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US Supreme Court Protects Consumers' Right To Refill Ink Cartridges In Precedent-Setting Lexmark vs Impression Case (hothardware.com)
The U.S. Supreme Court said on Tuesday companies give up their patent rights when they sell an item, in a ruling that puts new limits on businesses' ability to prevent their products from being resold at a discount. The ruling is a defeat for Lexmark International, which was trying to stop refurbished versions of its printer cartridges from undercutting its U.S. sales. It's also a blow to companies like HP and Canon that sell their printers for a relatively low cost with the idea that they will recoup money on sales of replacement cartridges. From a report: Lexmark originally set its sights on Impression Products, a small company that specializes in remanufacturing print cartridges for resale at prices much lower than what a customer would pay for a "genuine" Lexmark product. These cartridges often have no noticeable difference in performance compared to genuine ink or toner cartridges -- the only real difference is that customers can save a lot of money by going the remanufactured route. This secondary market for cartridges not only has implications for regular Joes looking to save a buck, but also businesses that are always looking to cut costs.
good
Now, what will the SCOTUS say about the right to repair for farming machinery from John Deere (if I remember correctly)?
This is great. Even better is that it was 8-0 (or 7-1 on some parts, as mentioned in the article). It's wonderful to see something as basic to our society as the idea that "sold products are not owned by the seller after the sale" be confirmed unanimously by the supreme court. This will send a very real message to other industries as well, and likely result in even peripherally associated industries looking for other ways to mitigate their perceived losses other than expensive legislation and punishing their customers.
Truly excellent, and will have invisible benefits for years.
Good call. Now let's get to work on John Deere while you're in a giving mood.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
"... when they sell an item..."
This may be a precedent-setter in the cases of the farmers who save seed and are then sued for by "patent infringement" by Monsanto.
-- Insert witty one-liner here. --
Both format shifting (ripping) and making backup copies have long been considered legal under fair use in the US. You just have to make sure to delete any copies if you resell the original. You also cannot share the copies you made with anyone else.
If you want to learn about a really interesting aspect of the "first sale doctrine" and how it applies to software, you should have a look at "Vernor vs Autodesk" in the USA and compare it to "Oracle vs UsedSoft" in the EU. Basically, in the USA the courts determined that if a company sells you software, but in their terms & conditions claim that they are merely granting you a license, then you can't resell the software b/c you aren't considered to own it. In the EU however, if a company sells you a permanent life-time license in exchange for a one-time fee, the courts determined that you aren't merely licensing that software, you own it and you are allowed to resell it.
I think these different rulings haven't been fully appreciated yet. For example, if you buy Apple's Final Cut X for $299, you should be allowed to resell that software if you live in the EU, but there is currently no way to transfer licenses between users, preventing users from reselling it. It seems to me that by preventing users from reselling their software, Apple (and the Google Play Store) are probably violating sharia law on this matter.
Glad to see that consumers rights trump corporations' rights in the eyes of the SCOTUS. My apologies to anyone that may have thought I might be going in a different direction there.
There is no XUL, only WebExtensions...
I like the ruling, but I think the day of the inkjet cartridge may finally be coming to an end regardless. For the past few decades the "paperless office" has been the Holy Grail of IT, but we were never quite able to reach it. I can remember seeing a statistic about 15 years ago stating that paper usage actually increased because of the ease of printing....If you needed to take something away from your desk, you just printed it and carried it with you. Now that mobile devices are pretty much ubiquitous, you can just carry it on your phone/tablet instead of having to print it.
If you post as Anonymous Coward, don't expect a reply.
...in the discussion. I used to repair printers. To say that there is no difference between remanufactured cartridges overall and OEM cartridges is a joke. Yes. there are some excellent remanufactures out there that produce outstanding products. There are also plenty of shoddy ones that sell leaky ones that crap up your printer and / or use substandard ink / toner that produce lesser (or awful) pages. In most cases, the consumer has no idea and buys on price. From a patent standpoint, Lexmark's case was stupid, petulant, and ridiculous. However, if they wanted to make an argument about voiding your warranty for using remanufactured cartridges then they would probably have a valid point. Really, the whole printer industry is in a prisoners' dilemma where they have to keep the printer prices down in order to sell printers and then they make it up on consumables. This eases up a bit in the enterprise space where you occasionally have more sophisticated buyers that have enough experience to understand that efficient purchasing covers the entire lifecycle of the device. Hopefully somebody will be able to break this cycle, but it will probably take some very good marketing to convince consumers to be less price-sensitive with the initial purchase.
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Sure cheap lasers are great for text, they don't do a good job of photos though ;) I personally have a brother laser sitting right next to my large format inkjet photo printer.
---- Den ene knappen er powerknapp, den andre er Bender voice knapp "Bite My Shiny Metal Ass"
Sorry but a 6 digit UID is not "low"... with a UID as high as yours I'd expect you to know that :-)
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
"Sorry but a 6 digit UID is not "low"... with a UID as high as yours I'd expect you to know that :-)"
Also, based on my recollection of the level of discourse in Slashdot's early days, I wouldn't assume a low UID is a sign of wisdom...
Some of the black laser printers are somewhat affordable, but I've never seen an affordable color laser printer and even the black laser printers usually cost more than most color inkjets. Ink still has a place until that changes.
The cost of the unit itself is pointless to discuss when it is the cost of the consumables that actually make the difference.
I've yet to find an inkjet cartridge last anywhere near as long as laser toner.
One might even feel like the court, with it's unanimity is trying to tell the Federal Circuit that it really wants to stop having to hear all these patent cases. The opinion was delivered by the Chief Justice who spared no words in telling the Federal Circuit that it needs to do a much better job.
This venerable principle is not, as the Federal Circuit dismissively viewed it, merely "one common-law jurisdiction's general judicial policy at one time toward antialienation restrictions."
And
The Federal Circuit reached a different result largely because it got off on the wrong foot.
So what does count as a "low" UID these days? Is anyone even still signing up? This place is a shell of it's former self.
That depends on which part of Title 17 you read. One section says you can't break the encryption. Another says you can, for purposes of cross-compatibility. This conflict has never been resolved.
Lexmark tried that and lost. Lexmark Int'l v. Static Control Components, 387 F.3d 522.