That's the problem though, we're not talking about "marketing material" here... These types of "studies" are being listed as facts, not opinions.
And there's simply no way that a study readable by and meaningful to ALL parties with an interest in the Linux-or-not issue (for their businesses, for example) could cover all strata of the IT landscape, address every typical solution-selling arena, etc. The group's study is clearly relevent to the types of solutions they provide and the types of customers that engage them to support their IT needs. It's hardly an all-encompassing claim about the OS as a whole and its suitability across the board, but it's instructive for certain audiences, and certain large companies that support those people with technology (that they have to trust). Just like some pro-Linux missives/"studies" (which completely miss the point for non-Nerd audiences)that are presented as a "representation of fact" are sometimes based on a bunch of out-of-context hooey. Context, context, context.
My point is, saying that they (RedHat, etc) should trot out the lawyers because their revenue might be hurt by a market-facing study is, well, endorsing the very same thing that so many slashdotters complain about when it's going the other way, or involves artists defending their revenue, etc. It just set off my hypocrisymeter, and I hope I've explained why.
I'm sure the big corporate Linux distro's... could possibly be losing a lot of money from these sort of lies... How come none of them are stepping up and putting in a lawsuit or two?
I'm always amused by the postings here that worry about whether a corporate entity is making money or not, and wonders if they shouldn't trot out the best-defense-is-a-good-offense lawsuit team when they don't like the tone of marketing material, but then scream bloody murder when the tables are turned, or the company making the money happens to be Microsoft.
I know, it's a not a 1-for-1 analogy, but the point is that businesses either should, or should not make money, and should or should not have some (at least civil) legal recourse when their revenue is threatened by actual fraud, infringement, etc... but what's good for a Linux-friendly company should be good for their competition, too (and for entertainment companies, for that matter). Can't have it both ways.
So, don't buy another CD, don't see another film, dont rent another DVD and don't buy any programs from the companys sponsoring "Antipiratbyrån" until they stop this foolishness!
Or, maybe go back to actually paying for expensively produced entertainment so that the entire industry doesn't feel the need to bother with this crap and will look silly when they do. Every time someone decides to "punish" them for protecting their rights by declaring "I wouldn't normally ever pirate anything, but now I'm going to, just to make a point!" (such sophistry) all they're doing is making the suits and enforcement seem more rational to the average news consumer. Alert: people that get large portions of their music and movie entertainment for "free" by copying somone else's paid-for version are not the average person. There's millions of them, sure, but they're not the ones reading the newspaper, talking with other soccer moms, and periodically voting for people who simplisticly indicate that they'll enforce the law when it comes to property rights. No one runs on a campaign theme of "elect me and I'll make sure you can keep getting free entertainment without consequence," so their political opponents are just indirectly propped up when downloaders become shrill, tantrum-having "activists." That's activism in the name of preserving not the right to free stuff (which doesn't exist), but the expectation of not being vigorously pursued for avoiding the price. Sure, there are real intellects who actively engage in the periphery of this area, focused on real issues of fair use, etc., but they are completely drowned out by (and will be smothered by the backlash against) the "let's act like it's noble not to want to pay for movies" crowd.
1. A deception deliberately practiced in order to secure unfair or unlawful gain.
2. A piece of trickery; a trick.
Sounds about right to me.
Really, I'm not clear. A manufacturer says they'll give you $20 if you buy something by a certain date, and send them a form/paperwork filled out with certain information, by a certain date. You do, and you get a check. This takes place millions of times, and involves billions of dollars. How is that process fundamentally fraud? Certainly some vendors or processing companies may be sleazy... but that doesn't make the whole mechanism fraudulant.
There are people that make fraudulant insurance sales, too. Does that make the entire business model of insurance fraudulant? There are shady mechanics that charge money while not repairing cars. Does that make all mechanics thieves? We're talking about large manufacturers, here. They're publicly held. They have way, way too much at stake to dick around with "stealing" $10 from you. If you don't like a vendor's marketing mechanisms, just don't patronize that vendor. It's called a market economy: use it.
Why not just refund the retailer the $20 for items purchased that month then
Usually, the manufacturer treats the rebates like a marketing expense, which is budgeted for, and disbursed in a completely different way than the accounting they do with regard to their shipments to retailers. This also allows the manufacturers to take a stab at building a communications relationship (or just gather stats) with their actual end users, who tend to be a lot more brand loyal than they are retailer-loyal.
Six months ago, PNY claimed I didn't send the UPC from the product for a $30 rebate. How do I prove otherwise?
They could also assert that a dead RAM stick you bought earlier today is dead because your power supply cooked it, and you'd have no recourse there, either (another you-said/they-said situation - except for their own interest in keeping you happy. If they want to hose you on a rebate, then they know that they're hosing themselves on you ever buying PNY memory again. If you're right, and I've heard the same thing elsewhere, I won't be doing it either. The 'net has completely changed the speed at which reputations in that area rise or fall.
Obviously you don't work in retail, distribution, manufacturing, or the IT support of those areas. It's not mumbo-jumbo, it's how it's actually done. Sorry if that doesn't help prop your take on this.
This doesn't even make sense
Sure it does. If the rebate is from the retailer then you apply pressure on the retailer. If the rebate is from the manufacturer, you apply pressure there. If the manufacturer is miserable about it, you can see if the retailer (as one of their dealer) is willing to help out, or you also apply pressure there.
Places like CompUSA have thousands of suppliers. Many of them (the suppliers) encourage sales through rebates. Most of those having nothing to do with CompUSA directly, and the cash flow that you mention doesn't change for CompUSA one way or the other (unless it's their own in-house campaign, or they've been recruited to get involved in the redemption process in some way).
Why is it inherently bad for the consumer? If every retailer (of the same size/buying-power) that sells Seagate drives pays Seagate essentially the same price for the products, then the price you pay at the register is determined only by how low a margin the retailer can stand while trying to remain competitive. If the manufacturer sweetens the deal (for YOU, not CompUSA) by throwing a rebate into the picture, that many stimulate sales for CompUSA, but it doesn't change what they have to pay Seagate for the products.
Merchant: Buy this widget for $2, and I'll give you $1 back in the mail.
Me: Why not just sell it to me for $1?
Merchant: Because I'm hoping you'll forget to send it in, and I won't have to pay you that $1.
You see? Its almost fraud but not quite. So from that viewpoint, I understand why people think it should be illegal to offer rebates.
OK, reality check here. In most cases it goes a lot more like this:
Manufacturer: "Thanks for ordering a pile of Acme Widgets, Mr. Big Box Retailer! Here's your shipment, and an invoice. You'll notice that the invoice says 'Net Due 60 Days, 2% Net 20' "
Retailer (to self): "Better pay that bill in 20 days so that we can get the extra 2% discount"
[retailers completely live or die on slim margins when the products are commodities like computer hardware, etc., so 2% is a lot over time]
Retailer (to self, 30 days later): "Gosh, I'm glad I've sold half of my Acme Widget inventory, but the rest is moving slowly, and I've got cash tied up in that pile of merchandise. Hmmm."
Sales Rep: "Here's a pile of rebate coupons. Your customers will get $20 back from us if they buy something out of your stock, but they've got to do it this month."
[the sales rep knows that he'll only earn commission on another order from Big Box if he helps Big Box cycle inventory]
Retailer: "Dear customers: you can get a $20 rebate on this thing that we've already paid for, but that's between you and the manufacturer."
So, you get the idea. With some exceptions, the retailer isn't even involved, other at the marketing level. There are a million variations on this theme, and many things like this are planned in advance, rather than being treatment for slow-moving products. But a key concept is that the retailer often is dealing with the vendor at essentially normal prices and margins, and the rebate is used to move the consumer into action while the vendor (not the retailer) absorbs the profit hit. As retailers improve their IT infrastructure, you're seeing the coupons show up as direct-on-your-receipt printouts, and redemption is even flowing back through a service provided by the retailer. But it takes a big company to make all of that work smoothly, so mom-and-pop retailers usually just hand you the printed coupon from the distributer.
This can, of course, turn slightly sleazy, as cheesy retailers and their suppliers gin up the appearance of stock liquidation/incentives just so they can float on your money for a couple of months. That low-rent behavior can be avoided by not patronizing those distribution channels, and by rewarding quicker-acting rebate programs with your business.
how do you deal with the practical aspect of a system that has no ability to be corrected
The same way you'd deal with a supplier/retailer that won't address the fact that they sold you a defective product, or over charged your credit card, etc. If they have crappy customer service, make sure that you, your frieds, and all of your business contacts no longer do business with them. Places like Slashdot are fantastic forums for alerting people to unethical (or, ideally, stellar) retailers. Hence my praise of Costco, for example - their rebates are quick and easy.
Also, explain to me how it takes 6-8 weeks to cut a check? Is this because they do it in bulk? Would it not be more efficient to process them as soon as they recieve them?
Actually, that's exactly why it takes time. The places that process these have huge teams of people doing the data entry. There is a certain amount of work done to make sure the transactions are legit, and then they cut checks in large print runs and pre-sort them in at least 1000 at a time so they can get favorable postage rates. The clearing houses usually have to provide the vendor (usually the manufacturer, not the retailer) with a report, and they don't cut the checks until the vendor hands them the money to cover it all. There are several business process cycles at work here.
Here in the UK they are, or at least the advertised price has to be the price you pay at the checkout. Doesn't seem to have done us any harm.
Same in the US. If you advertise that a product will ultimately cost you $100, but that you'll pay $150 at the register and can get $50 back on a rebate... well, that's exactly what happens unless someone is actually acting fruadulantly (and there are handy laws for that). Of course, there will always be some parties that will do what they can to make it hard to comply with some facet of the rebate transaction - but those are usually shady or fly-by-night-smelling retailers, and it seems pretty obvious. If enough money is involvd, one hopes that you know something about the retailer and manufacturer you're dealing with anyway... why buy a big ticket item from a someone you don't already trust?
Point is, it's illegal to lie about prices (rebate-related or not) in advertising or displays. Rebates, per se, have nothing to do with it.
Oh, please. What you mean is that fraudulantly offering an unredeemable rebate should be illegal, which it already is. Rebates are usually offered by the manufacturer, not the point-of-sale retailer. For the manufacturer, it's a form of advertising, and they usually let a third party handle the transaction, usually by snail mail. This takes time to process.
Rebates are bait and switch, no bones about it
No they're not. I've never seen a low price on a product that was low because of a rebate when that wasn't clearly marked as a factor in the price. True on tags, true in mailers, and on web sites. Someone who is shopping around for a low price on a competitve item should have the IQ to actually see and understand the words "after mail-in rebate."
Personally, I love the way that Costco handles it: you get a register receipt with a URL and code on it, you visit the site, spend 15 seconds keying in a scrap or two of info, and you get a check in a couple or few weeks, without fail. Another reason I spend every consumer dollar I can on worthy products there (I know, which means a lot of those dollars go to China - but unless you're looking for a $400 handcrafted New England birdhouse or something, that's where the commodity brands ship from these days).
I've never had a problem with a rebate from Best Buy, Circuit City (who sometimes redeem the rebates at the register), an allergy drug manufacturer, car parts vendors... come to think of it, I can only think of one that seemed to have gone un-payed, and it was from a local grocery store several years ago, and was hardely worth the stamp and the envelope.
If you think you've got a fraud problem with a retailer, go to the Better Business Bureau. If you think you've got a fraud problem with a manufacturer, talk to the FTC about that instance unless you know for a fact that they're scamming everyone (and five minutes on Google will tell you that). Otherwise, if you don't like rebates (and I understand - on the big ones, it's annoying to know that you're minus that cash flow for a month, but figure that lost dollar-or-so of interest into the price you just paid on that piece of hardware, and get over it), just don't buy stuff through those channels. Use eBay instead, or choose a brand that allows the retailers to take incentives off of their own costs, and represent that during the transaction (which is how car and most furniture dealers do it, but then you've got to know the scoop - with a rebate, the retailer can't pocket the difference if you weren't aware of the incentive).
But mostly, don't penalize honest retailers, manufacturers, and consumers with a body of regulation that won't have any impact on people who are already making the decision to operate outside of the law. When scammers are already using fake/impossible rebate schemes (which can be prosecuted), another regulation saying they can't isn't going to help unless you remove that entire marketing mechanism from the market. If your objective is to get more government involved in transactions between private parties, though, you're headed in the right direction.
Love the Truth=Troll modding. Must have been someone who, knowing they are unable to justify not paying artists for the entertainment they provide, tries to add credibility to their bad habit by anonymously shouting down someone who calls them on it. Just makes it even more obvious what sort of people we're talking about. Thanks! Because this was a lot quicker than actually talking about it in a thread: you don't like someone making a point that actually strikes a nerve, so you just mod down and walk away feeling smug. That's a lot easier than sending you away mad after even more actual discussion.
By "monk-like," I was referring more to the singular dedication and focus (at the expense of many other typical uses of social time) required for success in the more hands-on areas of IT. This is similar to full-time lab techs in hospitals, or serious, serious mechanics working on high-end cars... it's the same mindset, and there's a reason that certain personalities plug right into it (if you'll pardon the pun).
That has nothing to do with department-wide use of common/best practices, or with cowboy coders dropping a Linux box in the middle of an MS showplace of a network. I'm talking about the willingness to sit in front of a rack of servers for 16 hours straight and be glad you did. That's just a different sort of nerd, and most are simply men. I'm one of those people. We're easily confused with losers, but we make the world go 'round, IT-wise.
Kill the stigma of IT and the geek and IT will attract more Women
Funny, then, isn't it... how there are now national advertising campaigns for outfits like "The Geek Squad" featuring (inaccurately not overweight) nerdy looking guys rushing out to solve IT problems (in the daylight no less!). This is just reinforcing the stereotypes, of course. But then, stereotypes wouldn't work if there wasn't a grain of truth. It's monk-like, cerebral work, and that just attracts a certain type of nature/nurture combo... and that's not usually women, and those women that might be interested usually aren't too pumped up about being associated with The Geek Squad. Even though you apparently get a cool looking VW Bug while on deployments. I doubt it's the turbo version.
WHy do you think the RIAA targets grandmothers and little girls? Because they know that THEY won't fight it in court - they CAN'T. The RIAA will never sue someone who will likely make them look stupid in court.
But that's not who ends up IN court (unless they are actually the people responsible for the machine/pipe that was being used). The suits pursue damages for infringement, and the "profit" on those suits is a pittance up against the money that "sharers" aren't paying for the music they want (and which they illegally take anyway).
Well (Mr. Anonymous Coward), I'd say there's a lot of ground to cover between "I've done the exact opposite of you" and "you're lying."
Which part of what I said, precisely, is lying? I'm telling you exactly what I've encountered (no rush to Notes, and lots of migration TO Exchange). I made no comment on the scope of the operations, the number of users... no, I only told you my personal experience. My company has hundreds of IT customers, and we do indeed focus on MS products - though sometimes our expertise is used in getting people OFF of MS products and onto other platforms. So far, no requests for ES->Notes: that's my experience, and I deal with shops that have, typically, at most 500 or so users.
No, we don't do a lot of app dev using the ES hooks, but we do a lot of work flow stuff that's Exchange-friendly. People like the latest version of OWA, especially road warriors. I'm not comparing it to Notes myself, but I definately get comments like: "I'm really tired of Notes, this is great" from Joe Average users, including people like CFOs that pay for this stuff.
Statements like yours only display your ignorance of the product
But I haven't claimed to be a Notes expert: only someone who has listened to a fair number of fleeing-Notes users. I'll take your own opinions on this with the Anonymous Coward spin with which you obviously intended it.
There are a TON of people using Lotus Notes. It's only recently that Exchange has exceeded Notes in number of seats used. For the developers and admins working on Notes, this is the equivalent of Linus saying "What the heck, Server 2003 ain't that bad. Let me join up."
Hmmm. Then how shall we explain all of the people that have begged us consultants to pry them loose from the Lotus Notes Grip Of Doom and get them onto an Exchange platform? I've never, ever, once, been asked about going the other direction, and have not seen a single organization starting from scratch and thinking: "Can't wait to start using Notes!"
Nope, for most non-technical businesses, it's Exchange, SharePoint, and a rent-a-brain to get it into shape... and then, really, not much work at all for anyone other than a luke-warm admin body.
Y'know, we're altering the human race with this stuff
Altering what's considered a viable user interface, perhaps, but acquired traits aren't very likely to be passed on. On the other hand, perhaps the kids that really excel in the way you're describing are already pre-disposed to thumb-related activities, and will tend to hang out with (and make babies with) equally geeky but thumb-dextrous mates. Then we'd have a separate tribe of Thumble-e-nerds. I for one would welcome our new couch-dwelling, thumb-centric, simu-culture parallel race of people who think they rule. Because, see, they won't be able to distinguish games from reality, and they won't get underfoot while I'm out in the real world doing actual things.
if they didn't want applicants knowing their status, they shouldn't have put the information up in the first place.
But they didn't put the information "up," and that's the whole point. They were preparing to disclose that information, but had not taken the last steps to put it out there. Never mind what their reasons were (allowing for some last minute changes based on other info? allowing for a different approval of another applicant still pending? etc), it's up to them to decide when to put the information out. Just because they weren't very good at protecting it doesn't make it OK to hack in. By that standard, it would be reasonable to break into the dean's office to look for that same info on paper - but only if the lock on the door was only so-so, quality-wise.
i personally don't see this as unethical. the information is already there, it simply isn't linked. *shrug*
It's information in progress. It's the school's perogative to keep it private until they're ready for it to go out, and that leaves them the room to change it up until the last moment. There's a world of information on web servers that isn't "linked-to," and if that's your only standard for things, you're probably in for a long legal career fighting off suits over unlinked-to intellectual property, bank information, and other stuff that's just "up there" if you can hack to it. Have fun! Don't worry if right now you don't get why this is important... eventually, it will come and get you.
A site run by a guy looking like the second coming of David Koresh peddling a PDF
Ah, the ad hominem he's-not-like-us attack: the quintessential last resort of the clueless, would-be elitist, nanny-statist. The guy doesn't look like you (even worse, he looks like he's from Texas, where only simpletons live, right?), so of course he's wrong. Never mind that he doesn't look anything like Koresh, or that he's not "peddling" that free PDF. If that's peddling, and "looks" are the measure of credibility, then we could say about you, based on your erudite post and apparent standards:
"A comment, posted by a guy who sounds like he looks like Michael Moore, is peddling his supposed facts, which consist entirely of vague attacks on someone's research and information based on his looks, and on not having actually read the information at hand, which demonstrates the poster's eagerness to embrace any excuse for taking away personal liberty and responsibility so that he won't feel so bad about not wanting to be troubled with those things himself."
I mean, if it's good enough for you, it's good enough for you.
I suppose the reason that so many typical gun owners cough up routinely-used statistics and anecdotes is that they're weary of trying the rhetorical approach in the face of opponents that are not themselves addressing the underlying principles. It's tedious, speaking to the would-be confiscators, who themselves use the "fewer gun owners means fewer crimes" lines, as if this were all about (dubious) statistics, and not fundamentally about liberty and personal responsibility. It is indeed lazy to produce anecodotes and NRA re-treads as arguments, but it's intellectually lazy and paralyzed-by-emotion people we're up against, and a lengthy discussion of causal relationships just gets, well, lengthy.
The argument that you say works for you (that of personal responsibility trumping someone else's mis-use) doesn't fly with people who see danger everywhere. Well, they see danger in things that "look mean," and ignore dangers (like distracted soccer moms with minivans full of kids) that are just as likely to cause injury, but which fit within their understanding of risk in the world. That Hummer is no more dangerous than a loaded church van, but guess which one is "alarming" to the same people that we're talking about here? They're a muddleheaded audience when it comes to the basic principles, here, and probably have never hung out with sport shooters, hunters, etc - often some of the nicest, sanest, and safest people you'll ever meet (and the most demonized, for no reason).
And when was the last time you heard of someone trying to take a target pistol away from anybody?
Actually, the target pistols used in international competitions, including the Olympics, are now illegal, as-is, in Maryland (where I live). They are writing laws that make it impossible to keep simple guns simple, and the previous governor set into motion laws which will required electronic hand-sensors which only allow the one single owner of the gun to use it (which isn't very helpful in team sports or training, where a gun is shared, never mind that if the battery dies, it's useless for self defense). The new governor is wisely revisiting all of that crap, but that's the sort of "taking away" that is actually happening. In places like Australia, for example, they went way past just not being to import or buy new guns minus those features, they actually confiscated them (or, really, had you turn them in, and if you get caught having not done so, it's off to jail).
An olympic.22 target pistol is plenty lethal in the hands of a criminal, just like any other gun - so people who make distinctions between them are reacting almost entirely to movie-style cosmetics and missing the point that it's the person, not the gun that matters. Case in point: during the recent presidential campaign, Kerry was touting his support for "sensible gun controls" and backed a particular bill (which got nowhere). The entertaining thing about it was that one week later he was out shooting clay pigeons for the press (with no eye or ear protection! what a twit - it was all about the cameras!), and was proudly (so he claimed) using a fine, expensive shotgun, loaned for the occasion, that would, under the law he was backing, be illegal. Basically, guns are guns, and you're only going to cut down on criminals using them by cutting down on crime, and on the payoff that criminals get for being criminals.
Slashdot Mirror
*cough* Firefox
That's the problem though, we're not talking about "marketing material" here... These types of "studies" are being listed as facts, not opinions.
And there's simply no way that a study readable by and meaningful to ALL parties with an interest in the Linux-or-not issue (for their businesses, for example) could cover all strata of the IT landscape, address every typical solution-selling arena, etc. The group's study is clearly relevent to the types of solutions they provide and the types of customers that engage them to support their IT needs. It's hardly an all-encompassing claim about the OS as a whole and its suitability across the board, but it's instructive for certain audiences, and certain large companies that support those people with technology (that they have to trust). Just like some pro-Linux missives/"studies" (which completely miss the point for non-Nerd audiences)that are presented as a "representation of fact" are sometimes based on a bunch of out-of-context hooey. Context, context, context.
My point is, saying that they (RedHat, etc) should trot out the lawyers because their revenue might be hurt by a market-facing study is, well, endorsing the very same thing that so many slashdotters complain about when it's going the other way, or involves artists defending their revenue, etc. It just set off my hypocrisymeter, and I hope I've explained why.
I'm sure the big corporate Linux distro's ... could possibly be losing a lot of money from these sort of lies ... How come none of them are stepping up and putting in a lawsuit or two?
I'm always amused by the postings here that worry about whether a corporate entity is making money or not, and wonders if they shouldn't trot out the best-defense-is-a-good-offense lawsuit team when they don't like the tone of marketing material, but then scream bloody murder when the tables are turned, or the company making the money happens to be Microsoft.
I know, it's a not a 1-for-1 analogy, but the point is that businesses either should, or should not make money, and should or should not have some (at least civil) legal recourse when their revenue is threatened by actual fraud, infringement, etc... but what's good for a Linux-friendly company should be good for their competition, too (and for entertainment companies, for that matter). Can't have it both ways.
So, don't buy another CD, don't see another film, dont rent another DVD and don't buy any programs from the companys sponsoring "Antipiratbyrån" until they stop this foolishness!
Or, maybe go back to actually paying for expensively produced entertainment so that the entire industry doesn't feel the need to bother with this crap and will look silly when they do. Every time someone decides to "punish" them for protecting their rights by declaring "I wouldn't normally ever pirate anything, but now I'm going to, just to make a point!" (such sophistry) all they're doing is making the suits and enforcement seem more rational to the average news consumer. Alert: people that get large portions of their music and movie entertainment for "free" by copying somone else's paid-for version are not the average person. There's millions of them, sure, but they're not the ones reading the newspaper, talking with other soccer moms, and periodically voting for people who simplisticly indicate that they'll enforce the law when it comes to property rights. No one runs on a campaign theme of "elect me and I'll make sure you can keep getting free entertainment without consequence," so their political opponents are just indirectly propped up when downloaders become shrill, tantrum-having "activists." That's activism in the name of preserving not the right to free stuff (which doesn't exist), but the expectation of not being vigorously pursued for avoiding the price. Sure, there are real intellects who actively engage in the periphery of this area, focused on real issues of fair use, etc., but they are completely drowned out by (and will be smothered by the backlash against) the "let's act like it's noble not to want to pay for movies" crowd.
1. A deception deliberately practiced in order to secure unfair or unlawful gain.
2. A piece of trickery; a trick.
Sounds about right to me.
Really, I'm not clear. A manufacturer says they'll give you $20 if you buy something by a certain date, and send them a form/paperwork filled out with certain information, by a certain date. You do, and you get a check. This takes place millions of times, and involves billions of dollars. How is that process fundamentally fraud? Certainly some vendors or processing companies may be sleazy... but that doesn't make the whole mechanism fraudulant.
There are people that make fraudulant insurance sales, too. Does that make the entire business model of insurance fraudulant? There are shady mechanics that charge money while not repairing cars. Does that make all mechanics thieves? We're talking about large manufacturers, here. They're publicly held. They have way, way too much at stake to dick around with "stealing" $10 from you. If you don't like a vendor's marketing mechanisms, just don't patronize that vendor. It's called a market economy: use it.
In other words: it's a scam to (a) get data about the customer and
"scam" implies fraud. I think you're using the term a little loosely. As in, going to work is a scam to get your paycheck.
Why not just refund the retailer the $20 for items purchased that month then
Usually, the manufacturer treats the rebates like a marketing expense, which is budgeted for, and disbursed in a completely different way than the accounting they do with regard to their shipments to retailers. This also allows the manufacturers to take a stab at building a communications relationship (or just gather stats) with their actual end users, who tend to be a lot more brand loyal than they are retailer-loyal.
Six months ago, PNY claimed I didn't send the UPC from the product for a $30 rebate. How do I prove otherwise?
They could also assert that a dead RAM stick you bought earlier today is dead because your power supply cooked it, and you'd have no recourse there, either (another you-said/they-said situation - except for their own interest in keeping you happy. If they want to hose you on a rebate, then they know that they're hosing themselves on you ever buying PNY memory again. If you're right, and I've heard the same thing elsewhere, I won't be doing it either. The 'net has completely changed the speed at which reputations in that area rise or fall.
Despite all your mumbo-jumbo
Obviously you don't work in retail, distribution, manufacturing, or the IT support of those areas. It's not mumbo-jumbo, it's how it's actually done. Sorry if that doesn't help prop your take on this.
This doesn't even make sense
Sure it does. If the rebate is from the retailer then you apply pressure on the retailer. If the rebate is from the manufacturer, you apply pressure there. If the manufacturer is miserable about it, you can see if the retailer (as one of their dealer) is willing to help out, or you also apply pressure there.
Places like CompUSA have thousands of suppliers. Many of them (the suppliers) encourage sales through rebates. Most of those having nothing to do with CompUSA directly, and the cash flow that you mention doesn't change for CompUSA one way or the other (unless it's their own in-house campaign, or they've been recruited to get involved in the redemption process in some way).
Why is it inherently bad for the consumer? If every retailer (of the same size/buying-power) that sells Seagate drives pays Seagate essentially the same price for the products, then the price you pay at the register is determined only by how low a margin the retailer can stand while trying to remain competitive. If the manufacturer sweetens the deal (for YOU, not CompUSA) by throwing a rebate into the picture, that many stimulate sales for CompUSA, but it doesn't change what they have to pay Seagate for the products.
Merchant: Buy this widget for $2, and I'll give you $1 back in the mail.
Me: Why not just sell it to me for $1?
Merchant: Because I'm hoping you'll forget to send it in, and I won't have to pay you that $1.
You see? Its almost fraud but not quite. So from that viewpoint, I understand why people think it should be illegal to offer rebates.
OK, reality check here. In most cases it goes a lot more like this:
Manufacturer: "Thanks for ordering a pile of Acme Widgets, Mr. Big Box Retailer! Here's your shipment, and an invoice. You'll notice that the invoice says 'Net Due 60 Days, 2% Net 20' "
Retailer (to self): "Better pay that bill in 20 days so that we can get the extra 2% discount"
[retailers completely live or die on slim margins when the products are commodities like computer hardware, etc., so 2% is a lot over time]
Retailer (to self, 30 days later): "Gosh, I'm glad I've sold half of my Acme Widget inventory, but the rest is moving slowly, and I've got cash tied up in that pile of merchandise. Hmmm."
Retailer (to Acme Widgets territorial sales rep): "Help!"
Sales Rep: "Here's a pile of rebate coupons. Your customers will get $20 back from us if they buy something out of your stock, but they've got to do it this month."
[the sales rep knows that he'll only earn commission on another order from Big Box if he helps Big Box cycle inventory]
Retailer: "Dear customers: you can get a $20 rebate on this thing that we've already paid for, but that's between you and the manufacturer."
So, you get the idea. With some exceptions, the retailer isn't even involved, other at the marketing level. There are a million variations on this theme, and many things like this are planned in advance, rather than being treatment for slow-moving products. But a key concept is that the retailer often is dealing with the vendor at essentially normal prices and margins, and the rebate is used to move the consumer into action while the vendor (not the retailer) absorbs the profit hit. As retailers improve their IT infrastructure, you're seeing the coupons show up as direct-on-your-receipt printouts, and redemption is even flowing back through a service provided by the retailer. But it takes a big company to make all of that work smoothly, so mom-and-pop retailers usually just hand you the printed coupon from the distributer.
This can, of course, turn slightly sleazy, as cheesy retailers and their suppliers gin up the appearance of stock liquidation/incentives just so they can float on your money for a couple of months. That low-rent behavior can be avoided by not patronizing those distribution channels, and by rewarding quicker-acting rebate programs with your business.
how do you deal with the practical aspect of a system that has no ability to be corrected
The same way you'd deal with a supplier/retailer that won't address the fact that they sold you a defective product, or over charged your credit card, etc. If they have crappy customer service, make sure that you, your frieds, and all of your business contacts no longer do business with them. Places like Slashdot are fantastic forums for alerting people to unethical (or, ideally, stellar) retailers. Hence my praise of Costco, for example - their rebates are quick and easy.
Also, explain to me how it takes 6-8 weeks to cut a check? Is this because they do it in bulk? Would it not be more efficient to process them as soon as they recieve them?
Actually, that's exactly why it takes time. The places that process these have huge teams of people doing the data entry. There is a certain amount of work done to make sure the transactions are legit, and then they cut checks in large print runs and pre-sort them in at least 1000 at a time so they can get favorable postage rates. The clearing houses usually have to provide the vendor (usually the manufacturer, not the retailer) with a report, and they don't cut the checks until the vendor hands them the money to cover it all. There are several business process cycles at work here.
Here in the UK they are, or at least the advertised price has to be the price you pay at the checkout. Doesn't seem to have done us any harm.
Same in the US. If you advertise that a product will ultimately cost you $100, but that you'll pay $150 at the register and can get $50 back on a rebate... well, that's exactly what happens unless someone is actually acting fruadulantly (and there are handy laws for that). Of course, there will always be some parties that will do what they can to make it hard to comply with some facet of the rebate transaction - but those are usually shady or fly-by-night-smelling retailers, and it seems pretty obvious. If enough money is involvd, one hopes that you know something about the retailer and manufacturer you're dealing with anyway... why buy a big ticket item from a someone you don't already trust?
Point is, it's illegal to lie about prices (rebate-related or not) in advertising or displays. Rebates, per se, have nothing to do with it.
offering rebates should be illegal
Oh, please. What you mean is that fraudulantly offering an unredeemable rebate should be illegal, which it already is. Rebates are usually offered by the manufacturer, not the point-of-sale retailer. For the manufacturer, it's a form of advertising, and they usually let a third party handle the transaction, usually by snail mail. This takes time to process.
Rebates are bait and switch, no bones about it
No they're not. I've never seen a low price on a product that was low because of a rebate when that wasn't clearly marked as a factor in the price. True on tags, true in mailers, and on web sites. Someone who is shopping around for a low price on a competitve item should have the IQ to actually see and understand the words "after mail-in rebate."
Personally, I love the way that Costco handles it: you get a register receipt with a URL and code on it, you visit the site, spend 15 seconds keying in a scrap or two of info, and you get a check in a couple or few weeks, without fail. Another reason I spend every consumer dollar I can on worthy products there (I know, which means a lot of those dollars go to China - but unless you're looking for a $400 handcrafted New England birdhouse or something, that's where the commodity brands ship from these days).
I've never had a problem with a rebate from Best Buy, Circuit City (who sometimes redeem the rebates at the register), an allergy drug manufacturer, car parts vendors... come to think of it, I can only think of one that seemed to have gone un-payed, and it was from a local grocery store several years ago, and was hardely worth the stamp and the envelope.
If you think you've got a fraud problem with a retailer, go to the Better Business Bureau. If you think you've got a fraud problem with a manufacturer, talk to the FTC about that instance unless you know for a fact that they're scamming everyone (and five minutes on Google will tell you that). Otherwise, if you don't like rebates (and I understand - on the big ones, it's annoying to know that you're minus that cash flow for a month, but figure that lost dollar-or-so of interest into the price you just paid on that piece of hardware, and get over it), just don't buy stuff through those channels. Use eBay instead, or choose a brand that allows the retailers to take incentives off of their own costs, and represent that during the transaction (which is how car and most furniture dealers do it, but then you've got to know the scoop - with a rebate, the retailer can't pocket the difference if you weren't aware of the incentive).
But mostly, don't penalize honest retailers, manufacturers, and consumers with a body of regulation that won't have any impact on people who are already making the decision to operate outside of the law. When scammers are already using fake/impossible rebate schemes (which can be prosecuted), another regulation saying they can't isn't going to help unless you remove that entire marketing mechanism from the market. If your objective is to get more government involved in transactions between private parties, though, you're headed in the right direction.
Love the Truth=Troll modding. Must have been someone who, knowing they are unable to justify not paying artists for the entertainment they provide, tries to add credibility to their bad habit by anonymously shouting down someone who calls them on it. Just makes it even more obvious what sort of people we're talking about. Thanks! Because this was a lot quicker than actually talking about it in a thread: you don't like someone making a point that actually strikes a nerve, so you just mod down and walk away feeling smug. That's a lot easier than sending you away mad after even more actual discussion.
Its shouldn't be all monk-like
By "monk-like," I was referring more to the singular dedication and focus (at the expense of many other typical uses of social time) required for success in the more hands-on areas of IT. This is similar to full-time lab techs in hospitals, or serious, serious mechanics working on high-end cars... it's the same mindset, and there's a reason that certain personalities plug right into it (if you'll pardon the pun).
That has nothing to do with department-wide use of common/best practices, or with cowboy coders dropping a Linux box in the middle of an MS showplace of a network. I'm talking about the willingness to sit in front of a rack of servers for 16 hours straight and be glad you did. That's just a different sort of nerd, and most are simply men. I'm one of those people. We're easily confused with losers, but we make the world go 'round, IT-wise.
Kill the stigma of IT and the geek and IT will attract more Women
Funny, then, isn't it... how there are now national advertising campaigns for outfits like "The Geek Squad" featuring (inaccurately not overweight) nerdy looking guys rushing out to solve IT problems (in the daylight no less!). This is just reinforcing the stereotypes, of course. But then, stereotypes wouldn't work if there wasn't a grain of truth. It's monk-like, cerebral work, and that just attracts a certain type of nature/nurture combo... and that's not usually women, and those women that might be interested usually aren't too pumped up about being associated with The Geek Squad. Even though you apparently get a cool looking VW Bug while on deployments. I doubt it's the turbo version.
WHy do you think the RIAA targets grandmothers and little girls? Because they know that THEY won't fight it in court - they CAN'T. The RIAA will never sue someone who will likely make them look stupid in court.
But that's not who ends up IN court (unless they are actually the people responsible for the machine/pipe that was being used). The suits pursue damages for infringement, and the "profit" on those suits is a pittance up against the money that "sharers" aren't paying for the music they want (and which they illegally take anyway).
Well (Mr. Anonymous Coward), I'd say there's a lot of ground to cover between "I've done the exact opposite of you" and "you're lying."
Which part of what I said, precisely, is lying? I'm telling you exactly what I've encountered (no rush to Notes, and lots of migration TO Exchange). I made no comment on the scope of the operations, the number of users... no, I only told you my personal experience. My company has hundreds of IT customers, and we do indeed focus on MS products - though sometimes our expertise is used in getting people OFF of MS products and onto other platforms. So far, no requests for ES->Notes: that's my experience, and I deal with shops that have, typically, at most 500 or so users.
No, we don't do a lot of app dev using the ES hooks, but we do a lot of work flow stuff that's Exchange-friendly. People like the latest version of OWA, especially road warriors. I'm not comparing it to Notes myself, but I definately get comments like: "I'm really tired of Notes, this is great" from Joe Average users, including people like CFOs that pay for this stuff.
Statements like yours only display your ignorance of the product
But I haven't claimed to be a Notes expert: only someone who has listened to a fair number of fleeing-Notes users. I'll take your own opinions on this with the Anonymous Coward spin with which you obviously intended it.
There are a TON of people using Lotus Notes. It's only recently that Exchange has exceeded Notes in number of seats used. For the developers and admins working on Notes, this is the equivalent of Linus saying "What the heck, Server 2003 ain't that bad. Let me join up."
Hmmm. Then how shall we explain all of the people that have begged us consultants to pry them loose from the Lotus Notes Grip Of Doom and get them onto an Exchange platform? I've never, ever, once, been asked about going the other direction, and have not seen a single organization starting from scratch and thinking: "Can't wait to start using Notes!"
Nope, for most non-technical businesses, it's Exchange, SharePoint, and a rent-a-brain to get it into shape... and then, really, not much work at all for anyone other than a luke-warm admin body.
Y'know, we're altering the human race with this stuff
Altering what's considered a viable user interface, perhaps, but acquired traits aren't very likely to be passed on. On the other hand, perhaps the kids that really excel in the way you're describing are already pre-disposed to thumb-related activities, and will tend to hang out with (and make babies with) equally geeky but thumb-dextrous mates. Then we'd have a separate tribe of Thumble-e-nerds. I for one would welcome our new couch-dwelling, thumb-centric, simu-culture parallel race of people who think they rule. Because, see, they won't be able to distinguish games from reality, and they won't get underfoot while I'm out in the real world doing actual things.
Whew.
if they didn't want applicants knowing their status, they shouldn't have put the information up in the first place.
But they didn't put the information "up," and that's the whole point. They were preparing to disclose that information, but had not taken the last steps to put it out there. Never mind what their reasons were (allowing for some last minute changes based on other info? allowing for a different approval of another applicant still pending? etc), it's up to them to decide when to put the information out. Just because they weren't very good at protecting it doesn't make it OK to hack in. By that standard, it would be reasonable to break into the dean's office to look for that same info on paper - but only if the lock on the door was only so-so, quality-wise.
i personally don't see this as unethical. the information is already there, it simply isn't linked. *shrug*
It's information in progress. It's the school's perogative to keep it private until they're ready for it to go out, and that leaves them the room to change it up until the last moment. There's a world of information on web servers that isn't "linked-to," and if that's your only standard for things, you're probably in for a long legal career fighting off suits over unlinked-to intellectual property, bank information, and other stuff that's just "up there" if you can hack to it. Have fun! Don't worry if right now you don't get why this is important... eventually, it will come and get you.
A site run by a guy looking like the second coming of David Koresh peddling a PDF
Ah, the ad hominem he's-not-like-us attack: the quintessential last resort of the clueless, would-be elitist, nanny-statist. The guy doesn't look like you (even worse, he looks like he's from Texas, where only simpletons live, right?), so of course he's wrong. Never mind that he doesn't look anything like Koresh, or that he's not "peddling" that free PDF. If that's peddling, and "looks" are the measure of credibility, then we could say about you, based on your erudite post and apparent standards:
"A comment, posted by a guy who sounds like he looks like Michael Moore, is peddling his supposed facts, which consist entirely of vague attacks on someone's research and information based on his looks, and on not having actually read the information at hand, which demonstrates the poster's eagerness to embrace any excuse for taking away personal liberty and responsibility so that he won't feel so bad about not wanting to be troubled with those things himself."
I mean, if it's good enough for you, it's good enough for you.
That was actually here in Canada, not the US. We haven't become a State just yet.
Huh. Well, give it a couple of weeks. I'll see your bridge-throwing, and raise you two. You know how we here in the States hate to be out-done.
No offense meant in assigning wack-job news makers to the US when he's really one of yours. I mean, how often can I make that mistake!
I suppose the reason that so many typical gun owners cough up routinely-used statistics and anecdotes is that they're weary of trying the rhetorical approach in the face of opponents that are not themselves addressing the underlying principles. It's tedious, speaking to the would-be confiscators, who themselves use the "fewer gun owners means fewer crimes" lines, as if this were all about (dubious) statistics, and not fundamentally about liberty and personal responsibility. It is indeed lazy to produce anecodotes and NRA re-treads as arguments, but it's intellectually lazy and paralyzed-by-emotion people we're up against, and a lengthy discussion of causal relationships just gets, well, lengthy.
The argument that you say works for you (that of personal responsibility trumping someone else's mis-use) doesn't fly with people who see danger everywhere. Well, they see danger in things that "look mean," and ignore dangers (like distracted soccer moms with minivans full of kids) that are just as likely to cause injury, but which fit within their understanding of risk in the world. That Hummer is no more dangerous than a loaded church van, but guess which one is "alarming" to the same people that we're talking about here? They're a muddleheaded audience when it comes to the basic principles, here, and probably have never hung out with sport shooters, hunters, etc - often some of the nicest, sanest, and safest people you'll ever meet (and the most demonized, for no reason).
And when was the last time you heard of someone trying to take a target pistol away from anybody?
.22 target pistol is plenty lethal in the hands of a criminal, just like any other gun - so people who make distinctions between them are reacting almost entirely to movie-style cosmetics and missing the point that it's the person, not the gun that matters. Case in point: during the recent presidential campaign, Kerry was touting his support for "sensible gun controls" and backed a particular bill (which got nowhere). The entertaining thing about it was that one week later he was out shooting clay pigeons for the press (with no eye or ear protection! what a twit - it was all about the cameras!), and was proudly (so he claimed) using a fine, expensive shotgun, loaned for the occasion, that would, under the law he was backing, be illegal. Basically, guns are guns, and you're only going to cut down on criminals using them by cutting down on crime, and on the payoff that criminals get for being criminals.
Actually, the target pistols used in international competitions, including the Olympics, are now illegal, as-is, in Maryland (where I live). They are writing laws that make it impossible to keep simple guns simple, and the previous governor set into motion laws which will required electronic hand-sensors which only allow the one single owner of the gun to use it (which isn't very helpful in team sports or training, where a gun is shared, never mind that if the battery dies, it's useless for self defense). The new governor is wisely revisiting all of that crap, but that's the sort of "taking away" that is actually happening. In places like Australia, for example, they went way past just not being to import or buy new guns minus those features, they actually confiscated them (or, really, had you turn them in, and if you get caught having not done so, it's off to jail).
An olympic