6 ms·

It's not about copyright law, it's about Toshiba: Toshiba simply doesn't want its service manuals to be distributed by third parties and it might not even want

by chmars 14y ago

It's not about copyright law, it's about Toshiba: Toshiba simply doesn't want its service manuals to be distributed by third parties and it might not even want to distribute its service manuals via its own channels. My lesson is to avoid Toshiba and companies with a similar behavior – I take such behavior as a signal. As a side note on copyright law: In some European countries at least, service manuals don't reach the level of creativity and originality required by copyright law, i.e., hosting the site in such a country could by an option. Switzerland has a certain reputation for a relatively liberal copyright law (although at the price of the world's highest copyright fees on hardware that could be used to copy content).

aes256 14y ago
I think Hanlon's razor should be applied in this instance. This strikes me as the work of an overzealous legal team more so than a symptom of a broader corporate strategy. They see copyright infringement, they shut it down. As far as the legal team are concerned, it's that simple. That's their policy, and the protestations of someone who, in their eyes, is breaking the law and harming their business, is not going to change that.
- jwr 14y ago
  When I buy hardware, I don't buy it from a "team" or a "department". I buy it from a company. It's the company that I deal with. So I don't really care if it is an "overzealous legal team" — the letters were signed by "Toshiba", just as the laptop I was about to buy.
  - aes256 14y ago
    Oh sure, the upshot is a punch in the face for the public relations department, and perhaps a bunch of extra work for customer services, as well as the cost of maintaining a legal department with nothing better to do. If they conducted an audit of the policy taking into account its effects on all areas of the business, they'd probably determine it was a waste of time and money, and adopt a more laissez-faire attitude as Dell, HP, and even Apple do. It irks me when people see corporations as these cohesive entities that only ever act with deliberate intent. In reality, if you conducted a survey of Toshiba staff, I'm sure a sizeable number of them would disagree with this policy.
    - TeMPOraL 14y ago
      > It irks me when people see corporations as these cohesive entities that only ever act with deliberate intent. How else should we see it? Corporations are an abstraction layer, they're supposed to hide their inner workings and present one face to the customers. Hell, a corporation is a (legal) person. So I don't see a reason to not treat it as an whole, abstract entity - it's the corporation's job to figure out which internal part is causing them to have a bad name.
      - icegreentea 14y ago
        This is all true. But standing out the outside and pretending that they behave 'as intended' that is to say as a monolithic single entity, and then to guess about their behavior is counterproductive, especially if it is known that the company in question -does- deviate significantly from being a monolith. Basically you kind of have to take both positions. Knowledge that a company is made up of bickering idiots doesn't excuse the company from acting coherently. But ignoring that fact while trying to analyze and predict a company isn't very useful either.
      - aes256 14y ago
        > How else should we see it? I see it as it is; a constantly morphing organism, made up of thousands of people with conflicting interests and ideas, trying but often failing to present a cohesive image of itself to the public.
        CamperBob2 14y ago
        What, in your opinion, is the whole point behind a brand name? We see arguments similar to yours when the subject of the Sony rootkit fiasco comes up. "It's not Sony's fault, it was just a rogue actor in a subsidiary." Um, no. The CD says "Sony" on it. That means it's Sony's fault. They spend a lot of money on branding and advertising to make sure that no one ever forgets that. So let's not forget it.
        aes256 14y ago
antidoh 14y ago
"Toshiba simply doesn't want its service manuals to be distributed by third parties and it might not even want to distribute its service manuals via its own channels. My lesson is to avoid Toshiba and companies with a similar behavior – I take such behavior as a signal." Indeed. I recently bought a phone from Cricket. A major thing that helped me make that decision was that Cricket provides pdfs of the manuals of all (most?) of their phones online, on the public shopping pages. You don't even have to be a customer. You don't have to be logged in.
larrys 14y ago
"avoid Toshiba and companies with a similar behavior – I take such behavior as a signal." What specifically is it a signal of though? What is the specific thing you feel you are protecting yourself against by noting this signal? Here's an example of a "signal" that I just interpreted. I made an inquiry at Rackspace and the sales person was all over me for the transaction. Then I had questions about the AUP. The salesman responded with a 1 sentence answer which basically restated the AUP. I wrote back saying I already knew that and restated the questions. The salesman still hasn't (4 days later) written back. Even though the other questions were answered super promptly. Same day with gusto. (I don't expect I will hear back). But I've received several canned emails pushing me on how easy it is to setup the account and get going! To me that is a signal. He is all over us when he might get business. But isn't able to answer a few simple questions and he hasn't even closed the sale yet. To me that is a strong reason for me at least to avoid this company. A signal.

by chmars 14y ago

aes256 14y ago

I think Hanlon's razor should be applied in this instance. This strikes me as the work of an overzealous legal team more so than a symptom of a broader corporate strategy. They see copyright infringement, they shut it down. As far as the legal team are concerned, it's that simple. That's their policy, and the protestations of someone who, in their eyes, is breaking the law and harming their business, is not going to change that.

jwr 14y ago
When I buy hardware, I don't buy it from a "team" or a "department". I buy it from a company. It's the company that I deal with. So I don't really care if it is an "overzealous legal team" — the letters were signed by "Toshiba", just as the laptop I was about to buy.
- aes256 14y ago
  Oh sure, the upshot is a punch in the face for the public relations department, and perhaps a bunch of extra work for customer services, as well as the cost of maintaining a legal department with nothing better to do. If they conducted an audit of the policy taking into account its effects on all areas of the business, they'd probably determine it was a waste of time and money, and adopt a more laissez-faire attitude as Dell, HP, and even Apple do. It irks me when people see corporations as these cohesive entities that only ever act with deliberate intent. In reality, if you conducted a survey of Toshiba staff, I'm sure a sizeable number of them would disagree with this policy.
  - TeMPOraL 14y ago
    > It irks me when people see corporations as these cohesive entities that only ever act with deliberate intent. How else should we see it? Corporations are an abstraction layer, they're supposed to hide their inner workings and present one face to the customers. Hell, a corporation is a (legal) person. So I don't see a reason to not treat it as an whole, abstract entity - it's the corporation's job to figure out which internal part is causing them to have a bad name.
    - icegreentea 14y ago
      This is all true. But standing out the outside and pretending that they behave 'as intended' that is to say as a monolithic single entity, and then to guess about their behavior is counterproductive, especially if it is known that the company in question -does- deviate significantly from being a monolith. Basically you kind of have to take both positions. Knowledge that a company is made up of bickering idiots doesn't excuse the company from acting coherently. But ignoring that fact while trying to analyze and predict a company isn't very useful either.
    - aes256 14y ago
      > How else should we see it? I see it as it is; a constantly morphing organism, made up of thousands of people with conflicting interests and ideas, trying but often failing to present a cohesive image of itself to the public.
      - CamperBob2 14y ago
        What, in your opinion, is the whole point behind a brand name? We see arguments similar to yours when the subject of the Sony rootkit fiasco comes up. "It's not Sony's fault, it was just a rogue actor in a subsidiary." Um, no. The CD says "Sony" on it. That means it's Sony's fault. They spend a lot of money on branding and advertising to make sure that no one ever forgets that. So let's not forget it.
        aes256 14y ago

antidoh 14y ago

"Toshiba simply doesn't want its service manuals to be distributed by third parties and it might not even want to distribute its service manuals via its own channels. My lesson is to avoid Toshiba and companies with a similar behavior – I take such behavior as a signal." Indeed. I recently bought a phone from Cricket. A major thing that helped me make that decision was that Cricket provides pdfs of the manuals of all (most?) of their phones online, on the public shopping pages. You don't even have to be a customer. You don't have to be logged in.

larrys 14y ago

"avoid Toshiba and companies with a similar behavior – I take such behavior as a signal." What specifically is it a signal of though? What is the specific thing you feel you are protecting yourself against by noting this signal? Here's an example of a "signal" that I just interpreted. I made an inquiry at Rackspace and the sales person was all over me for the transaction. Then I had questions about the AUP. The salesman responded with a 1 sentence answer which basically restated the AUP. I wrote back saying I already knew that and restated the questions. The salesman still hasn't (4 days later) written back. Even though the other questions were answered super promptly. Same day with gusto. (I don't expect I will hear back). But I've received several canned emails pushing me on how easy it is to setup the account and get going! To me that is a signal. He is all over us when he might get business. But isn't able to answer a few simple questions and he hasn't even closed the sale yet. To me that is a strong reason for me at least to avoid this company. A signal.