I'm just having my internet fun of the day. Best Buy seems to be the Microsoft of this thread, and those disagreeing with me are arguing like my mother: They have decided best buy is bad, therefore any arguments against best buy must be correct.
This site is SUPPOSEDLY populated by geeks who should understand data backup and protection. It's just silly to and over a hard drive with unprotected private information to ANY third party and then get mad when it's compromised. Even in the VERY BEST of circumstances, stuff gets stolen and/or damaged. That's life. Especially when stuff is getting SHIPPED somewhere.
Expecting Best Buy to treat every hard drive like it has credit card numbers on it is not the right solution. The right solution is for users to protect their data.
What we have here is a customer who is mad at best buy who thinks the solution is to wage a PR war against Best Buy until she 'feels satisfied', when the real, original, problem is simply that the customer left unprotected, personal data on their laptop hard drive, nothing more, nothing less.
Note that that is an entirely separate issue from whether Best Buy has good customer service or not. In my experience, I've had good customer service from them. But even if everyone else had bad experience, and even if Slashdot geeks hate the shady, expensive, big box supplier of tech products to the computer masses, Best Buy is STILL not responsible for the data on the hard drive.
And I'm amused at the massive amount of negative moderation I've received on the basis of comments about 'reading the article' and 'what the law is' when the blog and comments are wrong and the law in question does not hold Best Buy legally liable in the first place, and separate from the legal liability, the person mostly responsible for the private data being accessible is the end user.
I have a laptop, and I don't keep any private data on it precisely because I know it's a laptop, and they are easily lost/stolen. And as a purchaser of laptops, and a purchaser of laptop warranties, I would prefer it if I did not also have to pay for Sue Public keeping her tax return where any idiot who can to a grab-and-run on her laptop has access to it.
I'm not saying the store shouldn't make you a happy customer, just that the fact that a problem may have caused you some inconvenience isn't legally actionable.
And yes, if you're going to sue me for $54 million because of a customer service problem, I hope you don't come in my store either.
Maintainers of the machine and maintainers of the data are not the same thing.
Re:I didn't miss anything. Read the law.
on
The $54 Million Laptop
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· Score: 0, Flamebait
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.
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.
She was at risk for identity fraud when she put private, unencrypted data on the hard drive of her laptop.
And who says Best Buy didn't offer her what the laptop was worth? They didn't offer her what she paid for it, but that's not the same thing. $750 for a laptop that was worth $1100 a year ago seems reasonable.
I'm not trying to defend best buy. I'm just saying the lawsuit is stupid. And the 'failure to notify loss of data' portion of it won't stick, because there's no legal basis for it.
This is Slashdot. We should all know by now that YOU are responsible for backing up and encrypting your data.
The problem here with regards to the private data is the negligent party is the customer, not best buy.
Let's say the government buys it's laptops from best buy. And one of them gets a broken power switch. One of them with the Veteran's Affairs patient records on it, which are not encrypted in any way. And the VA gives the laptop, with the hard drive, to best buy to repair. Best Buy then loses the laptop.
Now, who is responsible for the fact that thousands of unencrypted VA patient records were lost?
Duh, the VA is.
The customer apparently had no protections in place for their private data. Best Buy may have lost the laptop. But if the customer did not protect the data, Best Buy isn't obligated to either.
They didn't give you $250. They gave you an incentive to spend more money with them. Besides, $250/8 hours is 31.25(coupon bucks)/hr. I - and my employer - value my time far more than that. Do you work for coupon books?
I am willing to accept that it is in my best interest for the airline to operate in a manner that is efficient so that I pay low fares. Part of this is that I accept that there is a point where preventing problems is more expensive than dealing with problems, and that sometimes the victim of the problem is going to be me.
If there was an airline that gave out $3,000 every time something bad happened, I wouldn't fly it, because the tickets would be too expensive. I have a tough time faulting the airline for providing the level of service I've paid for.
Now, if there were other airlines out there that provided better service or a better price, then I'd switch, but since there are not, I am forced to conclude that the operational policies of the airline are reasonable, because if they were not, a different airline would offer a better experience.
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.
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.
None of that matters. Best Buy is liable for replacement of the product lost. They may be liable for negligence if there was a negligent act - i.e. they didn't exercise due care. Given that the customer had private data on a laptop unprotected, and given that she gave it to best buy, and given that best buy keeps the laptop in a secure area and the customer probably does not, best buy has exercised at least as much care for the laptop as the customer did. That's not negligence. It's unfortunate that the laptop got stolen, but the party responsible for that theft is the thief.
Worst Buys' sloppy procedures and/or dishonest employee(s) are the proximate cause. They're liable.
The criminal is the cause. Best Buy is still liable for replacement of the product though - otherwise they could always just claim something was stolen when it was lost.
She's not asking for a replacement laptop under warranty - the warranty doesn't cover THEFT!!! 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.
She provided her laptop to Best Buy. The agreement is that Best Buy would return to her a fixed, or similar, laptop. They agreed to provide a similar laptop. Obligation of best buy satisfied.
They originally offered her $750.00. Not even the price of the stolen laptop.
The laptop was a year old. If $750 was the cost of an equivalent laptop a year later, then $750 is the correct compensation.
Sounds like you don't LIKE best buy, but aside from that, the rest of your comment is rubbish.
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.
I didn't miss anything. Read the law.
on
The $54 Million Laptop
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· Score: 1, Informative
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.
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.
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.
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."
You don't burn tires because burning tires, by itself, does anything. The government doesn't care how many tires you burn. They just shoot you with rubber bullets (or real bullets, or fire hoses) and move on.
You burn tires because when you burn tires and the government shoots you, you get in the newspaper, and the article talks about what act of the government you found so egregious that you picked a sure-to-lose fight with its better-armed agents.
There's a reason we don't use fire hoses anymore - and it's not because (directly) it's inhumane. We don't do it because it generates too much press.
The internet lets you have the same effect as burning tires without having to get shot first. The real media is lazy. They don't want to have to go down to the National Mall every time somebody burns a tire any more than you really want to go down there and burn tires. They would much prefer to sit in their comfy office, read blogs, and report on what people are blogging about. You can get the same press with blogging nowadays as you can get with tire burning.
It's not like Ron Paul's brain in Obama's body hasn't been done before - last time we just called it Jesse Jackson.
I actually LIKE that Obama isn't talking all this "I'm going to change everything!" stuff. Why? Because President's don't change shit!
What percentage of 'Presidential Plans' actually make it onto the books?
Ron Paul is a moron, and Ron Paul followers are morons - if not because most of the ideas themselves are bad, then because they are silly enough to believe that ANY president is somehow going to be able to get ANY of those things to happen. Eliminate the Fed? What huh? People come down on Obama for having promises he doesn't have the 'experience' to deliver, but really all Obama is promising is good due diligence. Paul is promising to flip the country upside down, and the country is just too big for that.
All we need for a President is a guy who can talk to the world and not spend a bunch of lives and money blowing up shit that doesn't need to be blown up. Bonus points if he doesn't use the federal government to make his (or her) friends and political buddies and campaign donors rich. Obama is that guy.
Clinton is politics as usual. I'm sick of politics as usual, so I'm not voting for her.
That leaves Obama and McCain.
McCain tried 'Do the right thing' in '00. It didn't work. Now he's being a lot more savvy - catering more to his party, and he's now likely going to have the nomination. So, the question is, did he sell himself out, or did he just decide that he had to d some evil to make it to the general election, and once he actually gets elected, we'll get the '00 McCain back? Yes, it would be nice if he had been the '00 McCain the whole time, but a '00 McCain that doesn't get elected doesn't do us any good either.
McCain is my second choice.
Obama is either the most genuine person to ever run for President, twice as genuine as McCain, or he is the slickest politician ever - 10 times as slick as Clinton (either of them). Whichever it is - whether he's the mos genuine candidate ever, or the slickest candidate ever, I think I have to vote for Obama.
There's really no reason to vote for Clinton with Obama around. The only thing Clinton can have on Obama is that he's really just a fraud, but if that's the case, he's so much better at being a fraud than she is, he's STILL better than Clinton!
Why should the federal government tax the people to just give it back to them with requirements on how to teach their kids?
Because it lets you not give the money back to people who call 'intelligent design' teaching. At least, it would, if you had qualified people distributing that money in a sane manner.
In the federal vs. state's rights debate, people often overlook the important part the federal government plays. Individual states allow for variation in the country, but the federal government keeps things from getting too crazy. It's the federal government that keeps you from being denied the right to vote based on skin color. It's the federal government that provides you tax-free movement from state to state. And it's not a bad thing that the federal government prevents innocent children from becoming the victims of patently absurd 'education' practices at the hands of a pocket of religions nuts.
That's not to say the federal government is always right, or the involvement of the federal government leads to the best result all the time, but there are plenty of cases where it does.
The company needs to retain copyright, but release the code under the GPL, and have their employee continue to work on it until it is so good that the competition has to steal it. Then they wait until their competition has sold their closed-source product with the stolen code into critical application areas of their customers, then sue the competition for copyright infringement.
Much, much cheaper than developing a complete product on your own.
At least, that's what any smart attorney for your company who bills by the hour would tell your company to do.
The article summary (surprise) wasn't well written or edited.
The issue that the EFF would have is that since, as a non-profit engaged in advocacy, they're not likely to be directly financially harmed by most patents. It's not like the EFF sells less software or something due to software patents.
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Well, clearly I don't work for Best Buy.
I'm just having my internet fun of the day. Best Buy seems to be the Microsoft of this thread, and those disagreeing with me are arguing like my mother: They have decided best buy is bad, therefore any arguments against best buy must be correct.
This site is SUPPOSEDLY populated by geeks who should understand data backup and protection. It's just silly to and over a hard drive with unprotected private information to ANY third party and then get mad when it's compromised. Even in the VERY BEST of circumstances, stuff gets stolen and/or damaged. That's life. Especially when stuff is getting SHIPPED somewhere.
Expecting Best Buy to treat every hard drive like it has credit card numbers on it is not the right solution. The right solution is for users to protect their data.
What we have here is a customer who is mad at best buy who thinks the solution is to wage a PR war against Best Buy until she 'feels satisfied', when the real, original, problem is simply that the customer left unprotected, personal data on their laptop hard drive, nothing more, nothing less.
Note that that is an entirely separate issue from whether Best Buy has good customer service or not. In my experience, I've had good customer service from them. But even if everyone else had bad experience, and even if Slashdot geeks hate the shady, expensive, big box supplier of tech products to the computer masses, Best Buy is STILL not responsible for the data on the hard drive.
And I'm amused at the massive amount of negative moderation I've received on the basis of comments about 'reading the article' and 'what the law is' when the blog and comments are wrong and the law in question does not hold Best Buy legally liable in the first place, and separate from the legal liability, the person mostly responsible for the private data being accessible is the end user.
I have a laptop, and I don't keep any private data on it precisely because I know it's a laptop, and they are easily lost/stolen. And as a purchaser of laptops, and a purchaser of laptop warranties, I would prefer it if I did not also have to pay for Sue Public keeping her tax return where any idiot who can to a grab-and-run on her laptop has access to it.
I'm not saying the store shouldn't make you a happy customer, just that the fact that a problem may have caused you some inconvenience isn't legally actionable.
And yes, if you're going to sue me for $54 million because of a customer service problem, I hope you don't come in my store either.
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.
Maintainers of the machine and maintainers of the data are not the same thing.
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.
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.
She was at risk for identity fraud when she put private, unencrypted data on the hard drive of her laptop.
And who says Best Buy didn't offer her what the laptop was worth? They didn't offer her what she paid for it, but that's not the same thing. $750 for a laptop that was worth $1100 a year ago seems reasonable.
I'm not trying to defend best buy. I'm just saying the lawsuit is stupid. And the 'failure to notify loss of data' portion of it won't stick, because there's no legal basis for it.
This is Slashdot. We should all know by now that YOU are responsible for backing up and encrypting your data.
Where's the negligence?
The problem here with regards to the private data is the negligent party is the customer, not best buy.
Let's say the government buys it's laptops from best buy. And one of them gets a broken power switch. One of them with the Veteran's Affairs patient records on it, which are not encrypted in any way. And the VA gives the laptop, with the hard drive, to best buy to repair. Best Buy then loses the laptop.
Now, who is responsible for the fact that thousands of unencrypted VA patient records were lost?
Duh, the VA is.
The customer apparently had no protections in place for their private data. Best Buy may have lost the laptop. But if the customer did not protect the data, Best Buy isn't obligated to either.
They didn't give you $250. They gave you an incentive to spend more money with them. Besides, $250/8 hours is 31.25(coupon bucks)/hr. I - and my employer - value my time far more than that. Do you work for coupon books?
I am willing to accept that it is in my best interest for the airline to operate in a manner that is efficient so that I pay low fares. Part of this is that I accept that there is a point where preventing problems is more expensive than dealing with problems, and that sometimes the victim of the problem is going to be me.
If there was an airline that gave out $3,000 every time something bad happened, I wouldn't fly it, because the tickets would be too expensive. I have a tough time faulting the airline for providing the level of service I've paid for.
Now, if there were other airlines out there that provided better service or a better price, then I'd switch, but since there are not, I am forced to conclude that the operational policies of the airline are reasonable, because if they were not, a different airline would offer a better experience.
The law applies to data and systems maintained by Best Buy, NOT data and systems maintained by the customer.
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.
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.
None of that matters. Best Buy is liable for replacement of the product lost. They may be liable for negligence if there was a negligent act - i.e. they didn't exercise due care. Given that the customer had private data on a laptop unprotected, and given that she gave it to best buy, and given that best buy keeps the laptop in a secure area and the customer probably does not, best buy has exercised at least as much care for the laptop as the customer did. That's not negligence. It's unfortunate that the laptop got stolen, but the party responsible for that theft is the thief.
Worst Buys' sloppy procedures and/or dishonest employee(s) are the proximate cause. They're liable.
The criminal is the cause. Best Buy is still liable for replacement of the product though - otherwise they could always just claim something was stolen when it was lost.
She's not asking for a replacement laptop under warranty - the warranty doesn't cover THEFT!!! 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.
She provided her laptop to Best Buy. The agreement is that Best Buy would return to her a fixed, or similar, laptop. They agreed to provide a similar laptop. Obligation of best buy satisfied.
They originally offered her $750.00. Not even the price of the stolen laptop.
The laptop was a year old. If $750 was the cost of an equivalent laptop a year later, then $750 is the correct compensation.
Sounds like you don't LIKE best buy, but aside from that, the rest of your comment is rubbish.
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.
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.
Messed up and had a double negative, then messed up fixing it and had no negatives....
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.
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.
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."
There are plenty of printers out there with network ports. Once you plug something into your network, it's plugged into your network.
You don't burn tires because burning tires, by itself, does anything. The government doesn't care how many tires you burn. They just shoot you with rubber bullets (or real bullets, or fire hoses) and move on.
You burn tires because when you burn tires and the government shoots you, you get in the newspaper, and the article talks about what act of the government you found so egregious that you picked a sure-to-lose fight with its better-armed agents.
There's a reason we don't use fire hoses anymore - and it's not because (directly) it's inhumane. We don't do it because it generates too much press.
The internet lets you have the same effect as burning tires without having to get shot first. The real media is lazy. They don't want to have to go down to the National Mall every time somebody burns a tire any more than you really want to go down there and burn tires. They would much prefer to sit in their comfy office, read blogs, and report on what people are blogging about. You can get the same press with blogging nowadays as you can get with tire burning.
His platform is crazy.
It's not like Ron Paul's brain in Obama's body hasn't been done before - last time we just called it Jesse Jackson.
I actually LIKE that Obama isn't talking all this "I'm going to change everything!" stuff. Why? Because President's don't change shit!
What percentage of 'Presidential Plans' actually make it onto the books?
Ron Paul is a moron, and Ron Paul followers are morons - if not because most of the ideas themselves are bad, then because they are silly enough to believe that ANY president is somehow going to be able to get ANY of those things to happen. Eliminate the Fed? What huh? People come down on Obama for having promises he doesn't have the 'experience' to deliver, but really all Obama is promising is good due diligence. Paul is promising to flip the country upside down, and the country is just too big for that.
All we need for a President is a guy who can talk to the world and not spend a bunch of lives and money blowing up shit that doesn't need to be blown up. Bonus points if he doesn't use the federal government to make his (or her) friends and political buddies and campaign donors rich. Obama is that guy.
Clinton is politics as usual. I'm sick of politics as usual, so I'm not voting for her.
That leaves Obama and McCain.
McCain tried 'Do the right thing' in '00. It didn't work. Now he's being a lot more savvy - catering more to his party, and he's now likely going to have the nomination. So, the question is, did he sell himself out, or did he just decide that he had to d some evil to make it to the general election, and once he actually gets elected, we'll get the '00 McCain back? Yes, it would be nice if he had been the '00 McCain the whole time, but a '00 McCain that doesn't get elected doesn't do us any good either.
McCain is my second choice.
Obama is either the most genuine person to ever run for President, twice as genuine as McCain, or he is the slickest politician ever - 10 times as slick as Clinton (either of them). Whichever it is - whether he's the mos genuine candidate ever, or the slickest candidate ever, I think I have to vote for Obama.
There's really no reason to vote for Clinton with Obama around. The only thing Clinton can have on Obama is that he's really just a fraud, but if that's the case, he's so much better at being a fraud than she is, he's STILL better than Clinton!
Why should the federal government tax the people to just give it back to them with requirements on how to teach their kids?
Because it lets you not give the money back to people who call 'intelligent design' teaching. At least, it would, if you had qualified people distributing that money in a sane manner.
In the federal vs. state's rights debate, people often overlook the important part the federal government plays. Individual states allow for variation in the country, but the federal government keeps things from getting too crazy. It's the federal government that keeps you from being denied the right to vote based on skin color. It's the federal government that provides you tax-free movement from state to state. And it's not a bad thing that the federal government prevents innocent children from becoming the victims of patently absurd 'education' practices at the hands of a pocket of religions nuts.
That's not to say the federal government is always right, or the involvement of the federal government leads to the best result all the time, but there are plenty of cases where it does.
The company needs to retain copyright, but release the code under the GPL, and have their employee continue to work on it until it is so good that the competition has to steal it. Then they wait until their competition has sold their closed-source product with the stolen code into critical application areas of their customers, then sue the competition for copyright infringement.
Much, much cheaper than developing a complete product on your own.
At least, that's what any smart attorney for your company who bills by the hour would tell your company to do.
The article summary (surprise) wasn't well written or edited.
The issue that the EFF would have is that since, as a non-profit engaged in advocacy, they're not likely to be directly financially harmed by most patents. It's not like the EFF sells less software or something due to software patents.