The fall update class-action lawsuit continues

Here are details from the lawyer of Kevin Ray – representing everybody else suing Microsoft for bricking their 360s after the October 31 fall update. Ray filed the class action lawsuit on behalf of everybody else who got bricked 360s since there were lots of complaints about it in blogs and forums everywhere.

As we said earlier, it’s for breach of contract, violation of Washington’s Consumer Protection Act, and negligence. Brian Kabateck, senior partner at Kabateck Brown Kellner who are handling the case, said that MS promised to pay for all shipping, repair and/or replacement costs for affected consoles. But, that is not the case, he said. “Unfortunately, all the reports we’re getting is that Microsoft is saying ‘Send your Xbox in and for 140 bucks we’ll fix it.’ In our opinion, they’re turning their screw-up into a profit center.”

It’s not sure how much money they’ll end up demanding because there’s no clear data yet on how many people were affected. Still, the case was filed asking for at least 5 million US dollars – so that the case would get into the proper judicial jurisdiction (remember that cases are handled by different courts depending on the amount).

If you want Microsoft’s side, they released a statement (you can read that here) – they just haven’t responded to the law firm as far as we know.

The toughest part in the drama so far: Kabateck joked about what the MS defense would be: “We’re Microsoft and we can do anything we want.” His point was that’s really all they can say because otherwise MS would have to admit that they “screwed up” – “there’s no question” that the bricking problems happened. “My firm has been contacted by almost 400 people since this became public.”

Finally, Next Gen reports that “some onlookers have criticized the lawsuit as frivolous and lacking in evidence, as the complaint cites shaky sources such as independent bloggers, message board posts, Google search results…” But, the only evidence that Kabateck is going to use are “first-hand accounts from live witnesses that experienced the problem” and from subpoenas – yup, they’re going to demand records from Microsoft (this is the part in the movies where you see people running around and shredding all the “internally-kept complaint documentation”).

The only blog entries that would be useful: entries from Microsoft employees like Larry “Major Nelson” Hyrb. That’s because these entries are “an admission of the problem” or “acknowledged this problem.”

For the record, Kabateck said that Ray’s Xbox 360 was not modified or hacked. And if it’s true that MS did the brick-job on purpose to punish modders and hackers, well, Next Gen has this from Kabateck:

There are two issues here. First, that’s your property. You bought it, you own it. The other issue is that our justice system has ways to deal with people who steal software or modify a piece of equipment in an illegal or inappropriate way. [Microsoft] canÂ’t take the law into their own hands.

Well, since we independent bloggers and forum-goers are “shaky sources”, we’re free to run with this news. Everybody thinking this case should push through because MS is guilty, say “Aye.” Everybody opposed to this lawsuit and say that MS is innocent, say “Nay.”

Here are details from the lawyer of Kevin Ray – representing everybody else suing Microsoft for bricking their 360s after the October 31 fall update. Ray filed the class action lawsuit on behalf of everybody else who got bricked 360s since there were lots of complaints about it in blogs and forums everywhere.

As we said earlier, it’s for breach of contract, violation of Washington’s Consumer Protection Act, and negligence. Brian Kabateck, senior partner at Kabateck Brown Kellner who are handling the case, said that MS promised to pay for all shipping, repair and/or replacement costs for affected consoles. But, that is not the case, he said. “Unfortunately, all the reports we’re getting is that Microsoft is saying ‘Send your Xbox in and for 140 bucks we’ll fix it.’ In our opinion, they’re turning their screw-up into a profit center.”

It’s not sure how much money they’ll end up demanding because there’s no clear data yet on how many people were affected. Still, the case was filed asking for at least 5 million US dollars – so that the case would get into the proper judicial jurisdiction (remember that cases are handled by different courts depending on the amount).

If you want Microsoft’s side, they released a statement (you can read that here) – they just haven’t responded to the law firm as far as we know.

The toughest part in the drama so far: Kabateck joked about what the MS defense would be: “We’re Microsoft and we can do anything we want.” His point was that’s really all they can say because otherwise MS would have to admit that they “screwed up” – “there’s no question” that the bricking problems happened. “My firm has been contacted by almost 400 people since this became public.”

Finally, Next Gen reports that “some onlookers have criticized the lawsuit as frivolous and lacking in evidence, as the complaint cites shaky sources such as independent bloggers, message board posts, Google search results…” But, the only evidence that Kabateck is going to use are “first-hand accounts from live witnesses that experienced the problem” and from subpoenas – yup, they’re going to demand records from Microsoft (this is the part in the movies where you see people running around and shredding all the “internally-kept complaint documentation”).

The only blog entries that would be useful: entries from Microsoft employees like Larry “Major Nelson” Hyrb. That’s because these entries are “an admission of the problem” or “acknowledged this problem.”

For the record, Kabateck said that Ray’s Xbox 360 was not modified or hacked. And if it’s true that MS did the brick-job on purpose to punish modders and hackers, well, Next Gen has this from Kabateck:

There are two issues here. First, that’s your property. You bought it, you own it. The other issue is that our justice system has ways to deal with people who steal software or modify a piece of equipment in an illegal or inappropriate way. [Microsoft] canÂ’t take the law into their own hands.

Well, since we independent bloggers and forum-goers are “shaky sources”, we’re free to run with this news. Everybody thinking this case should push through because MS is guilty, say “Aye.” Everybody opposed to this lawsuit and say that MS is innocent, say “Nay.”