own) && breach_of_the_security_of_the_system()) {
notify_the_owner_or_licensee_of_the_information(most expedient time possible following discovery);
}
breach_of_the_security_of_the_system() {
return (unauthorized acquisition && ((computerized || other electronic data) || ((equipment || device) && (storing data)))) && compromises && (security || confidentiality || integrity) && personal information && maintained by (person || business));
}
But it wasn't that the plaintiff sued for that amount right away. I have read (but can't back up with a link right now) that he reason the jury decided in that way was annoyance with McDonald's lawyer. According to the article I read, the lawyer had insinuated that the plaintiff's request to pay for her skin crafts was unreasonable, given that, in his opinion, nobody would ever see the groin of an 81 year old woman. I certainly understand the jury getting angry over that.
"When I first heard Daydream Nation it quite frankly scared the living shit out of me." -- Matthew Stearns
You're the contemptible one because you're holding yourself in contempt every time you judge someone. The contempt piles on your own head faster than you can dole it out- thus, the most contemptible. Check your zen before you go "reasoning" things out.
When Best Buy participated in the crime as accessories after the fact, by failing to report the theft for months after it occurred and as suck allowing the maximum amount of time for the criminal to cover the tracks and safely abscond with the computer and the data contained there in. Make no mistake failure to report a crime is in fact a crime.
This pretty much makes Best Buy liable for any kind of damages no matter how far fetched. The customer might also aid the case by seeking the criminal prosecution of those that failed to report the crime.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
The issue is that *someone else* also has possession of exactly those records, and had enjoyed possession of same for a period of up to three months before the customer was informed.
Or would you care to post your (assuming you're a US Citizen) SSN here as a 'backup'?
Lurk more, pls.
F_T
Did your source [http://www.overlawyered.com/2005/10/urban_legends_and_stella_liebe.html] not seem reputable enough to link?
Sorry, that was not my source. Please play again.
in the early 1990's home coffeemakers only brewed up to 130-140 degrees
And today, they brew hotter.
http://www.bunn.com/retail/bunn_difference.html
"The patented ready-to-brew reservoir keeps water at the ideal brewing temperature of approximately 200. (Conventional home brewers heat water until it boils up to coffee basket.)"
Bunn also recommends you DO use "a brewer that keeps water at 200 Fahrenheit" and that you DON'T even bother reheating coffee if it's "below 175 F".
"It happens to the best of us: you drop off your laptop at the local branch of some Super Mega Electronics McStore..."
Actually, the best of us can and do fix our own laptops, and wouldn't be caught dead in such a store.
Man, some people just dont want to read the article no matter how many times you tell them.
I am glad you did read it to explain it to me, as now I don't have to read anything....
I do hope she gets a big settlement, even though I am against suing someone all together.
This is a clear case of a big corp pushing away their responsibility and not owning up to it.
I think its about time that the little guy ( or woman) gets properly represented against these
big corps, where BB or futurshop or staples and the like learn that you can't
avoid the law when it suits them.
Bunn does not say that 175 is too cold. They say "Dont reheat it".
They say 'don't reheat it', because once it's fallen to 175, it no longer tastes good. Therefore, for it to taste good, you need to keep it ABOVE 175. McDonalds had it 180-185.
And the rest of your articles give brewing temperature, not serving temperature.
NOT TRUE. Learn to read. The Homeclick link says "dispenses at the correct 180 degree temperature" DISPENSES, as in "serving temp", of 180.
The Morekitchenappliences link is refering to a SERVING carafe that keeps coffee hot for SERVING to people. It mentions how well it hold the heat "based on water at a starting temperature of 203F".
You want more?
http://www.boyds.com/coffee/brewingguide.html
"If brewed coffee must be "held" on a direct heat source, it should be held at 185F,....Lower temperatures make the brew too cold and consumers will be dissatisfied. "
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070926204605AAFm6xU
"several restaurants, including the one I work for, have a minimum temperature that coffee must be served. In the case of the company I work for, it's 180 degrees+.
So, a coffee may be "too hot" to your standards, but as far as the restaurant that served it, it was "just right""
http://coffeeflavour.blogspot.com/2008/02/right-temperature-for-hot-coffee.html
"Ideally, the right temperature for serving coffee is 165 - 175 degrees."
http://solutions-cds.com/FAQ.htm
"185 degrees to 190 degrees temperature for holding beverage coffee. "
Sheesh.
I really couldn't care less about this discussion, but...
"And today, they brew hotter."
I'd say it's good for ole' Stella that the lawsuit didn't happen today. It happened in the early '90s, when, apparently, the standard was different.
It's not like a Judge could've said "Stella, get real, in ten years every home coffee maker will be brewing at 200* !!"
Question...
An eager fake lawyer like yourself surely is familiar with the term "legislative intent."
A big part of the job description of a judge is to study a statute, and case history, to determine legislative intent. He's supposed to weigh his own judgment along side the past judgments of other courts.
Precedent is equally as important in interpreting a statute as the legislative language itself.
So, tell me.. since you've basically represented yourself as an expert on this particular part of the municipal code, have you examined the case history? Do you have a grasp on the precedents set by previous courts?
Ooops, misread... missed the "Why" part...
Lots of reasons. Best Buy pays crap, treats its people like crap, and makes sure that its people know that customers are there to get money out of, whether satisfied or not. So a disgruntled employee decides to sweeten the pot for himself, doesn't see any downside to letting the company suffer for it, and doesn't have any problem hurting the cattle that left their stuff with him.
1. Record 360 tracks of you talking on your microphone on your laptop.
2. Give laptop to someone
3. Have laptop stolen
4. Sue person responsible for laptop for $1000 plus $150,000 per track of copyrighted recorded material
6. Citing precedent, settle out of court for a mere $10,000 per track
http://www.accountkiller.com/removal-requested
1. Record 360 tracks (videos, or of you talking on your microphone) on your laptop.
2. Give laptop to someone
3. Wait for laptop to be stolen
4. Sue person responsible for laptop for $1000 plus $150,000 per track of copyrighted recorded material for a total of $54 million
http://www.accountkiller.com/removal-requested
No, actually, contempt is intransitive. I'm pretty contemptuous of you right now. And you're being pretty contemptuous yourself, so by your own standards, you're contemptible.
They should let it degrade.. It's awful coffee.
waiting for ad.doubleclick.net
What part of "I tried to give it back, but they wouldn't take it" constitutes "acceptance"..?
The part where she took the money.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
qwerty
There is another option.. Liquid coffee concentrate (it's refrigerated). It's is mixed with the hot water as it goes into the cup. You have probably had it many times in resturants and never knew it. Wasted coffee = 0
waiting for ad.doubleclick.net
You overlook the fact that it was hot enough to put her in the hospital with 3rd degree burns.
Also, you make coffee at 190-200 degrees, you don't serve it at that temperature.
Another thing, McDonalds treated her like crap.
but wait, there is more: They had been told that is was too hot to serve and ignored it in exchange for profits.
"...just 1 injury per 24 million cups sold! "
Which goes to show something was wrong at the McDonald's she got her Coffee because it was estimated to be over 190 degrees at the TIME OF THE SPILL. So it was probably closer to 205-210 when served.
An infury of this magnitude had happened ONCE before and McDonald's had been told there coffee was dangerous and ignored it.
So in actuality:
A) McDonald's NEW it was too hot.
B) This particular cup was well above reasonable temperatures.As shown by the magnitude of the burns.
C) The lady spent 10 days in the hospital.
Yes, most burns may have been mild, but so what? Clearly hers wasn't. Most people ride a roller coaster are perfectly fine , that doesn't mean the amusement company isn't liable when improper maintenance that the were warned about cause the vehicle to go off the tracks.
Your argument is specious at best, and just down right stupid at worst.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
When you give BB a laptop for repair, they try to secure it, right? That is, they have some system of procedures to take, tag, log, and securely store it, no? Sounds like a security system to me. And if, say, a customer or employee were to steal it, that would involve a breach of that system, would it not?
And, while that laptop is in BB's possession, are they not maintaining it? I think so. And the data on the laptop are a part of that laptop, which BB is maintaining. If there's personal information on that laptop, and it's in BB's custody and care, that's personal information maintained by Best Buy.
Sounds simple. Why do you fight this so hard? Any relation to BB?
everything in moderation
Regardless of anyones feeling toward Best Buy and "poor practices"
Didn't she sign the disclaimer when Best Buy accepted her computer in hopes of repairing it? She probably did, in which case Best Buy legally isn't responsible for very much for "losing" her laptop. As the fact is - it has yet to be proven that it was "stolen". It might be locked up in some warehouse somewhere nobody has checked yet. She will get nothing - just like the pants guy. Best Buy was trying to be nice when they offered her 2500 bucks.
People have to look at the facts. Best Buy employs people - people are not perfect. Stuff happens. If 1 laptop out of millions gets lost or stolen - that's a good day.
Part of the reason this planet is going to hell in a handbasket is because of people suing for unreasonable ammounts of money just to make a point. What a waste of time on her part.
early in 2007, i was working the weekend shift. i parked my motorcycle in front of the office and went to work.
about 2:00PM, one of the security guards came to my desk and asked me to come to the building door. i thought "i'm getting fired on the weekend ?". WTF ???
when i got there, there was a police car there, 2 officers and a bum in handcufs. he had tried to steal my bike...
here's the thing, the bike's alarm was off, and i had no chains or other kind of locks on the wheels. it was just a matter of hardwiring the ignition and ride away.
now, the fact that i had no protection other than having removed the key makes it OK for this guy to take away what's mine ?
even if i had left the key on the ignition he'd have no right to ride it away, absence of security measures is not a permission to use.
oh, yeah. the guy is still in jail.
What ? Me, worry ?
The problem comes in, though, is if the laptop was at the BB store or if it was sent to an off-site location for repairs. Geek Squad has to send any laptop with a hardware problem or any computer with a heavy virus infection to an off-site repair center. If the laptop was being sent off-site, then the question is: Was the laptop lost at the off-site loc, or was it lost in-route to the off-site loc? If the answer is the latter, then BB is not at fault, but the shipping company that was transporting the laptop is. However, if the laptop was at the BB store when it was lost, it also begs the question: was the laptop just simply lost, or was it stolen? If it was stolen, then BB is also a victim, and the thief needs to be found and charged. Either way, the truth of the situation needs to be discovered.
Angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night- Ginsber
You overlook the fact that it was hot enough to put her in the hospital with 3rd degree burns.
What's your point? ALL coffee is that hot!
Also, you make coffee at 190-200 degrees, you don't serve it at that temperature.
Actually, you make it at "195 -205". As for serving temp, I've posted numerous references that confirm the correct holding/serving temp to be around 180 to 185, which is exactly what McDonalds used.
"...just 1 injury per 24 million cups sold! "
Which goes to show something was wrong at the McDonald's
Huh? ONLY one cup in 24,000,000 ended up causing a burn. There are 50,000 deaths due to car accidents per year, and only 70 McDonalds coffee burns.
A) McDonald's NEW it was too hot.
I'm sorry, but you can't even spell "knew", but we're all supposed to listen to your opinion?
B) This particular cup was well above reasonable temperatures.As shown by the magnitude of the burns.
SHe spilled an entire cup in her crotch, and then sat there for up to 7 seconds. Neither of these things are McDonald's fault.
C) The lady spent 10 days in the hospital.
SO? I mean it's horrible, but it's also irrelevent.
1) it went directly from from brewer to styrofoam mug.
2) Their commercial peculators are 5 to 10 gallons, enough weight to increase the boiling point slightly and is poured from the bottom. Home brewing is pored from the top typically.
3) Homes typically use drip pots, not peculators.
This being said, I was unaware how hot McDonald's coffee was until I ordered some and burnt my tongue. I was then told afterwards the coffee was not meant to be drunk in the restaurant but rather after 2 hours after work. However, when I was a teen with a crappy care I used their coffee to clean my engine. There was no way I could get water as hot as their coffee.
There is no sanctuary. There is no sanctuary. SHUT UP! There is no shut up. There is no shut up.
Why am I working in the basement?
Where is my paycheck?
...
Please explain how you don't accept it.
TO BUY A NEW CAR WOULD MAKE YOU SEXUALLY ATTRACTIVE.
"Fact 0: Regardless of whatever temperature other places serve coffee, everyone who has a kettle at home makes tea and coffee at just under 100 C. It's just not possible for McDonalds to server coffee significantly hotter than it would be at home."
Yes, just under 100 C would be about right for brewing. Let's convert to Fahrenheit, where it would be just under 212 F. or, for simplicityies sake, 195. allow for cooling whilst serving, and you have approximately 185 F.
Conversion rates are your friend.
"Teach a man to build a fire, and he's warm for a day. Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life."
Maintaining data means something specific. You can't be maintaining data that you don't know is there, and even if you did know it was there, were not supposed to even access anyway.
If the customer had asked Best Buy to back up the data on her hard drive, then you MIGHT have something. But she didn't. She just gave them a disk in a computer. That's not data maintenance, despite the grammar hoops you're trying to jump through.
And no, I have no relation to Best Buy. But it doesn't matter - the law still doesn't apply to this situation, and the customer is still at fault for the data loss. I just think it's stupid when people sue other people for $54 million over something worth $1,000. It's a waste of resources, tax dollars, and time.
A warranty program is simple - your stuff breaks, you give it to me, I fix it or give you another one. The woman had no reasonable expectation that she would get her laptop back - she gave it in for warranty repair.
The only thing Best Buy really screwed up here was dicking the customer around for 3 months. They overcompensated her for that to the tune of $350 in cash over the value of the laptop lost and a $500 gift card. Did it make her happy? No. But the appropriate remedy for that is NOT $54 million lawsuit.
Anyway, I've apparently burned enough Karma to be post limited for the day, which is a new one. Quite amusing.
It's irrelevant how severe her injuries were? How does this even make sense in your head? Of course the degree of injury is relevant to a lawsuit about that injury.
I write sci-fi for metalheads
How about nearly boiling hot coffee to an 81 year old?
Maybe I'm not being fair to older people, and maybe I don't fully appreciate the difference between 190F and 212F. Is it really that different?
I write sci-fi for metalheads
Somebody should throw a cup of freshly brewed McDonald's coffee in your face. I'd love to see what you'd be saying then, you fucking prick.
She paid Best Buy $300 dollars to "maintain" the system. And was in their possession to be 'maintained'
Those who can, do.
It's irrelevant how severe her injuries were? How does this even make sense in your head?
It's irrelevent for 2 reasons:
1) The accident was HER FAULT. Therefore, no matter how severe the injuries, McDonalds owed her nothing.
2) It was a BLATANT Appeal to Emotion. 'Oh, the poor woman was in severe pain. Just look at the horrible, horrible injuries she suffered. Look at the flesh peeling off the bone. And did we mention this was her, you know, 'groin area'. Imagine how humiliating to have burns 'there'. Don't you feel sorry for her and want to give her lots of other people's money??'
...says the Anonymous Coward. /I'd say "Ow! What the fuck! That burns. Owww! Call the Ambulance! Damn!" And then continue to moan in pain. //What I wouldn't do is sue McDonalds. ///Unless it was a McDonalds employee they threw it on me.
I was about to post an apology for trying to dress you down while I was tired and had had too much to drink, but then I came here and read your rebuttal, filled with ad hominem attacks, insane arguments, and layman posturing. So now I don't know what to think.
First, I appreciate the time and energy you've put into quoting and decrying each and every thing I wrote, but I'm afraid I'm unwilling to extend you that same courtesy. Frankly, you are not worth the time it takes to do it. So just use your imagination as far as what part of your reply I'm responding to:
- This article that you've repeatedly accused me of not reading is actually the exact thing that I did read. But you know--you got me--I didn't thoroughly read this woman's crappy blog. But in fairness, I probably don't read your crappy blog either. Nobody does. So if there were juicy little tidbits of information buried deep within her blog that would have changed my mind about her case, then I guess I'll just never know. Because I'm damn sure not going to click on three links for her sake instead of the main one. Not unless I'm on the clock.
- Plaintiff's counsel being the plaintiff doesn't matter in the least. It just means that she's a pro se. The court doesn't care one way or the other, except in criminal cases, where the court cares whether defendant has waived the right to counsel or not. Otherwise, the sky's the limit as far as trying to represent yourself in court. While some judges extend pro se's a slight bit of leniency, this is usually overshadowed by their propensity to screw things up in the worst way. I'm actually glad that you pointed it out, though, because it means that plaintiff is about 1000% more likely to mess up the pleading requirements (not even 1st base) and lose her case outright. Summary judgment ring a bell? If you were actually an attorney, you would have just told me that she was a pro se. To which my reply would have been "OK." It's the term that attorneys use instead of person-who-is-representing-themselves-because-you-see-there-is-no-counsel. Nice try, though. But it's not your fault. You just didn't know to Google for the Latin words any lawyer knows that would have helped throw me off your trail.
- You have not actually litigated a case anywhere before. You don't have to fess up to it. I already know. At best, you're a 1L law student, but I doubt even that. My guess is that you're playing semantics with me, and are trying to count some epic, small claims battles as a pro se yourself that nobody cares about. Also, lawyers are not so quick to play the condescending "Don't you understand!?!" card so frequently with other people, least of all one of their own. We're a tight-knit group that believes in Karmic retribution in the same lifetime, and are completely unafraid to screw you over in whatever professional capacity is available to us. But that's any profession. Probably, dentists are the same way.
- Courts are not sympathetic to plaintiffs who waste time while attempting to retrieve a chattel, and then turn around and sue defendant for the time wasted. I won't go into any more detail than this. You can probably figure out the reasoning behind the holdings.
- I absolutely knew what you were trying to intimate by saying made "complete." It's just that nobody uses that phrasing. I thought I made that clear in my post. Hmm, guess not. I don't know if it's a regional thing, or something you heard on television, but we say "made whole." Every attorney I've ever known says it. There are even doctrines in many states that use exactly that phrasing. That's probably where we got it from. This and your clumsy application of the "proximate cause" concept were my first clues that you had no idea what you were talking about. That and of course, your reply--which is filled with gems in and of itself--helped give that impression as well. I guess I shouldn't emphasize the irony behind your calling me a "moron" right after expounding upon the Doctrine of Being 'Complete,' according
I was then told afterwards the coffee was not meant to be drunk in the restaurant but rather after 2 hours after work.
So McDonalds wants me to buy coffee and let it sit for two hours before I drink it? Source please.
when I was a teen with a crappy care I used their coffee to clean my engine. There was no way I could get water as hot as their coffee.
Are you suggesting that McDonalds coffee is served significantly hotter than boiling? Sorry, but nothing in your post holds water.
>> What part of "I tried to give it back, but they wouldn't take it" constitutes "acceptance"..?
> The part where she took the money.
She didn't have much choice-- rather than address her concerns by, oh, actually replying to her, they just shoved the refund onto her card and sent her an unrequested "gift card" in the hopes that she would just shut up and go away.
I say good for her, for not bending over!
So McDonalds wants me to buy coffee and let it sit for two hours before I drink it? Source please.
Well, I don't know about '2 hours', but this coffee was bought at the DRIVE THRU. As in, you buy it on the way to work. So, it would sit in a cupholder until you got to work. (Yes, some people drink it while driving, but that is unsafe and not to be encouraged.)
So, there is a reasonable expectation that there will be a delay between the customer getting the coffe and drinkign the coffee.
Yes, but when I make tea, I pour the boiling water into a cup that's at room temperature, use a tea bag that's at room temperature, and use a metal spoon to stir that's also at room temperature. I'm pretty sure the resulting temperature of the beverage ends up being significantly less than the temperature of the boiling water I used to make it.
"Sounds simple. Why do you fight this so hard? Any relation to BB?"
if you look at his user account every reply is to this thread.. looks like damage control to me. (granted i don't subscribe so i can't see past his last 25 posts or so.. but still).
The part where she indicated de facto that she accepted it by donating it charity. You can't donate what you don't own.
>> What part of "I tried to give it back, but they wouldn't take it" constitutes "acceptance"..?
> The part where she indicated de facto that she accepted it by donating it charity. You can't donate what you don't own.
Ah, I see. So TELLING them you don't want it, and that you want to give it back, and having them not respond, that really means "okay fine, I accept" ?
I don't understand why she didn't just tear it up, but she certainly didn't 'accept' it - otherwise she would have used it herself. It was an offer for HER to take store credit, which she never did.
You need to apply the dictionary definition of "maintain" because if "maintain" is not otherwise defined, that is what the court will use. Your narrow definition may have a special use that you are familiar with -- try not to get hung up on that.
Secondly, the purpose of the statute is not to prevent data loss in the "my hard drive died" sense. It is meant to prevent data _release_ and thereby prevent identity theft.
As for damages, $54m is obviously way to high, but getting that wasn't her intent. No matter what happens now, she has won because of the publicity generated. It was a brilliant move on her part. As for the actual damages, who knows how much that would be. It would likely bear some relation to the costs of curing identity theft. I would think an award in the $20-30k range would be adequate but I'm just guessing. That would protect the plaintiff against the potential for future harm, and encourage BB to be a good citizen without being silly high. Even if she gets nothing though, she has to consider this a complete victory. She's on the "front page" of Google News Sci/Tech section and who knows where else.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
Whats the recommended temp for pouring on your someone's crotch?
The legislature however, used "maintain" which in ordinary parlance, simply means to keep without allowing degradation
It would seem to me that if maintain means to keep without allowing degradation, and Best Buy is making no effort to prevent degradation of the data, and may even allow the data to be destroyed, they're not maintaining the data then, are they?
Best Buy is ignoring the data entirely. That's what we want them to do - we don't want them snooping around our hard drives, right? So if they're ignoring the data entirely, then they're not maintaining it. By the very definition you used.
paintball
In order to create a bailment, the bailee must both intend to possess, and actually physically possess, the bailable chattel.
Well, it applies for the computer, which I wholeheartedly agree Best Buy is responsible for replacing. But it doesn't apply to the data, as Best Buy never intended to possess the data.
Best Buy is simply not responsible for the data. If this same woman had brought her computer to a mom-and-pop shop for repair and it got stolen, nobody would think this lawsuit was reasonable.
paintball
Accidents with coffee at home usually don't result in 3rd degree burns. Second degree burns are rather rare.
To revisit what you said Fact 0: Regardless of whatever temperature other places serve coffee, everyone who has a kettle at home makes tea and coffee at just under 100 C. It's just not possible for McDonalds to server coffee significantly hotter than it would be at home. Bottom pouring percolators are very rare at home let alone ones with 2 to 3 head/feet, and even then coffee served in a styrofoam mug with a sealed lid at home. Home drinkers usually use ceramic or glass mugs, which intently cool the coffee. Also you need to understand some of the fundamentals of brewing coffee.
Brewing temperature -- Pretty irrelevant to this issue.
Holding temperature -- What McDonalds hiked up to a higher than normal level
Serving temperature -- As others have pointed out 175 is a minimum holding temperature
There is no sanctuary. There is no sanctuary. SHUT UP! There is no shut up. There is no shut up.
Poor analogy. Better analogy:
If, the last time you were at the doctor's office, you left a box there, and in that box was your tax return, is the doctor's office obligated to notify you that your tax return may have been stolen? Or even if, for some strange reason, you asked your doctor to stash the box under his desk, but didn't tell him what was in it?
The difference is that when the medical records are stolen, those records belong the the doctor's office, they know they have them, and they are responsible for maintaining them. When the box you left at the doctor's office is stolen
paintball
The parent was quoted as saying two hours. I call BS.
Well, I don't know about '2 hours', but this coffee was bought at the DRIVE THRU. As in, you buy it on the way to work. So, it would sit in a cupholder until you got to work. (Yes, some people drink it while driving, but that is unsafe and not to be encouraged.)
So, there is a reasonable expectation that there will be a delay between the customer getting the coffe and drinkign the coffee.
Just as there is a reasonable expectation that the consumer will drink the coffee while seated in the restaurant, thus not having the "drive to work" delay. I call BS again.
"I would not call 1C "significant," would you?"
.433psi or 1 psi : 2.31 head foot.
I certainly would. That's 1% hotter than I can do at home which is rather why I used McDonald's coffee to clean my engine. For temps above 90c, 1 degree makes the difference is a big deal making the difference between being able to treat a burn in time, to not even being able to think about it before a 3rd degree burn. In case you don't know, 3rd degree burns are most dangerous because you can't feel them. It's been over a decade since I did food service.
The pressure increase is is 1 head ft :
However the biggest factor in those restaurant percolators is the fact that the coffee is poured right next to the heating elements, certainly more significant. Most significant are the styrofoam mugs, which AFAIK are NOT in use anymore.
So there you have it. Is it possible their coffee was served "significantly" hotter than at home. Absolutely! With styrofoam mugs, bottom poured percolators, and to a lesser degree 2-3 head feet of pressure. Note I never said it was served hotter than boiling, but at the time it was poured just shy of boiling.
There is no sanctuary. There is no sanctuary. SHUT UP! There is no shut up. There is no shut up.
You have me confused with another poster.
You said:
There was no way I could get water as hot as their coffee.
then you said
I am suggesting at the time, it was their goal to serve the coffee as close to boiling as possible then put directly in their styrofoam.
No, you said "There was no way I could get water as hot as their coffee."
1. There is no way McDs could make or serve coffee significantly hotter than boiling water.
2. Any moron can boil water.
3. You said "There was no way I could get water as hot as their coffee."
4. ????
The second quote you attributed to me was made by somebody else.
You're confused. Nobody's listening.
"The patented ready-to-brew reservoir keeps water at the ideal brewing temperature of approximately 200. (Conventional home brewers heat water until it boils up to coffee basket.)"
Your argument from authority is a coffee machine advertisement. Another claims the brew is better-tasting long and cold.
I worked for McDonald's in the 90's. If you don't mind my saying, the suggestion their coffee came fresh off the drip after 5:45 AM is as ludicrous as debating its quality (at any temperature).
Google third-degree burns. As I understand the case, legal action was justified, even if I weren't politically inclined to hope an old lady with crotch blisters can have her day in court with a billion-dollar international business.
you can have my violent video games when you pry them from my cold, dead hands.
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There's no such thing as "negative publicity"...
There's an argument to be made that the amounts in the McDonald's coffee case were outrageous, but I don't think it's a very strong argument.
Damages in a civil tort action are not limited to those which are compensatory in nature, and "make-whole" damages (what you're probably thinking of as "fair") are largely seen as anachronistic. The leading modern theory in tort actions lies at the intersection of law and economics (and is called exactly that: "law and economics" or L&E); the L&E approach to an action with a corporate tortfeasor would be to impose damages in an amount to disincentivize the behavior which gave rise to the claim. The original award in this case amounted to the profits of one day of coffee sales by McDonald's Corp. Be careful not to conflate this with the total sales of one day of coffee sales - just the profits. McDonald's Corp. literally lost nothing in this lawsuit except the expense of the suit itself and opportunity cost. If you're looking for a genuine disincentive, I'd say that's a bit on the low end.
It's true that plaintiffs may seem to profit unjustly by the L&E approach. I suppose that depends on who you talk to. Usually a lawsuit involves three years, more headache than you can imagine, stress, stress-related illness, stress-related injury, attorneys' fees, credit damage, damage to personal relationships, and often a lot of harassment from the other side before the damages are finalized and paid. After going through all that for something that was deserved in the very beginning, I don't usually have a problem with the plaintiff getting the benefit of that disincentive.
I won't talk about the merits of the case itself, since you only mentioned outrageous lawsuit amounts. But I'm confident that a significant number of people would change their mind at least a little if they knew the entire story.
Your argument from authority is a coffee machine advertisement.
My arguement is the National Coffee Association's recommendations. Why would they LIE about how best to brew coffee???? Their purpose in life is to sell more coffee. If they give give bad instructions on how to brew coffee, people will buy less coffee because they hate how it tastes.
Besides, I have posted NUMEROUS quotes from many different sites on how coffee is best brewed. Your cite is ONE site, the points of which I have already rebutted elsewhere in this thread.
even if I weren't politically inclined to hope an old lady with crotch blisters can have her day in court with a billion-dollar international business
See what I mean about Appeal to Emotion??
"Appeal to emotion is a logical fallacy which uses the manipulation of the recipient's emotions, rather than valid logic, to win an argument. "
YES, she got injured. Severely.
SO WHAT? The accident that caused her injuries was HER OWN DAMN FAULT, NOT McDonalds fault. Repeating how horrible the injury was is "a logical fallacy".
$54M might not be as unreasonable as you think. In terms of general damages, she's entitled to replacement of her laptop, reimbursement for anything of value in the laptop (purchased software, hardware additions, and probably any product she created that has any value). She's probably also entitled to her time and money spent dealing with Best Buy, and also a few years of credit protection. This would all come due if Best Buy were found negligent. Of course, if a judge or jury found that BB's behaviour was actually malicious (and I think there might be a good case here for it), then punitives would apply. The whole point of punitive damages is that they are supposed to hurt. A lot. The award would have to be big enough to make Best Buy smart. The other neat thing about punitive damages is that most insurance policies don't cover them, so the cost has to come out of the company coffers, and not from their Insurer. If punitive damages are involved, and if this woman can prove it (the burden of proof is usually higher for punitive damages), $54M could be well within reasonable range.
Rule of Slashdot #0: You and people like you are not representative of the larger population. - A.C.
What I was talking about here was kettles, and instant coffee. Not sure what the US is like for instant coffee, but it's pretty common in the UK, where more people drink tea anyway. With a kettle the water is poured at nearly boiling point into the cup, quick stir and served there and then. For black instant coffee the serving temp would be well over 90 C. I've managed to splash the boiling water onto my hands and I can believe if I accidentally poured the water onto somewhere more sensitive I'd end up with very bad burns.
For real coffee, admittedly it shouldn't get as hot because the coffee gets burnt above 90C, and the temperature for coffee from a home coffee maker will be substantially lower. I've had coffee from both McDonalds and Starbucks and both places burn it so badly I don't buy from them any more. But I've never found the coffee to be any hotter than instant coffee made in a kettle at home.
Seems pretty simple to me. Best Buy habitually, repeatedly, and willfully flouts the law for profit. Make 'em pay through the nose. Some people should wind up in prison.