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Your argument fails hard at point #1. A ticket buyer, through merely the act of purchasing a ticket, isn't making a material representation. You should have ar

Your argument fails hard at point #1. A ticket buyer, through merely the act of purchasing a ticket, isn't making a material representation. You should have argued contract law. That's perhaps a winning argument. Civil Fraud isn't because you'd have to argue that the simple act of clicking a "buy" button on a web-site is akin to a representation, and by extension a misrepresenting, an argument which you'd never win. The fact your example ("I am traveling to ILM from SFO") literally never would be spoken or written, just inferred, should have been a clue. You've constructed that example-misrepresentation from nothing more than making a purchase, it doesn't hold up to basic scrutiny.

otterley 8y ago
> Civil Fraud isn't because you'd have to argue that the simple act of clicking a "buy" button on a web-site is akin to misrepresenting, which you'll never win. Are you an attorney? Putting an origin and a destination in a form and asking for the price is a clear representation of intent, not to mention buying said ticket. Intent need not be verbally communicated; any conduct that is recognized as a representation is sufficient. This is basic civil law; your strict definition is hogwash. It absolutely holds up, in the same way that clicking an "I agree" button in an online transaction is a representation of agreement, which courts have already held to be valid. See, e.g., the Uniform Electronic Transactions Act (UETA), and Feldman v. Google, E.D. Penn, Civ. 06-2540 (2007).
- dragonwriter 8y ago
  > Putting an origin and a destination in a form and asking for the price is a clear representation of intent, not to mention buying said ticket. It's a clear representation of intent to purchase the ticket. Whether it is a representation of intent to use every leg of travel included as part of that ticket is...at best, a point on which you have provided no supporting evidence, reasoning, or case law. I think its pretty obvious that in the general case purchase of a composite (or bulk) good or service is not a representation of intent to use all the components, do if you think there is something special about either multileg airline tickets in general or United’s tickets in particular that warrants different treatment, please, feel free to enlighten us. > It absolutely holds up, in the same way that clicking an "I agree" button in an online transaction is a representation of agreement, which courts have already held to be valid No, it doesn't, and the cases are readily distinguished, because the representation you wish to infer is (unlike the “I agree” case for contract formation) of a different intent than what is expressly stated by the UI element being interacted with. We aren't arguing over whether a “buy” button indicates intent to buy tickets, but whether it is a representation of intent to use every leg of travel covered by the purchased tickets. Even if the contract of carriage has language to that effect, which might give you a breach of contract claim, I don't think you’ll find much support for the use of language in a contract of adhesion as a representation by the non-drafting party for fraud claim.
  - otterley 8y ago
    > Whether it is a representation of intent to use every leg of travel included as part of that ticket is...at best, a point on which you have provided no supporting evidence, reasoning, or case law. You're trying to find a loophole that, as a former Federal court intern, I find extremely unlikely to persuade any reasonable judge. When you declare your destination to be ILM in the search field, one can reasonably infer that your intent is, in fact, to travel to ILM. I concede that there's no case law yet on this subject, but I would be surprised if it made it out of the "laughed out of court" stage if you argued otherwise.
    - dragonwriter 8y ago
      > You're trying to find a loophole No, I'm not. I'm trying to find an actual false representation, and seeing only a false inference of intent to use every leg of travel from a representation of intent to purchase a ticket; testing this as fraud is something which you seem to admit would see every purchase of an aggregate good or service (the example you specifically addressed elsewhere in the thread being fast food value meals) priced below the price of some proper subset of their components as actionably fraudulent (if not always worth the effort) if the intent was not to use every purchased component but only to save money compared to individually purchasing the components.
      - otterley 8y ago
        I'm going to say this one last time. The false representation is "I intend to fly to city B." That's it. Nothing else. It's not "I intend to use all components of a series of segments that would get me to city B" as you suggest. You're making the analysis more complicated than it is, and that's why you would fail to persuade a court.
        sk5t 8y ago
        The representation is "I would like to purchase an option to travel towards this destination."
- Someone1234 8y ago
  > Intent need not be verbally communicated; any conduct that is recognized as a representation is sufficient. Indeed. You're arguing that the mere act of buying is and of itself a representation, which is erroneous. The whole rest of your arguments fall apart because that one core detail is wrong. > It absolutely holds up, in the same way that clicking an "I agree" button in an online transaction is a representation of agreement Clicking "I agree" binds both parties to a contract, but we are talking elements of civil fraud not contract law. You were arguing that consumers were committing civil fraud by pressing a buy button due to some supposed representations you're insisting they're making. Let's stay on topic here.
  - otterley 8y ago
    > Indeed. You're arguing that the mere act of buying is and of itself a representation, which is erroneous. It's not the purchase that is the representation. It is the communication that you want to fly to a particular city by placing it in the destination field or by telling it to the ticket agent. I'm tired of arguing this to amateurs; take it to a judge and try it yourself. I'll bring the popcorn.
    - Someone1234 8y ago
      > It is the communication that you want to fly to a particular city by placing it in the destination field or by telling it to the ticket agent. By that logic even searching for tickets without purchasing them could be argued as "fraud." Since even putting something in the destination field is, according to your argument, a material representation of intent. None of this holds up. > I'm tired of arguing this to amateurs Please review the Hacker News Guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
      - otterley 8y ago
        > By that logic even searching for tickets without purchasing them could be argued as "fraud." Since even putting something in the destination field is, according to your argument, a material representation of intent. If you search for tickets with no intent to purchase, it's plausibly an element of fraud, but it's not fraud. The additional elements (reliance and detriment) aren't met yet. Once the purchase is complete and the rest of the events occur (i.e. intentionally abandoning travel), then all the remaining elements are fulfilled and a plausible fraud claim can commence.

otterley 8y ago

> Civil Fraud isn't because you'd have to argue that the simple act of clicking a "buy" button on a web-site is akin to misrepresenting, which you'll never win. Are you an attorney? Putting an origin and a destination in a form and asking for the price is a clear representation of intent, not to mention buying said ticket. Intent need not be verbally communicated; any conduct that is recognized as a representation is sufficient. This is basic civil law; your strict definition is hogwash. It absolutely holds up, in the same way that clicking an "I agree" button in an online transaction is a representation of agreement, which courts have already held to be valid. See, e.g., the Uniform Electronic Transactions Act (UETA), and Feldman v. Google, E.D. Penn, Civ. 06-2540 (2007).

dragonwriter 8y ago
> Putting an origin and a destination in a form and asking for the price is a clear representation of intent, not to mention buying said ticket. It's a clear representation of intent to purchase the ticket. Whether it is a representation of intent to use every leg of travel included as part of that ticket is...at best, a point on which you have provided no supporting evidence, reasoning, or case law. I think its pretty obvious that in the general case purchase of a composite (or bulk) good or service is not a representation of intent to use all the components, do if you think there is something special about either multileg airline tickets in general or United’s tickets in particular that warrants different treatment, please, feel free to enlighten us. > It absolutely holds up, in the same way that clicking an "I agree" button in an online transaction is a representation of agreement, which courts have already held to be valid No, it doesn't, and the cases are readily distinguished, because the representation you wish to infer is (unlike the “I agree” case for contract formation) of a different intent than what is expressly stated by the UI element being interacted with. We aren't arguing over whether a “buy” button indicates intent to buy tickets, but whether it is a representation of intent to use every leg of travel covered by the purchased tickets. Even if the contract of carriage has language to that effect, which might give you a breach of contract claim, I don't think you’ll find much support for the use of language in a contract of adhesion as a representation by the non-drafting party for fraud claim.
- otterley 8y ago
  > Whether it is a representation of intent to use every leg of travel included as part of that ticket is...at best, a point on which you have provided no supporting evidence, reasoning, or case law. You're trying to find a loophole that, as a former Federal court intern, I find extremely unlikely to persuade any reasonable judge. When you declare your destination to be ILM in the search field, one can reasonably infer that your intent is, in fact, to travel to ILM. I concede that there's no case law yet on this subject, but I would be surprised if it made it out of the "laughed out of court" stage if you argued otherwise.
  - dragonwriter 8y ago
    > You're trying to find a loophole No, I'm not. I'm trying to find an actual false representation, and seeing only a false inference of intent to use every leg of travel from a representation of intent to purchase a ticket; testing this as fraud is something which you seem to admit would see every purchase of an aggregate good or service (the example you specifically addressed elsewhere in the thread being fast food value meals) priced below the price of some proper subset of their components as actionably fraudulent (if not always worth the effort) if the intent was not to use every purchased component but only to save money compared to individually purchasing the components.
    - otterley 8y ago
      I'm going to say this one last time. The false representation is "I intend to fly to city B." That's it. Nothing else. It's not "I intend to use all components of a series of segments that would get me to city B" as you suggest. You're making the analysis more complicated than it is, and that's why you would fail to persuade a court.
      - sk5t 8y ago
        The representation is "I would like to purchase an option to travel towards this destination."
Someone1234 8y ago
> Intent need not be verbally communicated; any conduct that is recognized as a representation is sufficient. Indeed. You're arguing that the mere act of buying is and of itself a representation, which is erroneous. The whole rest of your arguments fall apart because that one core detail is wrong. > It absolutely holds up, in the same way that clicking an "I agree" button in an online transaction is a representation of agreement Clicking "I agree" binds both parties to a contract, but we are talking elements of civil fraud not contract law. You were arguing that consumers were committing civil fraud by pressing a buy button due to some supposed representations you're insisting they're making. Let's stay on topic here.
- otterley 8y ago
  > Indeed. You're arguing that the mere act of buying is and of itself a representation, which is erroneous. It's not the purchase that is the representation. It is the communication that you want to fly to a particular city by placing it in the destination field or by telling it to the ticket agent. I'm tired of arguing this to amateurs; take it to a judge and try it yourself. I'll bring the popcorn.
  - Someone1234 8y ago
    > It is the communication that you want to fly to a particular city by placing it in the destination field or by telling it to the ticket agent. By that logic even searching for tickets without purchasing them could be argued as "fraud." Since even putting something in the destination field is, according to your argument, a material representation of intent. None of this holds up. > I'm tired of arguing this to amateurs Please review the Hacker News Guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
    - otterley 8y ago
      > By that logic even searching for tickets without purchasing them could be argued as "fraud." Since even putting something in the destination field is, according to your argument, a material representation of intent. If you search for tickets with no intent to purchase, it's plausibly an element of fraud, but it's not fraud. The additional elements (reliance and detriment) aren't met yet. Once the purchase is complete and the rest of the events occur (i.e. intentionally abandoning travel), then all the remaining elements are fulfilled and a plausible fraud claim can commence.