British Mac user sues Apple for .Mac?

N

~~NeYo~~

iBud
MacUser UK reports that an Apple customer in the United kingdom is suing Apple in small claims court for its decision to charge for its .Mac service.

MacUser UK stated that the case is based on the printed materials supplied with Apple products that list iTools as a feature. iTools contains many of the same services that Apple has now branded .Mac and is charging customers up to US$99 per year for. Apple is giving existing iTools users until the end of September to sign up for the .Mac service for a special reduced rate of $49.95.

"If a legal challenge could show that the iTools services were included with a Mac or Apple software purchase, then Apple could be obliged to provide these services for free to anyone who bought a product on those terms," said MacUser UK.

http://www.macuser.co.uk

NeYo


<< Sounds Promising, even got me checking the box of my iBook, it does come labelled with iTools, but i'm never one to read a 20,000 page Licence agreement!!
 
yeah, I was looking forward to a free @mac.com e-mail addy, but with .Mac, it isn't free anymore. :(
 
I thought here in the UK you could'nt file for small claims if it was under something like £100. Ah well, Apple would not like this to turn out in favour of the fella (imagine the county court scene: small court office (where small claims are conducted)... 1 happless UK user pointing to an apple machine box, surrounded by 10 Apple lawyers:eek:
 
Well they said iTools was going to be free and that they reserved the right to change that at anytime without notice. They were well within their legal rights to kill off iTools.

The new service .Mac coincidentally has much of the same funtionality of iTools and then some, without the free clause.

I'm not sure how this guy could hope to win. Granted I'm opposed ot paying even 50$ a year for this, I really only want the email which should be 10$ a year at most. But this guy has no legal grounds to stand on as far as i can see.
 
Can we see some reminders of what was actually stated on the boxes / brochures. I'm pretty sure the box my iBook came in (which I don't have to hand right now) listed iTools as a feature and promised email, web space and iDisk storage as part of the whole package.
If you want to dig out the boxes your machines came in, and have a look, I'd be interested to see what they say exactly, and whether this might support the claim.
 
I'm not sure how this guy could hope to win
Click to expand...

I agree under contract law. The only hope he has is that small claims is an arbitration and may not follow the letter of the law 100%. Possibly he could argue that it the ad was a representation that he relied upon in purchasing the computer, and so he could after the tort of misrepresentation, but the changes of winning would be slim, to none, with almost no damages.

However winning and enforcing the result are two very different things with the small claim's court - I think that the guy is wasting his time. Perhaps he can embarras Apple enough into giving him .mac free for life.

R.
 
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