March 11, 201610 yr For those of you interested.... Class actions against Seagate over hard drives combined, http://legalnewsline.com/stories/510698667-class-actions-against-seagate-over-hard-drives-combined
March 13, 201610 yr Man buys hard disk. Hard disk fails. Man loses data. Man reads negative reviews of the hard disk. Man sues hard disk manufacturer. Man ought to have make backups and read the reviews before buying.
March 13, 201610 yr Man buys hard disk. Hard disk fails. Man loses data. Man reads negative reviews of the hard disk. Man sues hard disk manufacturer. Man ought to have make backups and read the reviews before buying. Welcome to the USA. Sue for anything and everything...
March 14, 201610 yr Author Many buys hard disk. Disk allegedly has a manufacturing defect and was allegedly deceptively marketed. Man has claim for appropriate compensation from manufacturer. Man has no obligation to read third-party reviews, and is completely within his rights to rely on representations of manufacturer, as well as consumer protection laws which apply to the goods. Man discovers many other people injured in the same situation. A class action is the most efficient method of handling such multiple claims based on same facts. Or would you like a system where manufacturer can make crap, advertise it as non-crap, and laugh all the way to the bank when someone complains by telling the consumer "you should have read third-party reviews." In reality, it is the manufacturer that should have read the third-party reviews (and their own customer complaint statistics) and stopped selling defective drives. The law in such a situation is very much caveat venditor.
March 14, 201610 yr Was more making fun of the US and its lawsuit happy mentality where you sue for anything and everything. Only country I know of where its standard business practice to automatically set aside 10% for eventual lawsuits. My fav story is where a widow sued Black and Decker because her husband electrocuted himself using an electric hedge-trimmer that he - didn't have a 3 prong extension cord, so he cut the ground off of the hedge trimmer - was standing in a puddle of water - cut the cord with the trimmer while using it. Widow won. Something wrong here... I fully expect to occasionally wind up buying defective merchandise. (and if you don't then you're naive). Suing over it is another issue.
March 14, 201610 yr Author I was pointing out that no system is perfect. Just like there are a small number of innocent people put in jail, and a lot of guilty go free.... you can't make it perfect. I've never heard of ANY "standard business practice to automatically set aside 10% for eventual lawsuits" and I've worked in litigation for over 30 years. 99.99% of frivolous lawsuits are tossed out very quickly. Any that survive past that point are dispatched at the discovery stage. Not aware of the B&D case you mentioned, but electrical cutting tools for nonprofessionals should have a double-insulated chassis and have arc-fault interrupters built into the plug since cutting the cord accidentally is a reasonably anticipated event to the manufacturer. That's why a lot of such tools now have 2-prong cords and the other safety measures that aren't defeated by removing the ground connector (indeed, the ground connector is no longer needed in such tools for safety).
March 15, 201610 yr Overall this is good news. Vendors will be more careful in any marketing claims. And if you meet the class requirements, you might join in for some emotional satisfaction. I also don't know of any business practice to a priori set aside funds for lawsuits, as this would quickly be claimed and then exceeded. What is best practice is purchasing insurance, liability, O&E, etc.
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