4 ms·

It's probably to avoid/mitigate lawsuits. It's possible that this would still be covered under false advertising but there's something to be said about the feas

It's probably to avoid/mitigate lawsuits. It's possible that this would still be covered under false advertising but there's something to be said about the feasibility of testing a lot of unopened packages to show the ink level is low vs having to run all those packages down within the parameters of the device (so the testers aren't seen as the cheaters, over-using the cartridges to make the problem seem worse than it would be for "regular folk"). They'd be dead-to-rights under-filling but they have a better shot (and a better potential settlement) with the under-reporting.

kbenson 9y ago
There's a lot a wiggle room in saying that your ink is almost out. The simple defense is that they don't want people to have wasted prints, which might happen if the ink for one color actually runs out, so they notify a little earlier. That "little earlier" is vague and relative, giving a lot of defensible ground for a lawyer to work with if it comes to that. Stating you are selling a certain amount of something and not actually delivering that amount is illegal, and fairly cut and dry at that. It's not hard to see why one is more likely to be attempted than the other for a company.
- ghostly_s 9y ago
  Right. Putting a different amount of ink in the package than is indicated on the label would be out-and-out fraud, and easily detected. This route operates firmly within a legal grey area. Plus, increasing the actual volume of product you sell without relying on a commensurate increase in demand is basically printing (heh) money as far as corporate returns are concerned.
  - russdill 9y ago
    If 95% of cartridges with 20ml of ink will only allow 18ml to be consumed, is the 20ml an honest figure? Related to the above, and possibly specifically because of the above, I've noticed that HP doesn't document ink quantity in cartridges, only approximate cartridge yield in pages. Oh, and the other thing that drives me batty. Their XL high yield cartridges are sold with "Get up to 2x the pages", but from page count it's clear that it contains 1.5x the amount of ink. So ya, you could get 2x the pages, but only if your pages use less ink. There's a disclaimer, but the link is broken. http://store.hp.com/us/en/pdp/hp-02-cyan-original-ink-cartridge-p-c8771wn-140--1 http://store.hp.com/us/en/pdp/hp-02-cyan-original-ink-cartri... http://store.hp.com/us/en/pdp/hp-02xl-high-yield-cyan-original-ink-cartridge-p-c8730wn-140--1 http://store.hp.com/us/en/pdp/hp-02xl-high-yield-cyan-origin...
    - Zanni 9y ago
      This is one of those ideas that seems obvious at first glance ... and then problematic with more thought. Have you ever gotten 100% of the peanut butter out of a jar? I haven't. Is that fraud? There's a distinction to be made between jars of peanut butter and ink cartridges, but it wouldn't be easy to draw that line. (For an even better example, see Merchant of Venice, Act 4, Scene 1 ...)
      - sliken 9y ago
        Sort of, imagine if when you were 90% through a jar of peanut butter it auto-closed the lid and you couldn't even open it. What's worse would be if peanut butter was widely acknowledged to be safe to eat for 12 months, but the jar wouldn't open after 6 months.
      - kbenson 9y ago
        > Have you ever gotten 100% of the peanut butter out of a jar? Peanut butter? No. I've gotten really close to 100% out of most containers of liquid though. The exact location of the line between them might be hard to pin down, but when comparing things as dissimilar as that, it's a great big fat line so the overlap of where you put it and where it should be is probably pretty large, making it easy to place with some confidence.

kbenson 9y ago

There's a lot a wiggle room in saying that your ink is almost out. The simple defense is that they don't want people to have wasted prints, which might happen if the ink for one color actually runs out, so they notify a little earlier. That "little earlier" is vague and relative, giving a lot of defensible ground for a lawyer to work with if it comes to that. Stating you are selling a certain amount of something and not actually delivering that amount is illegal, and fairly cut and dry at that. It's not hard to see why one is more likely to be attempted than the other for a company.

ghostly_s 9y ago
Right. Putting a different amount of ink in the package than is indicated on the label would be out-and-out fraud, and easily detected. This route operates firmly within a legal grey area. Plus, increasing the actual volume of product you sell without relying on a commensurate increase in demand is basically printing (heh) money as far as corporate returns are concerned.
- russdill 9y ago
  If 95% of cartridges with 20ml of ink will only allow 18ml to be consumed, is the 20ml an honest figure? Related to the above, and possibly specifically because of the above, I've noticed that HP doesn't document ink quantity in cartridges, only approximate cartridge yield in pages. Oh, and the other thing that drives me batty. Their XL high yield cartridges are sold with "Get up to 2x the pages", but from page count it's clear that it contains 1.5x the amount of ink. So ya, you could get 2x the pages, but only if your pages use less ink. There's a disclaimer, but the link is broken. http://store.hp.com/us/en/pdp/hp-02-cyan-original-ink-cartridge-p-c8771wn-140--1 http://store.hp.com/us/en/pdp/hp-02-cyan-original-ink-cartri... http://store.hp.com/us/en/pdp/hp-02xl-high-yield-cyan-original-ink-cartridge-p-c8730wn-140--1 http://store.hp.com/us/en/pdp/hp-02xl-high-yield-cyan-origin...
  - Zanni 9y ago
    This is one of those ideas that seems obvious at first glance ... and then problematic with more thought. Have you ever gotten 100% of the peanut butter out of a jar? I haven't. Is that fraud? There's a distinction to be made between jars of peanut butter and ink cartridges, but it wouldn't be easy to draw that line. (For an even better example, see Merchant of Venice, Act 4, Scene 1 ...)
    - sliken 9y ago
      Sort of, imagine if when you were 90% through a jar of peanut butter it auto-closed the lid and you couldn't even open it. What's worse would be if peanut butter was widely acknowledged to be safe to eat for 12 months, but the jar wouldn't open after 6 months.
    - kbenson 9y ago
      > Have you ever gotten 100% of the peanut butter out of a jar? Peanut butter? No. I've gotten really close to 100% out of most containers of liquid though. The exact location of the line between them might be hard to pin down, but when comparing things as dissimilar as that, it's a great big fat line so the overlap of where you put it and where it should be is probably pretty large, making it easy to place with some confidence.