Re: Jets and Farms
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@Gustav said in The Official Funny Stuff Thread™:
@jinpa said in The Official Funny Stuff Thread™:
@Gustav said in The Official Funny Stuff Thread™:
@dangeRuss said in The Official Funny Stuff Thread™:
@Gustav said in The Official Funny Stuff Thread™:
As opposed to an international multibillion dollar conglomerate with hundreds of people working on that points promotion and hundreds more on that one ad specifically? The $10 guy knew what he's doing, but THEY didn't?
They argued that it was obviously a joke, and nobody would take it seriously.
So basically, the $10 guy was in the right, he just brought up the wrong argument in the court?
Not exactly. There's a subtle difference between the two. In the farm case, both sides thought they were taking advantage of a foolish person. The buyer knew that the seller did not think it would hold up in court (because obviously he wouldn't sell his farm for $10) even though the buyer correctly believed that it would, and the seller thought he was going to get ten bucks out of a fool.
In other words, both sides knew no reasonable person would ever offer to sell that farm for $10 - the Pepsi defense applies and the contract ought to be declared null and void. The seller could be charged with fraud, but the contract itself had no legal power. Either that, or Pepsi defense only works when you're worth many zeroes more than the plaintiff.
@Gustav You didn't actually address the central point I made.
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@jinpa the central point is that one was a conman and the other was just a funny marketer, right? Then yes, I did address that - this point is irrelevant because there's no law saying a conman's joke has more legal standing than an honest person's joke.
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As ever, the law protects big business while everyone else can go fuck themselves.
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@Gustav said in Re: Jets and Farms:
@jinpa the central point is that one was a conman and the other was just a funny marketer, right? Then yes, I did address that - this point is irrelevant because there's no law saying a conman's joke has more legal standing than an honest person's joke.
No, you still missed it. Strike two and three.
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@jinpa then I have no idea what the fuck you could possibly mean. Care to elaborate?
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@Gustav I suspect @jinpa's point (or at least, the one I would make myself on that topic?) is that in the farm case, the seller did go through all the motions that are needed to make an actual sale, whereas in the jet case, the "seller" never really said that the jet truly was for sale (this was, basically, the equivalent of putting fruits on a breakfast cereal box and forgetting to say it's just a "suggested presentation").
The farm seller truly wanted to get the buyer to think they bought something (up to and including money changing hands), even if they believed that the sale would later be made invalid. The jet "seller" never intended to get an actual purchase offer for what they thought was just, well, an ad. Maybe a poorly worded one (but then again, this kind of overly-literal interpretation is how we end up with "caution: contents are hot" and other stupid warnings), but there still wasn't any intent to actually make believe that the jet was truly for sale.
(the buyer in both cases thought it was too-good-to-be-true and may not have thought the sale would go through, but I don't think that's really relevant to how both cases were ruled)
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@remi said in Re: Jets and Farms:
@Gustav I suspect @jinpa's point (or at least, the one I would make myself on that topic?) is that in the farm case, the seller did go through all the motions that are needed to make an actual sale, whereas in the jet case, the "seller" never really said that the jet truly was for sale (this was, basically, the equivalent of putting fruits on a breakfast cereal box and forgetting to say it's just a "suggested presentation").
If the immediate context is things that actually are for sale (i.e. trade for points), that's more like advertising the nutritional values of a cereal like "2mg folate, 500mg magnesium, 2000mg gold per serving" and when someone buys a shitton to extract the gold, be like "haha, we never said we'd actually put gold in there!"
The farm seller truly wanted to get the buyer to think they bought something (up to and including money changing hands), even if they believed that the sale would later be made invalid. The jet "seller" never intended to get an actual purchase offer for what they thought was just, well, an ad.
Maybe a poorly worded one (but then again, this kind of overly-literal interpretation is how we end up with "caution: contents are hot" and other stupid warnings), but there still wasn't any intent to actually make believe that the jet was truly for sale.They actually intended to take the money of kids who thought they were making a good deal by buying more Pepsi to get more points. A significant portion of the target group likely believed they could get the jet if only they drank shitloads of Pepsi. Even if they'd consciously say, ok, my parents would never let me buy this much, they way the ad works is by making the subconscious say "but maaaaybe!".
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In the interest of forestalling a tragic massacre of
s, the Pepsi commercial in question appears to be this here:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZdackF2H7Qc
My take after watching it is that the "Pepsi defense" is bullshit, they absolutely should have gotten slammed for false advertising and held liable for any damages and losses the hopeful jet buyers may have suffered.
The farm case seems obvious: an offer was made and accepted, a meetig of the minds was established and that makes for a valid contract. Any other decision would set a truly disastrous legal precedent.
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@ixvedeusi said in Re: Jets and Farms:
Any other decision would set a truly disastrous legal precedent.
"Insanely unfair trade deals are automatically invalid" isn't THAT disastrous.
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@Gustav said in Re: Jets and Farms:
@ixvedeusi said in Re: Jets and Farms:
Any other decision would set a truly disastrous legal precedent.
"Insanely unfair trade deals are automatically invalid" isn't THAT disastrous.
And in my particular socialist hellhole, insanely unfair contracts are unenforceable in court. By law.
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@Gustav said in Re: Jets and Farms:
"Insanely unfair trade deals are automatically invalid" isn't THAT disastrous.
"LOL did you really believe I was serious?" being a valid defense to wiggle out of a contract would IMHO be quite disastrous.
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@ixvedeusi and then you give the plaintiff all the ammo they need for a fraud lawsuit. On the other hand, most scams actually depend on the unfair contract being completed and the victim not realizing how unfair it is until it's too late. All in all, such precedent would do far more good than harm, even if it rubs the conservative sense of justice the wrong way. Note that I'm talking only about contracts that are unfair to an extreme degree, not ones that are only slightly unfair. Also also, many countries have something like that as an actual law and it works just fine.
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@ixvedeusi said in Re: Jets and Farms:
false advertising
Yeah, I think that's where the two cases differ. The farm case was (probably) fraud (entering into a sales contract with no intent to actually follow it by delivering the goods), the jet is false advertising.
Again, to me the significant difference is that Pepsi never intended to sign a sales contract for a jet. They let the other party believe they would (and should probably have been convicted of misleading the other party (=false advertising)), but as soon as an offer was made, they never hinted they would follow through.
Whereas in the farm case, the seller clearly and non-misleadingly advertised what they were selling, then clearly and voluntarily entered into a contract. But then they never intended to fulfil their end of the contract.
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@Gustav said in Re: Jets and Farms:
Note that I'm talking only about contracts that are unfair to an extreme degree, not ones that are only slightly unfair. Also also, many countries have something like that as an actual law and it works just fine.
AFAIK it's indeed the case in French law, in particular in contracts between asymmetrically informed parties (typically an individual vs. a very large corp).
It gets fishy very quickly because it relies on very vague things such as "reasonable expectations" and the like, which is very similar to the old "I know it when I see it" definition of pornography. But OTOH, despite being fishy when talking in the absolute, it actually works reasonably well in practice, when it is framed by enough court cases that have gone through all the layers to turn it into legal precedent.
It's a practical solution that works sufficiently not-badly, which the most that can be expected from most laws...
