Bad apple

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A glitch in the newest iTunes software update has caused many people to lose previously purchased music and movies. Though they've fixed the problem and apologized for it, many people are unsatisfied.

"Most of the music I have purchased online from Apple's iTunes Store has been deactivated," wrote Martin of Suisan, Calif. "I have purchased approximately $140 dollars worth of songs and videos from iTunes Store, which currently is worthless due to the fact that iTunes will no longer play any of them."

When you deal with a company that is dead set on controlling everything you do with your legally purchased media, you're best off not using their product. Even if you decide to use iTunes, make sure to strip the DRM off using the Hymn Utility so you can copy or use the music freely.

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A disgruntled former employee of GameStop calling himself "WhistleBlowerZero" has created a 9-part YouTube video series which explains quickly, but in exhaustive detail, the many reasons why you, Dear Consumer, should not shop at GameStop.

That pretty much sums it up. I listened to a few of them and the best part is that it's both amusing and packed with real world information and math that explains exactly why Gamestop is a huge rip-off.

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Now if the lawsuits would propagate throughout the world, we'd finally be getting somewhere. From the article:

In his order, the judge found that the church had used "personality tests void of scientific value...with the sole aim of selling services or divers products."

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Sometimes when you buy something online or at a major retailer, you'll get it home to find out that it's full of bricks or bathroom tiles instead of the product you expected. Sometimes this is due to shifty warehouse workers and sometimes because a customer buys a product, says it's defective and returns it even though they replaced it with bricks. If the customer service counter doesn't check the box before accepting it, it goes back on the shelf and you get stuck with it.

The store's response to this is generally not going to work in your favor, but there are ways you can make sure you don't end up with the brick.

Read the article for full details, but here are the two main tips they cover that I agree with:

1. Pay with credit card – This will give you many types of buyer protection automatically like the ability to do a chargeback.
2. Check the item before you leave the store – Make sure you know what's actually in that box before you walk out. It's much harder for them to make the claim that you put a brick in it inside the store.
3. Policies aren't laws – Just because a story says "it's policy" doesn't mean you should give up. They often have very bad policies and even some that might be considered illegal. You should fight for what's right regardless of what the store says is "policy".

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Amazon.com has been closing accounts that have "too high a percentage of returns" or "[ship] to too many different addresses".

I've never liked Amazon.com's policies but this kind of anti-customer activity is even worse than Yahoo. To be fair, there's not much detail on which accounts have been closed and what counts as abuse to them, but this sounds a lot like the customer profiling that Best Buy has been doing.

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I really hate the kinds of things companies pull in their contracts and terms of service. Even more I hate when people say, "you signed it so quit complaining!" What they don't seem to understand is that even if the information is there, that doesn't mean that people can understand it or its implications. Thus was the case in a Washington supreme court ruling that mightily smacked and slapped around the one-sided AT&T service agreement.

The court had the option of determining that some portions of the contract were legally valid and could be enforced. Instead, the ruling determined that unconscionable conditions pervaded the agreement, rendering it invalid in its entirety

Save some money. Always a good thing.

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Funny that I was just talking about this with someone yesterday, but today there's an article on Lifehacker about saving money on textbooks. I have used their first suggestion, Bigwords.com many times myself though I've often found even better deals by simply looking for a previous edition book. For example, if your class is using the 5th edition, look for the 4th for big savings.

Anyway, if you or someone you know is looking for textbooks, perhaps you should give it a try.

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Did you know that you could get DSL service WITHOUT having to have a phone land line with the same company? Probably not since the phone company won't tell you. Check out this article for tips on how to teach the "Customer Service Reps" what and how to do it.

Banks aren't supposed to steal from customers

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California, a historically consumer-friendly state, has recently won a settlement against Citibank for over 14 million dollars in theft from its customers. They apparently used a computer program to "sweep" up positive balances due to double paid bills or merchandise returns from customers' accounts into the Citibank's general fund.

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Companies that are desperate to force you to look at their ads have been disguising them as traffic tickets which you'll surely not ignore. Even if the ad were fantastic, I think I'd throw it away as a matter of principle.

Note, this post begins a new category on my page dedicated to the low and dirty cheats among the market. It will serve as evidence for my continuing position that the market needs heavy and strict regulation to play fair.