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Florida Lawyer Sues Apple for Renting HD Movies on Non-HD Devices
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You could transfer rentals on the iPhone 3GS and earlier.
Apple already moved before they were sued. The lawsuit acknowledges that Apple already added notifications.
I don't think people are appreciating the real sneakiness of this. The whole point of this is to get a judgment or settlement, however insignificant, and then petition the court to make Apple pay his exhorbitant attorney fees (which, since he is representing himself, will go right into his own pocket). He's just creating work for himself at everyone else's expense.
I'm betting the extra dollar merely goes towards paying for the additional bandwidth, and thus Apple keeps all of it.
Either way, this guy is an idiot and is just trying to make a quick buck. I'm sure if he wins he will allocate a fairly sizable part of the settlement to himself for his own "fees". Meanwhile the people who supposedly got "screwed" will probably just get a free iTunes rental (which costs Apple basically nothing)
Either way, this guy is an idiot and is just trying to make a quick buck. I'm sure if he wins he will allocate a fairly sizable part of the settlement to himself for his own "fees". Meanwhile the people who supposedly got "screwed" will probably just get a free iTunes rental (which costs Apple basically nothing)
You don't think the content owner gets paid more for an HD movie? I find that hard to believe.
HD has more content than SD (that's the point of HD: more visual content a la higher resolution). The studios want to get paid for that additional content.
It's not like
is given the HD copy and then just delivers every other row & column of pixels. pays for a separate source file containing more valuable content; it is, from a technical standpoint, a completely different movie with a higher price tag.
This guy is an idiot
I'm sure if he just emailed Apple, they would have adjusted the charge.
Did this guy run out of ambulances to chase? Why do people clog up the courts with ridiculous litigation? Waste of time and money.
I'm sure if he just emailed Apple, they would have adjusted the charge.
Did this guy run out of ambulances to chase? Why do people clog up the courts with ridiculous litigation? Waste of time and money.
But the apps you buy on the phone you use on the phone... If I buy/rent a movie from my iPhone I can download it on my mac and on my iPad and on my PC... I can even stream it to my HDTV with AirPlay...
Preference for hot coffee is very subjective... Some like it scalding hot, some hot, some like it Luke warm... If you serve a customers very hot coffees the people who prefer it less hot can just wait a bit for the coffee to cool off... But if you serve Luke warm as your standard coffee how can customers who like their coffees piping hot heat their coffees...?
People make mistakes. I often buy coffee, put it on a tray, carry it to a table. I'm notoriously careful, always carry it so it won't go on top of people if I drop it. There's probably a one in ten thousand chance that I would spill coffee on some person.
One in ten thousand means coffee gets spilled over an awful lot of people every year. Totally unavoidable. Now if that coffee is scalding hot, lots of people will be scalded. Scalding hot is the difference between annoyance and possibly lengthy hospital visit.
However, if a company's management is aware of this... and had literally hundreds of cases against them settled out of court... and continues serving dangerously hot coffee, because they offer free refills and scalding hot coffee means nobody takes them up on that offer which saves money... more money than they paid out to victims of that policy... then clearly the payouts must be made higher to stop them.
The lack of sympathy from the suit is this. It's hot coffee, I can understand it tipping on a tray, but the woman who sued, took the lid off, after putting it between her thighs, in a moving car.
How is the spill McDonald's fault? Yes, the coffee is hot, but like the post above you said, it's easier for the consumer to let hot coffee cool, than it is to heat it up.
We need to stop protecting people like the McDonald's woman, and this lawyer. There was nothing malicious intent-wise in either this case or the McDonald's one.
So when I go to the AT&T store and the clerk sees me make a phone call on my iphone 4S while I am buying a iPhone 5 Case, I can then sue AT&T for not telling me the case I am buying wont fit on my iPhone 4S?
Or more specific to rentals, if I am playing my DS at blockbuster while checking out to rent a PSVita game, I can sue if they dont inform me its not compatible?
At the checkout at a Grocery Store the clerk overhears my wife tell me she is lactose intolerant, I can sue if they dont inform me the cheese we are buying has milk?
There are a million examples, it is not the stores responsibility to do research for you.
Again he could have had anotehr device capable of HD he was planning on watching on.
And really, HD content to watch exclusively on an iPhone screen (even a retina)? seems like a silly purchase in the first place to me, so if I were apple, I would assume that he would only select it if he knew he had something bigger to watch it on.
Would you even want to download HD content to a iPhone and take up all that space for something you cant truly enjoy without a bigger screen?
The only real issue I see here is that there is no way to download the HD version on a SD Only iPhone so it can be streamed to a device that supports HD playback but only has WiFi and no available internet access. However, who wants to download a full HD movie over Cellular data speeds?
Or more specific to rentals, if I am playing my DS at blockbuster while checking out to rent a PSVita game, I can sue if they dont inform me its not compatible?
At the checkout at a Grocery Store the clerk overhears my wife tell me she is lactose intolerant, I can sue if they dont inform me the cheese we are buying has milk?
There are a million examples, it is not the stores responsibility to do research for you.
Again he could have had anotehr device capable of HD he was planning on watching on.
And really, HD content to watch exclusively on an iPhone screen (even a retina)? seems like a silly purchase in the first place to me, so if I were apple, I would assume that he would only select it if he knew he had something bigger to watch it on.
Would you even want to download HD content to a iPhone and take up all that space for something you cant truly enjoy without a bigger screen?
The only real issue I see here is that there is no way to download the HD version on a SD Only iPhone so it can be streamed to a device that supports HD playback but only has WiFi and no available internet access. However, who wants to download a full HD movie over Cellular data speeds?
Lawyers are not people.
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Even IF this ****** lawyer wins, the most likely settlement forced on Apple would be to award some paltry $3 iTunes gift card for each customer affected. Which will be a very small number of people who actually were daft enough to purchase/download HD movies into their non-HD Apple hardware.
But the net loss is millions of dollars costing and tying up the US judicial system on this frivolous suit. But the lawyer will certainly get a few million in legal fees since he is "representing" the people, and himself.
Kind of right
is it frivolous? yes. but he has a point, it is very misleading to charge an HD premium for content that clearly isn't HD and not supported by your iDevices. Other companies like Vudu and Cinemanow detects whether your device is capable of delivering HD content or not and delivers the appropriate options. There's no reason Apple and iTunes can't do the same thing. Detect the device you are purchasing on and only deliver the options the device supports. Especially considering HD Digital Versions are almost always at a premium price - sometimes twice as much as SD.
is it frivolous? yes. but he has a point, it is very misleading to charge an HD premium for content that clearly isn't HD and not supported by your iDevices. Other companies like Vudu and Cinemanow detects whether your device is capable of delivering HD content or not and delivers the appropriate options. There's no reason Apple and iTunes can't do the same thing. Detect the device you are purchasing on and only deliver the options the device supports. Especially considering HD Digital Versions are almost always at a premium price - sometimes twice as much as SD.
Apple does do the same thing.
As pointed out multiple times, rentals were transferable, so there was a legitimate reason to purchase HD versions on an SD device.
Because everyone should expect third degree burns requiring skin grafts from spilling a beverage! How could McDonald's reasonably expect anyone would spill their drink?!
Because everyone should expect third degree burns requiring skin grafts from spilling a beverage! How could McDonald's reasonably expect anyone would spill their drink?!
Agree. Such a tired, ill-informed comment. It turns out that McDonalds was repeatedly fined and warned about the temperature in the coffee, the lids were flimsy and any drink that causes major 3rd degree burns tells you it was brewed too hot and was "undrinkable" to begin with. I've spilled Tea or other hot beverages on myself in the past and never got burns.
For some strange reasons, Americans always talk about the merits of taking personal responsibility, but they reject that principle when they talk about company management. Actually, the term "personal responsibility" is most often used to refuse companies taking responsibility. McDonalds clearly created a dangerous situation and profited from it. 700 cases are plenty of evidence that they knew they created a problem. It's like a car manufacturer building cars without seatbelts to save money. The damage is caused by creating a dangerous situation, _and_ someone making a mistake.
Now if a lawyer knew that McDonald's coffee was too hot, and intentionally threw coffee over himself to sue McDonald's, that should be rejected. That's what this situation is like. If Apple had an option hidden somewhere in the iPhone to buy HD versions even when the customer clicks on "buy SD", enabled by default in a place very hard to find, that would be comparable to the McDonald's case.
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I read this after the post that I'm adding this to - exactly what I said. You say "take personal responsibility" but what you mean is "management shouldn't have to take responsibility". What's wrong with McDonald's taking personal responsibility? And isn't it much much easier to make things safe if _one_ McDonald's executive decides that coffee should be sold at safe temperature, than millions of customers having to watch out?