Bob, I'm a virtual store and will gladly accept your virtual money, in any amount, denomination or currency. HAND IT OVER!
:-) Tom C. On Fri, Feb 5, 2010 at 12:04 PM, Bob Sullivan <[email protected]> wrote: > Thanks Mark for putting some sanity back into this thread. > Bill wants to argue like this is some 2 dollar item picked off of the > store shelf. > I think the situation changes with the price of the item and in the > virtual store. > Regards, Bob S. > > On Fri, Feb 5, 2010 at 8:04 AM, Mark Roberts <[email protected]> wrote: >> William Robb wrote: >> >>>I asked you once, I'll ask you again: If you walked into a store to buy a >>>quart of milk and when you get to the counter you are told the price that is >>>clearly marked on the bottle as pr quart is actually per pint, and therefore >>>you will have to pay double, would you do so happily? >>>If you'd care to, answer me this time. >>> >>>In essence, this is what B&H has done, and it is what you, Mark, Godfrey and >>>(most unfortunately) Henry is defending. >> >> Bill, you're equating a physical store with a virtual store. There >> seems to be a tacit assumption that online stores can or should >> work just like physical stores. This is, in and of itself, untrue. >> They don't. They can't. They shouldn't. >> >> Here's how a mis-priced item is handled in a physical store: You sell >> the product to the customer for the price marked and eat the loss. >> That's the right thing to do and it's also the law in many places (it >> was in New York State when I lived there). Then you go back onto the >> sales floor and correct the price. This isn't viable in an online >> store because in the time it takes to ring up the sale and walk back >> to the sales area of the physical store the customer in the virtual >> store has announced his bargain through Twitter, Facebook, Woot, etc. >> and the mis-priced product has been ordered by 100 other people. Or >> 200. Or 800. B&H's servers can probably handle several hundred orders >> a *minute*. Consider an expensive item that's not underpriced by a >> mere 50% but with a mis-placed decimal point (it's been known to >> happen) that effectively underprices it by 90%... and is ordered by >> 1000 or so people before the mistake is discovered. Consider a web >> site that's been hacked and products re-priced: If the law treated any >> of these like a physical store, they'd be obliged to sell everything >> at the marked price until they noticed and fixed each erroneous price >> (good luck "proving" it was hackers who did it - or, if you're an >> aggrieved customer, proving that hackers *didn't* do it when the >> seller claims that was the case). >> >> Mark Cassino's web page was hacked not long ago - they were trying to >> upload trojans to site visitors but they could just as easily have >> re-priced everything he sells. >> >> Are there any online retailers who *do* guarantee that they'll sell >> for the price that's advertised in their online store even if it's an >> error? Find one. I haven't been able to. Look at the places that offer >> to match competitors' prices (buy.com, for example): They specifically >> state that they'll only match *correct* prices - they know *none* >> of their competitors will actually sell at an erroneous price, and >> they know pricing errors are a realistic possibility so they want to >> be protected, too. >> >> The marking of a price on an item on the shelf of a physical store >> carries with it a kind of contractual obligation between the store and >> the customer. The advertised price in a virtual store, on the other >> hand, is treated as "informational" like the price in a printed >> advertisement; subject to change or retraction in the case of errors. >> >> Many practices that work in the physical world don't scale to the >> speed, volume and security threats of the online environment. As far >> as I can tell there are *no* online retailers who promise to sell for >> the price advertised on the web site even if it's wrong. This is one >> of the policies that simply isn't workable in the virtual world. >> >> >> -- >> PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List >> [email protected] >> http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net >> to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and >> follow the directions. >> > > -- > PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List > [email protected] > http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net > to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow > the directions. > -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
