Comments on: Class actions from scratch

By: LAN3

LAN3 — Thu, 12 Jul 2007 03:04:45 +0000

There’s no reason to sue on the washing machine– of the three things you mention, Zubon, that’s one that won’t scratch its contents if you flip it on its side while operating. And at the risk of accidentally helping the plaintiffs, none of those devices are sold as being operable either on its base or side. Of course, the use of either/or doesn’t suggest that it can be operated at any angle in between, much less operating at all of them, one after another, as such a flip would imply.

I, for one, recommend an engineering solution– increase the mass of the spinning elements within the 360, to the point that the gyroscopic moment is large enough to prevent a user from accidentally or deliberately changing the orientation of the console while it’s operating.

Then kids would *really* learn something about gyroscopes. As would the pets, the vacuum cleaner, blundering parents, and whoever else is knocking over these X-boxes.

By: Steven Livingston

Steven Livingston — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 12:59:03 +0000

To be accurate, Microsoft placed a warning on the front of the xbox360 that clearly states “Do Not Move Console With Disc In Tray”. In 3 languages too. I’m sure the same warning can be located in the manual as well..

By: Zubon

Zubon — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 12:33:31 +0000

Many products I own have similar problems when I flip them on their sides while they are in use. You should see the difficulties I have with my washing machine, car, and crib. Where do I sign up for the class action suits on those?

Maybe that “remove child before folding” tag on the stroller was a necessary warning.

By: Hikaru Katayamma

Hikaru Katayamma — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 01:35:52 +0000

Normally, I would jump at the chance to rail against Megaslop, but not this time. ANY compact (1/3 height) DVD/CD player will scratch the disk if you rotate the drive from horizontal to vertical while the disk is spinning.

Centripetal force will make the disk want to remain static while you’re forcing it to rotate. Ever play with a gyroscope? Same effect.

By: LAN3

LAN3 — Tue, 10 Jul 2007 22:21:27 +0000

Give it another couple years, and the plaintiff’s bar will remind the world of all the damage, by then mostly repaired, paid off, and forgotten, done by flying Wii-motes as the non-defective-yet-not-very-strong wrist-strap falls victim to centripetal force of particularly energetic Wii users, causing the sweat-lubricated Wiimotes to be released from the user’s control and fly into everything from ceiling fans to expensive TV screens.

By: KDP

KDP — Tue, 10 Jul 2007 21:00:25 +0000

In the old days, when high-tech products were new, there was a three letter acronym that was quoted to you when you tried to get help – RTM. Sometimes that would be expanded to RTFM when tech support was sufficiently annoyed with you.

If the manual says don’t move the device while in operation, then don’t do that! Today it seems that everybody thinks they know more than the engineers who design the products.