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Judge Approves $100 Million Dell Settlement
crimeandpunishment writes "It's official. Dell will pay the US government $100 million to settle fraud charges. CEO Michael Dell will personally pay a $4 million fine. A federal judge approved the settlement after Michael Dell assured him the company will deliver on the reforms it promised. Dell was accused of pumping up its profits over five years by improperly using payments from Intel, in order to meet Wall Street targets."
There was a time when your name was synonymous with inexpensive but decent computers. However, the last truly decent computers you released were the Dell Mini 9/10v...you're just not the Dell I used to know. Your monitors still kick quite a lot of ass, but your computers are more or less worthless at this point.
"Dude, you're getting a Dell." "Crap."
Living With a Nerd
Dell>>>>>HP
Period
What I want to know is why is the government the one that always gets these settlements? Why not refund it back to the consumers or use it to subsidize the next year of computers that they ship out?
I know it's a fine, but still, in the end, it's always the consumers that lose.
"Freedom in the USA is not the ability to do what you want. It is the ability to stop others from doing what THEY want"
Might those "payments from Intel" be related to Intel's attempts to keep AMD CPUs out of the market place as much as possible?
The AACS key is NOT 0xF606EEFD628B1CA427BEA93A9CA9773F
That is all? Man, it's good to be rich in the US. A regular person caught cooking the books would probably go to jail. Michael Dell gets to pay $4 mil and walk. No penalties whatsoever for his accomplices, either.
I can only imagine that this would still be cheap for Dell at twice the price.
I wouldn't say the time of bad capacitors is over. I've still run into and heard about recent cases.
I think more people should know about the whole story and you can read it at http://www.badcaps.net
Why no jail time? It was a multi-million dollar fraud to bilk consumers and stockholders out of millions. How is this any different than blatant theft.
100m fine but it doesn't say how much they did profit from this fraud. So this could very easily (and probably) be a win-win situation for them
Maybe the judge cares about the middle class and when he saw that in order to save up this possibility, Dell had frozen all raises and bonuses that people had been promised?
Oh, I have to redact that - i'm lower class... work for them... and make around 40k a year, and have probably talked to a couple of you.
Shows how much bad thinking is left in Wall Street... when one of history’s most successful computer retailers thinks it’s better to artificially “pump up” its stock prices, rather than increasing its true overall value through better products and better customer service. And as Pikoro noted above, the settlement funds should go towards programs which provide or promote technology for the public good (i.e. pumping up Kno/iPad tablet availability for schools to replace textbooks, or funding a practical, decent, open school admin database), and not going directly into mysterious government coffers where people like defense contractors can get at it, which is doing nothing but *harming* the public good.
Thinkingman.com New Media
CEO Michael Dell will personally pay a $4 million fine
So, does personally, really mean personally, or is he going to get reimbursed the $4 million as a "business expense"?
This bad thinking is endemic in our short-term society.
For example, let's say you ran a business printing t-shirts. For an expense you can get a brand new shirt printer that will make your shirts look better than the competitions as well as cost less to print. The downside is that they are pricey enough where you would show a loss this quarter. Would you take this deal? You'd give up short-term profits on the books, but ultimately you'd get greater profits in the long run.
There's this culture of growth growth growth. If you're not growing (and by growing, I mean making profit), you're failing - even if it's for a good reason. I honestly don't think it's a sustainable way to do business in the long term.
Random Thoughts From A Diseased Mind (Not For Dummies)
the new Gateway 2000
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gateway,_Inc.
when you ruin your name, everything else goes down the toilet. electronics is such a cutthroat competitive environment, you can't ever play the game of ruining what people associate your brand name with
because there's also this:
http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2010/06/suit-alleges-that-dell-shipped-12-million-faulty-computers.ars
bye bye dell
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Wow, with a net worth of $13.5 billion, that's like a $20 fine to most of us.
"What would I do?" Mr. Jobs said to an audience of several thousand information technology managers. "I'd shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders."
CEO Michael Dell will personally pay a $4 million fine.
I think his first question was, "Do you take a personal check, or do I have to use my AmEx?"
Seriously, a 4 million fine for someone like Michael Dell is nothing.
We don't want them fined.
We want them closed down.
If the market was allowed by Dell to operate properly, they'd be closed down.
That's the only acceptable result. Government seizure of all IP, with liquidation of the physical assets
and disbursement to everyone who held a share of Dell, prior to the suit.
Anything less is trivial, frivolous, and meaningless.
It's not just making a profit. It's not just making more profit than last time. It's making as much profit as totally unconnected 3rd parties say you should make. Even if you make a profit, more profit than the company has ever made before, because you didn't meet analyst expectations, you as CEO (and your job) are now on the hook for the drop in stock price (supposedly a representation of the value of the company) that will happen when people here "they didn't make their targets!" There are reasons a corporation is considered a sociopath by any measure...
The culture of growth used to be also a culture of contraction, due to a natural cycle. There was balance. Periods of expansion and contraction. People were responsible, bought only what they needed, saved like a squirrel during the good times, in preparation for the lean times.
Now this country is built on living the lifestyle you want NOW, by financing it on your future labor & productivity. And very few squirrel away during the good times, in preparation for the lean times.
People can adjust to contractions. But not if they're loaded up with bills and debt. If you're renting a big apartment, you move to a small apartment. If your paid-for-car costs too much to drive, you take public transportation, ride a bike, walk, or buy a used scooter. If you're commute is 100 miles, you get a different job, you move closer to your existing job. If you lose your job, you use your rainy day fund.
In the last several decades, contractions are increasingly viewed as absolutely negative, and at the first sign of a small contraction, central planners manipulate people so that the small contraction is prevented. This is done over and over, till the strategy fails, and nature gets her way eventually, and we see a huge contraction, that would test even the most responsible people, and for those who are severely leveraged out (just look at debt to income ratio), they have zero chance of adjusting. This is analogous to putting out every small fire in forests. Then one day, the whole thing goes up in a jaw dropping inferno. The natural cycle of expansion/contraction clears out bad businesses, bad debts, reminds people to be responsible on a regular basis with minimal blood on the street, and prevents expansion for expansion's sake. The side effects of a debt based society that embraces central planning, and the idea that we can expand forever, till the music stops, and people scramble for a chair ...it is unsustainable. We're watching it in action, right here right now. This ain't a Republican thing, this ain't a Democrat thing. It's an "us" thing. The leadership of both parties have grandiose plans that are not sustainable. And the sheeple follow along as if it's only one party or the other that is insane... when the reality is, both parties are insane, and they are perfect mirror of their constituents... ...sorry for my long post with the slide into politics ..it's a bad habit. But money, economics, politics, etc are all inseparable....
Wasn't SOX (also know as the 'Corporate and Auditing Accountability and Responsibility Act') supposed to prevent such financial accounting fraud?
Sarbanes–Oxley Section 802: Criminal penalties for violation of SOX
Whoever knowingly alters, destroys, mutilates, conceals, covers up, falsifies, or makes a false entry in any record, document, or tangible object with the intent to impede, obstruct, or influence the investigation or proper administration of any matter within the jurisdiction of any department or agency of the United States or any case filed under title 11, or in relation to or contemplation of any such matter or case, shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.
I know:
http://blogs.hbr.org/martin/2010/02/why-modern-business-is-bad-for.html
That was an excellent post that described my thoughts better than I did! Thanks for articulating my general point so wonderfully.
Random Thoughts From A Diseased Mind (Not For Dummies)
Earn billions illegally or immorally.
Pay 30% as Tax to Govt.
Pay 20% as Party Fund to Republicans or Democrats.
Govt will bail you for your shady activities.
I'd like to buy homeland for our 10 million people. http://twitter.com/mahadiga
He is just choosing to spend his money unwisely.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.