As an oft-time "small-business" owner, I think you're discounting the problem called "loss control."
True, in my experience loss control more often affects inventory and other streams, than cash. But I'd guess than the risk of loss in direct cash and similar transactions, aggregated over time, results in far more loss than the cost of electronic transactions with audit trails and other controls.
One bad employee can severely cripple the cash flow of a "small business" relying on cash transactions. Bigger businesses have simply learned this lesson, and use electronic transactions and other controls to guard against it. (-- oversimplified, of course!!)
Yep, nothing like getting a letter in the mail after you've infected their superSecuritySystem with your own version of StuxNet. Asymmetrical cyberwarfare against these dinosaur organization is a Fitch(tm).
Personally, I owe them (doctor evil laugh) $1 million USD for the $10 million in superDollars I bought from them. Since they can't tell the difference, I plan to pay them back in superDollars if they ever call in the debt.
I rather preferred Tim O'Reilly's take on this, on NPR this week.
He prefers it when O'Reilly publications are copy-leifted. It's free marketing and distribution. The majority of customers he has, became customers by acquiring such copies.
Equally I once enjoyed Kai Lee's statement on a copy of Bryce 3D in '95 or so: look, if you're pirating my program and not making any money off of it, fine-- learn it. If you find yourself using my product to make money, and it makes you money, then please, pay us for some of our products so we can continue to help you make money. (Paraphrased).
Counterfiet currency is entirely a different thing, of course.
Yes, but there are disadvantages in a number of countries when pulling out a card that says "Pentagon" across the front. At least, I don't suggest trying to pay your visa stamp fee with it, while presenting passport with entry stamps from Israel, and attempting to enter any of the countries that officially bar people with Israeli stamps (but whose border guards normally look the other way).
Uh, I'm sorry, not quite. Most people in the Americas consider themselves Americans (Americanos). North American are norte-americos; citizens of the US, Estadosunidioestes.
Read the other posts in this thread, whydon'tcha, like the woman who opted out of a $200 Toyota settlement and won $10K instead.
The point is that you wouldn't sue for the $15, which is the reduced bulk rate that the firm filing a CLA is willing to accept.
In this case I'd probably file for 18 months service costs ($900 or so), and some amount up to treble damages, so potentially, $3600 or so. I'd typically be glad to settle for 2/3 or so of that.
Personally, it would take me an hour or two to send the proper paperwork and letter, and to file, and a bit more for the associated work. Which works out to a bit over $750/hr. Not ideal, but it'll do.
In addition to the technical resources, you have to do legal research, often tons of it. Junior associates have to show up at 5 and stay until 10 to get this done, often under deadline-- and the firm competes to find people capable of that (most burn out within a year or two). These costs come right out of the firms' pocket, long before any chance of profits.
Running a large class-action is not a slam-dunk process by any means. It can often require the long hours and co-ordinated work of tens or hundreds of individuals. It's not small claims; you don't just show up and say "it didn't work, hey judge, here's the press articles that say it didn't work and many other people had problems." The discovery process alone, in which you request and review company documents and communications (etc etc; you're likely to spend hours and hours on depositions in something like this) can eat up a few hundred thousands in a blink of an eye.
But, hey, if you want to persist in your delusions, do so... no skin off my back.
You sir, clearly, have never worked at a class action firm.
The risks and costs of such litigation are real and large. A failed case can cost a firm millions. Hundreds of thousands are often spent researching cases that go nowhere. Very few lawyers get filthy rich, as opposed to standard compensation, from CALs.
>Yes. But you're making it as if Apple were Monsanto lying about 3 headed babies because their mothers ate corn in the 3rd trimester.
Yes. But a lie is a lie is a lie is a lie, and this was no small fib.
If you're going to treat corporations as persons, then they need ot conform to the moral standards of individuals.
In this case, it looks like Apple committed a material deception, actively concealing a product flaw. That's not birth defects, no, but that's treble damages area, if not criminal conduct.
Instead of $25 or so per customer, Apple should be paying out $500 or so, twenty times what it's being asked.
Of course, the foregoing would require the US to have a Department of Justice.
I think the OP was lying, and was just about to pass it by.
I know of no such CAL against Morgan Stanley, and have followed the news. Certainly there could be something small I don't know about, but...
$3 is a ridiculously small payout on a $10K loss, especially considering treble damages. To keep making the point I've made in other threads: when we're talking about something substantive and tangible and reasonably large, not your VCR rebooting on 3rd Thursdays (yes, that was essentially the jist of a CAL), then you'd often be far better off just litigating it out in your local small claims.
For a $10K loss involving fraudulent activity, I'd file for $25K in my local jurisdiction without prejudice to filing further. Let the CAL do the discovery and other legwork, and bring the whole recoded into the Court. The $25K should be more or less a slam-dunk at that point, and I can decide whether it's worth it to pay a lawyer part of it to go after the $15K that's above the small claims limit at that point.
It probably would be, depending on the strength of the claim (I'm assuming a strong claim).
Sheesh, sorry, the whole "pay a lawyer $1M to litigate a $15 claim" thing around here, is a bit annoying:P
>And that law firm spent a million to do that shuffling. Would you pay a lawyer a million dollars to sue Apple over $15? Of course not.
No, but you wouldn't be paying $1 million. $15 or $150 or $1500 (all reasonable amounts to sue for) are small claims-- $25,000 is the small claims limit in my jurisdiction, and $1500 is the lowest state-set jurisdictional limit in the US.
In small claims, you can represent yourself. The filing fee can range from free to about $75. As a corporation, Apple needs to send a lawyer across the company to respond to my suit, pay that lawyer $350/hr, pay his travel and lodging expenses, etc etc.
The above is an imbalance that highly favors the plaintiff. In practice, I've never heard of Apple sending a lawyer (outside cases filed in Cupertino) for anything under $5000; they settle, because the costs of not settling are enormously disproportionate. As do almost all corporations.
One-on-one lawsuits and class actions are entirely different things.
If your story is true as stated, you likely had the choice to litigate in local small claims. As stated, the chances that the company would have settled when served with a lawsuit are at least 90%.
You chose not to, and to participate in the class action instead, for whatever reason.
With the existing precident, you are almost guaranteed to win in any small claims venue. Your costs range from free to about $75. You can represent yourself.
On the other hand, Apple, as a corporation, is going to have to send a lawyer. At $350/hr or so, they're going to spend at least $5000 on the case -- time, travel, expenses (hotel etc).
If you sue them for $500 or less, it simply makes sense to settle. And in fact, I've only seen Apple not settle once-- when a law student at Berkeley did them the convenience of (intentionally) suing them in Cupertino over a defective laptop.
Guess what? He still won. Small claims litigation is not massive class action. It has restricted, common sense rules and proceeds by a common sense, preponderance of the evidence. Guys in fancy suits tend not to impress judges who have deep caseloads to clear.
In this case, the question is the damages. Hard to calculate, but I could see service costs over a year, plus some punitive or retributive damages in some jurisdictions. The higher you make it, the more incentive you give Apple to fight, so realistically, I'd peg a reasonable suit at $500-750.
If it's worth your time to do the research and/or go through the hoops of the small claims procedure in your jurisdiction (5-10 hours for a novice), then I'd say go for it. If people did it all the time, corporations would be much more careful and responsive.
Otherwise, my point is that the parent post is mostly FUD, mixed with ignorance.
If true, this is the more interesting fact in the news. Unless one assumes, of course, that it is an exchange of fake plutonium for fake bonds. Ah, Nigeria-- a banana peel Republic economy.
From the article intro: >The idea has been hovering in the ether for some time, but TomTom is the first satnav firm to sign on the dotted line and bring insurance to drivers through their GPS.
>The Dutch company has joined up with Motaquote insurers to offer UK drivers "Fair Pay" insurance, where customers pay lower premiums because their satnav monitors how they're driving.
Slashdot Mirror
As an oft-time "small-business" owner, I think you're discounting the problem called "loss control."
True, in my experience loss control more often affects inventory and other streams, than cash. But I'd guess than the risk of loss in direct cash and similar transactions, aggregated over time, results in far more loss than the cost of electronic transactions with audit trails and other controls.
One bad employee can severely cripple the cash flow of a "small business" relying on cash transactions. Bigger businesses have simply learned this lesson, and use electronic transactions and other controls to guard against it. (-- oversimplified, of course!!)
It's called privatization. Outsourcing. Or somesuch other buzzword for "a good idea" that really means FUBARed.
Yep, nothing like getting a letter in the mail after you've infected their superSecuritySystem with your own version of StuxNet. Asymmetrical cyberwarfare against these dinosaur organization is a Fitch(tm).
Personally, I owe them (doctor evil laugh) $1 million USD for the $10 million in superDollars I bought from them. Since they can't tell the difference, I plan to pay them back in superDollars if they ever call in the debt.
-- miniMe
I rather preferred Tim O'Reilly's take on this, on NPR this week.
He prefers it when O'Reilly publications are copy-leifted. It's free marketing and distribution. The majority of customers he has, became customers by acquiring such copies.
Equally I once enjoyed Kai Lee's statement on a copy of Bryce 3D in '95 or so: look, if you're pirating my program and not making any money off of it, fine-- learn it. If you find yourself using my product to make money, and it makes you money, then please, pay us for some of our products so we can continue to help you make money. (Paraphrased).
Counterfiet currency is entirely a different thing, of course.
Yes, but there are disadvantages in a number of countries when pulling out a card that says "Pentagon" across the front. At least, I don't suggest trying to pay your visa stamp fee with it, while presenting passport with entry stamps from Israel, and attempting to enter any of the countries that officially bar people with Israeli stamps (but whose border guards normally look the other way).
Uh, I'm sorry, not quite. Most people in the Americas consider themselves Americans (Americanos). North American are norte-americos; citizens of the US, Estadosunidioestes.
*yawn*
I just got back from my local pub, this is in my email. It takes about 20 seconds to reply.
I'll probably get tired of it if you bother to reply again. Or maybe we'll make this the longest pissing contest in the history of Slashdot.
Speaking of which... gotta go empty...
You game? Bets, anyone?
Uh, hardly a kick in the groin. More like the impact of a knat's feet upon an elephant's skin.
Hey, I didn't mean "you" as in "you personally." I meant "you" and in "your average govcritter making these decisions."
Read the other posts in this thread, whydon'tcha, like the woman who opted out of a $200 Toyota settlement and won $10K instead.
The point is that you wouldn't sue for the $15, which is the reduced bulk rate that the firm filing a CLA is willing to accept.
In this case I'd probably file for 18 months service costs ($900 or so), and some amount up to treble damages, so potentially, $3600 or so. I'd typically be glad to settle for 2/3 or so of that.
Personally, it would take me an hour or two to send the proper paperwork and letter, and to file, and a bit more for the associated work. Which works out to a bit over $750/hr. Not ideal, but it'll do.
You obviously have no idea what a law firm does.
In addition to the technical resources, you have to do legal research, often tons of it. Junior associates have to show up at 5 and stay until 10 to get this done, often under deadline-- and the firm competes to find people capable of that (most burn out within a year or two). These costs come right out of the firms' pocket, long before any chance of profits.
Running a large class-action is not a slam-dunk process by any means. It can often require the long hours and co-ordinated work of tens or hundreds of individuals. It's not small claims; you don't just show up and say "it didn't work, hey judge, here's the press articles that say it didn't work and many other people had problems." The discovery process alone, in which you request and review company documents and communications (etc etc; you're likely to spend hours and hours on depositions in something like this) can eat up a few hundred thousands in a blink of an eye.
But, hey, if you want to persist in your delusions, do so... no skin off my back.
You sir, clearly, have never worked at a class action firm.
The risks and costs of such litigation are real and large. A failed case can cost a firm millions. Hundreds of thousands are often spent researching cases that go nowhere. Very few lawyers get filthy rich, as opposed to standard compensation, from CALs.
Yes. A million times, yes. And one more time, yes. At least some around here, get it.
>Yes. But you're making it as if Apple were Monsanto lying about 3 headed babies because their mothers ate corn in the 3rd trimester.
Yes. But a lie is a lie is a lie is a lie, and this was no small fib.
If you're going to treat corporations as persons, then they need ot conform to the moral standards of individuals.
In this case, it looks like Apple committed a material deception, actively concealing a product flaw. That's not birth defects, no, but that's treble damages area, if not criminal conduct.
Instead of $25 or so per customer, Apple should be paying out $500 or so, twenty times what it's being asked.
Of course, the foregoing would require the US to have a Department of Justice.
I was too busy punching you in the fucking nose. Sorry. :P
I think the OP was lying, and was just about to pass it by.
I know of no such CAL against Morgan Stanley, and have followed the news. Certainly there could be something small I don't know about, but...
$3 is a ridiculously small payout on a $10K loss, especially considering treble damages. To keep making the point I've made in other threads: when we're talking about something substantive and tangible and reasonably large, not your VCR rebooting on 3rd Thursdays (yes, that was essentially the jist of a CAL), then you'd often be far better off just litigating it out in your local small claims.
For a $10K loss involving fraudulent activity, I'd file for $25K in my local jurisdiction without prejudice to filing further. Let the CAL do the discovery and other legwork, and bring the whole recoded into the Court. The $25K should be more or less a slam-dunk at that point, and I can decide whether it's worth it to pay a lawyer part of it to go after the $15K that's above the small claims limit at that point.
It probably would be, depending on the strength of the claim (I'm assuming a strong claim).
Sheesh, sorry, the whole "pay a lawyer $1M to litigate a $15 claim" thing around here, is a bit annoying :P
>And that law firm spent a million to do that shuffling. Would you pay a lawyer a million dollars to sue Apple over $15? Of course not.
No, but you wouldn't be paying $1 million. $15 or $150 or $1500 (all reasonable amounts to sue for) are small claims-- $25,000 is the small claims limit in my jurisdiction, and $1500 is the lowest state-set jurisdictional limit in the US.
In small claims, you can represent yourself. The filing fee can range from free to about $75. As a corporation, Apple needs to send a lawyer across the company to respond to my suit, pay that lawyer $350/hr, pay his travel and lodging expenses, etc etc.
The above is an imbalance that highly favors the plaintiff. In practice, I've never heard of Apple sending a lawyer (outside cases filed in Cupertino) for anything under $5000; they settle, because the costs of not settling are enormously disproportionate. As do almost all corporations.
One-on-one lawsuits and class actions are entirely different things.
$3500 is real money.
If your story is true as stated, you likely had the choice to litigate in local small claims. As stated, the chances that the company would have settled when served with a lawsuit are at least 90%.
You chose not to, and to participate in the class action instead, for whatever reason.
Actually, no, no, no no no.
With the existing precident, you are almost guaranteed to win in any small claims venue. Your costs range from free to about $75. You can represent yourself.
On the other hand, Apple, as a corporation, is going to have to send a lawyer. At $350/hr or so, they're going to spend at least $5000 on the case -- time, travel, expenses (hotel etc).
If you sue them for $500 or less, it simply makes sense to settle. And in fact, I've only seen Apple not settle once-- when a law student at Berkeley did them the convenience of (intentionally) suing them in Cupertino over a defective laptop.
Guess what? He still won. Small claims litigation is not massive class action. It has restricted, common sense rules and proceeds by a common sense, preponderance of the evidence. Guys in fancy suits tend not to impress judges who have deep caseloads to clear.
In this case, the question is the damages. Hard to calculate, but I could see service costs over a year, plus some punitive or retributive damages in some jurisdictions. The higher you make it, the more incentive you give Apple to fight, so realistically, I'd peg a reasonable suit at $500-750.
If it's worth your time to do the research and/or go through the hoops of the small claims procedure in your jurisdiction (5-10 hours for a novice), then I'd say go for it. If people did it all the time, corporations would be much more careful and responsive.
Otherwise, my point is that the parent post is mostly FUD, mixed with ignorance.
In Harlan County? They hang geeks there...
I have here a $1 billion FRN I will be happy to exchange on Monday, for a bitcoin mine today.
If true, this is the more interesting fact in the news. Unless one assumes, of course, that it is an exchange of fake plutonium for fake bonds. Ah, Nigeria-- a banana peel Republic economy.
http://www.fairpayinsurance.co.uk/Frequently-Asked-Questions/
Oy, pretty low-quality website there, mate.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/02/08/tomtom_insurance/
From the article intro:
>The idea has been hovering in the ether for some time, but TomTom is the first satnav firm to sign on the dotted line and bring insurance to drivers through their GPS.
>The Dutch company has joined up with Motaquote insurers to offer UK drivers "Fair Pay" insurance, where customers pay lower premiums because their satnav monitors how they're driving.