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Florida Man Sues Samsung, Says Galaxy Note 7 Exploded (reuters.com)
An anonymous reader shares a Reuters report: Samsung Electronics Co was sued on Friday by a Florida man who said he suffered severe burns after his Galaxy Note 7 smartphone exploded in his front pants pocket. The lawsuit by Jonathan Strobel may be the first in the United States by a Samsung phone user against the South Korean company over a battery defect linked to the Note 7. It was filed one day after Samsung recalled about 1 million Note 7s sold in the United States. Samsung has received 92 reports of batteries overheating in the United States, including 26 reports of burns and 55 reports of property damage, U.S. safety regulators said. "We don't comment on pending litigation," Samsung spokeswoman Danielle Meister Cohen said in an email. "We are urging all Note 7 owners to power their device down and exchange it immediately." Strobel, 28, of Boca Raton, said he was in a Costco store in Palm Beach Gardens on Sept. 9 when his Note 7 exploded. He said the phone burned directly through his pants, resulting in severe burns on his right leg.
Here are their claims:
- You will be fine if you don't leave it charging overnight
- They will have replacement handsets sometime in the next few weeks.
The first claim is false according to many sources including Samsung. As for the second, they are supposed to have replacements by the 21st but hey that's just a schedule. No one sticks to those apparently.
Oft quoted, but done so inaccurately. The McDonald's coffee lawsuit was not simply because the coffee was hot and spilled out of the cup. It's that it was so hot that it delaminated the bottom of the coffee cup, causing the bottom to fall off and the coffee to fall out. If your hot beverage cup is not capable of holding the hot beverage, negligence is a reasonable claim.
> (And McDondald's got in trouble because their coffee was hotter than usual, and they had ignored the risk involved.)
This was the claim made by the plaintiff's attorney, but no, actually it was not.
First, I have no dog in this fight. I think McDonald's food is nasty and I don't go there unless I need coffee in the middle of the night and there's absolutely no other place open.
According to the court records (available many places online, plus the wiki entry) McDonald's served their coffee at 180 to 190 degrees.
In point of fact, this is the same temperature range that Starbucks, Dutch Brothers and Peets serve their coffee, both then and now. I didn't just take someone's word on this -- I happened to possess a lab thermometer at the time that I was using to diagnose server failure in a wiring closet (side note; an unventilated wiring closet is a bad place for servers. But I needed to prove this to the customer.) Buying a regular coffee at the above named shops and a couple of locals and checking with the thermometer, I found that every one was between 180 and 190 degrees.
You can test this for yourself -- buy or rent an accurate thermometer, walk into any Starbucks, order a regular coffee, and check the temperature. Be sure to do several to have a sufficient sample size. You'll find that they all serve coffee at a temperature equal to or greater than the temperature alleged in the lawsuit.
The reason for this is that 180 to 190 degrees fahrenheit is the proper serving temperature for coffee.
But don't bother testing McDonald's, because (in my experience) they all serve coffee lukewarm now. It's nasty.
There has been several urban legends from this case. The most amusing of which (told to me by a very earnest young lady) was that McDonald's was saving boatloads of money by making coffee with live steam which resulted in the coffee being too hot when served. I asked how this was supposed to save money. She didn't know.
But yes, McDonald's lost, and now they serve lukewarm coffee. But indications are, they lost because the defense team acted like arrogant assholes, and the plaintiff was sympathetic, not because of any practical reason.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
> (And McDondald's got in trouble because their coffee was hotter than usual, and they had ignored the risk involved.)
This was the claim made by the plaintiff's attorney, but no, actually it was not.
Actually, you're wrong. What doomed McDonald's in that lawsuit was that their own policies and procedures specified that the coffee be served at a lower temperature. Failing to follow their own three-ring binder is actually what got them nailed.
In point of fact, this is the same temperature range that Starbucks, Dutch Brothers and Peets serve their coffee, both then and now. I didn't just take someone's word on this
It doesn't matter whose word you did or didn't take. Your opinion on this case is irrelevant. The fact is that McDonald's uses inferior ultra-thin styrofoam cups which do not remain cuplike at those temperatures. They lose all rigidity and become basically a thick polystyrene bag. Since they know this, they deliberately specified that coffee should be served at a lower temperature. The franchise in question deliberately increased that temperature to increase pot hold times, at risk of causing harm to customers due to failing cups. This in fact came to pass, and they subsequently lost the lawsuit.
The reason for this is that 180 to 190 degrees fahrenheit is the proper serving temperature for coffee.
No, 160 to 185 is the proper serving temperature for coffee. But again, remember, the "proper serving temperature for coffee" is utterly irrelevant here, because the proper temperature range for McDonald's shitty cups is lower than that. McDonald's assumes you're going to begin eating and drinking immediately, so there's no reason for them to serve coffee at "optimal" temperature; to them, optimal temperature is something you can begin drinking right away, which (shock amazement) is at about 165. Something at 180 has to be slurped to cool it, and that particular manouever is too delicate to be performed in a moving car on American roads, which are shit.
But don't bother testing McDonald's, because (in my experience) they all serve coffee lukewarm now. It's nasty.
McDonald's coffee is lukewarm by design. It is how it is designed to be served. All fast foods are engineered; they have to achieve several goals and superior flavor is only one of them. They also have to not threaten, confuse, or bebother the customer, who has alternatives and will drive through some other place for breakfast if you don't coddle them.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"