Digital BW, The Print

peter nelson wrote:

 >At 03:48 AM 2/13/2003 +0000, Jerry Olson wrote:
 >
 >
 >
 >>This would be illegal to ban the use of third party inks.
 >>
 >>
 >
 >
 >You're the second person to make this bizarre claim.
 >Please cite the applicable law.  I'm sure Epson had their lawyers
 >review their warranty.
 >
 >
 >
OK Peter, here's the story... It's not bizarre, that quote is
essentially correct.

1) You clearly don't know what you are talking about as far as the state
of the law.. and I'm beginning to think you simply came onto this list
to provoke discord and rancor.  (as an aside - I mean,  why you'd want 
to print B&W digitally since you've been able since age 13   to produce 
simple, reliable, B&W fine art prints in a chemical darkroom that 
satisfy you, is beyond me.. -- if you don't see other people producing 
digital B&W prints that impress you, why move to digital yourself?)

A company CANNOT legally void a warranty simply because you use a third
party consumables (just as it cannot use a quid pro quo warranty
qualification, like refusing to honor a warranty because you don't send
in a warranty card).  EPSON tried and lost the case on the former in
Oregon or Washington (I forget which and honestly don't care to go
searching for the case now). AFAIK based upon Federal. law and some
state laws, it's considered a restraint of trade and anti-competitive to
require the use of a particular consumable to keep your warranty intact.

As a starter, I would suggest reading and understanding the Sherman
Anti-Trust act, its provisions, application, and evolution. I doubt
you'll take me up on that, so I won't even suggest follow-on reading.
However, feel free to concentrate on court rulings regarding "tying" as
the interpreted and re-interpreted Sherman over the 20th century.

(I'll put up with just about anything EXCEPT a whiner who has NO clue.)

2)    What they can do is refuse a warranty repair if  some
characteristic peculiar to that consumable caused the product failure
(i.e. the consumable was particularly unsuited to the product), when a
similar failure would not occur if using OEM consumables. However, the
onus is on the OEM to show that the failure WAS most likely caused by
that characteristic.  It is NOT upon the consumer to prove the failure
would not have happened.

That's settled law for warranties on cars, trucks, Xerox
machines/copiers, inkjets and a whole slew of products. Imagine if Honda
could simply void your warranty for not using Honda brake fluid. It
can't happen, the onus would be on Honda to show that your choice of
brake fluid ruined some part -- the rationale is that the manufacturer
has significantly more economic power and can avail themselves more
easily of expertise to prove he failure cause, than can a consumer to
prove the failure was not the result of "consumable  x"... Besides the
basic logical reality  that it is easier to prove something IS a likely
cause than to prove the inverse.. (A corollary to the fact that you can
  more easily prove something exists than the almost impossible task of
proving non-existence)

Paul Roark and others could go into a discussion of why, even the use of
chips to try and prevent the use of 3rd party consumables may well be a
case of prohibited tying. -- something that at one point was considered
strictly prohibited under Sherman and its progeny of opinions (if I was
Static Control Devices attorneys, I would certainly argue in part that
Lexmark is using the DMCA to formalize tying and take it outside of
legal review and that a positive ruling on behalf of Lexmark would
eviscerate Sherman of any real anti-tying prohibitions, as long as a
vendor is clever enough to include some DMCA or otherwise copyrighted
component in the consumable -- clearly that represents a financial
disutility of the type Sherman IS meant to prevent),  However, at the
same time, starting in the 70's the Chicago School began re-interpreting
the law in a more utilitarian way. That meant  less explicit
restrictions on tying to create a "more efficient" market (in the belief
that a less regulated market will apportion economic costs more
equitably and efficiently through simple market economics)..

To understand the current state of tying prohibitions, please feel free
to read up on Sherman 1 and the "rule of reason" as it relates to
determining if a specific incidence of tying is prohibited.. In
particular, you'll want to check how rules on tying have been changed
since the 70's by court opinions from the original strict prohibition.
Then, I would suggest reading the Commercial Code of your state and few
others, along with opinions. It turns out that while the Feds have moved
away from strict prohibitions on tying, some states do attempt to
enforce their own prohibitions.

There, you have your citations...

If you want more, feel free to pay me, Paul, or someone else and I'm
sure you can be provided with a nice set of string cites to read beside
the fireplace and warm you on these cold winter nights.

What

Keith



"Just some guy," and caretaker of the Multiverse's largest EPSON printer
User Community (highly recommended by Vogon Poets and MegaDodo
Publications), at:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EPSONx7x_Printers/

"For the rest of you out there, the secret is to bang the rocks together
guys"