Apple tried to silence owner of exploding iPod with gagging order

[meegbear]

Source: TimesOnline

Apple attempted to silence a father and daughter with a gagging order after the child’s iPod music player exploded and the family sought a refund from the company.

The Times has learnt that the company would offer the family a full refund only if they were willing to sign a settlement form. The proposed agreement left them open to legal action if they ever disclosed the terms of the settlement. The case echoes previous circumstances in which Apple attempted to hush up incidents when its devices overheated.

Ken Stanborough, 47, from Liverpool, dropped his 11-year-old daughter Ellie’s iPod Touch last month. “It made a hissing noise,” he said. “I could feel it getting hotter in my hand, and I thought I could see vapour”. Mr Stanborough said he threw the device out of his back door, where “within 30 seconds there was a pop, a big puff of smoke and it went 10ft in the air”.

Mr Stanborough contacted Apple and Argos, where he had bought the device for £162. After being passed around several departments, he spoke to an Apple executive on the telephone. As a result of the conversation, Apple sent a letter to Mr Stanborough denying liability but offering a refund.

Read more: http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/personal_tech/article6736587.ece

[hobbit709]

1. Just another reason NOT to get an iPod

[Rebubula]

16. LOLZ

Ok...this happens a few times out of the MILLIONS of IPODs in the world and you make this a reason NOT to get one?

What are your other reasons - Cannot play 8 Track Tapes? Unable to hear the hiss and pop of albums? You lose the 'feel' of Barry Manilow (and I admit that I like Manilow) when you play his songs on IPOD?

Seriously, if you love music there is no better device to enjoy your sound than the IPOD (or other MP3 devices).

[hobbit709]

17. MP3 players yes, I have 3

iPod or any other player that uses DRM and/or proprietary crap-NO!

[Rebubula]

18. OK...

...I was thinking that you were some sort of angry Luddite.

I understand your message better. However, any device that uses such batteries can have the same danger.

[tomreedtoon]

2. Probably the rechargeable NiMH battery.

These have gotten hot and exploded in laptops. Oh, and perhaps I should mention that they are all made in China by slave labor, for American corporations that don't really have quality control.

Perhaps you remember the earlier iPods, which used weird batteries only made by Apple, which had to be replaced by Apple and which cost more than a brand-new iPod to replace. There was somebody in New York who posted hundreds of spray-paint posters saying "iPod Battery Only Lasts 18 Months" - here is the hard-to-find account on Wikipedia (I guess Apple blackmailed everyone else in keeping quiet):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neistat_Brothers

Lots of people love Apple, thinking it's a moral corporation. There is no such animal.

[SleeplessInAlabama]

3. I don't claim Apple to be a fantastic nor moral corporation

but I've owned an iPod for about 3 years now and it still holds a charge for hours on end.

No issues with explosions or eroding battery life here...

[Patiod]

6. That's the same logic as I ran into with lamps

I bought a lamp at Target that smoked and burned. I was mentioning this in a group of people at work, and someone else said, "that's weird, I had a Target lamp that also smoked and started to flame."

Another person looked angry, and said "well, I've bought Target lamps and never had a problem!" I asked her if hearing that TWO of her co-workers had faulty lamps from the same store didn't make her think that Target lamps might be dangerous, but she said no.

[jmm]

20. I had a similar incident involving pop tarts.

I tried to make one before heading into high school early to catch up on some work I missed while absent and it set my toaster on fire. I mentioned it to my teacher when I got there and he told me he had recently read about a house that had extensive damage because some pop tarts burst into flames in a toaster that was under some curtains.

When I was in college I saw big flames come out of a friend's toaster oven thanks to a pop tart but a couple of people who came by when they smelled smoke refused to believe the pop tarts could be the problem.

[Th1onein]

4. Buy a defective product, ask for your money back.......

And get a gag agreement in the mail? Huh?

[ejpoeta]

5. how nice of them to offer a refund!! wonder how long the family had had the

ipod and if it were under warranty anyway. and i wonder if this is an isolated incident, or if there is a problem with the product. i mean, most folks wouldn't probably drop it... but still...

[truthisfreedom]

7. fucking scary all around!

8^(

[dipsydoodle]

8. Charming

not.x(

[Libertas1776]

9. Ah Apple,

just another friendly neighborhood multi-billionaire conglomerate looking out for its valued customers. :sarcasm:

I have one of those Sansa players, must have dropped it a dozen times, and it still hasn't exploded on me yet. Plus it didn't freaking cost me £162 ($270+).

[Robb]

10. "denying liability but offering a refund."

...Isn't that common?

[avaistheone1]

11. This doesn't speak well for Apple.

They sound like another greedy corporation with no concern for the welfare of the general public.
I think they suck now.

[Xenotime]

23. Not true. They are one of the most progressive companies out there.

Their PR is probably run by some RW nut job who Jobs will fire today.

[WriteDown]

25. You forget this?

:sarcasm:

[Xenotime]

28. No. Did you forget this?!?!

1.) eliminating polyvinyl chloride (PVC) and brominated flame retardants (BFRs) from Apple products by the end of 2008.
2.) recycling volume grew 57% as Apple collected nearly 21 million pounds of e-waste.
3.) Reduced product’s carbon footprint by increasing energy efficiency, material composition, packaging, and — most significantly — greenhouse gas emissions.

What other company has done that?

[WriteDown]

29. You forgot a couple of things....

Apple is at its heart a monopolistic company that seeks total control of hardware and software which is inherently unprogressive (see post 27 for more on that) and of course....

[cslinger59]

12. Just for the record

This can happen with any lithium battery powered flashlight/camera etc. where there are 2 or more cells. It is basically explosive decompression due to a short etc.

Stuff happens when you pack that much energy into that small of a space. Nature of the beast. It is still very very unlikely to happen.

When you read battery packs or manuals that tell you to always use new cells of the same brand and charge levels, heed the warning.

I am not saying Apple is the best thing since sliced bread or anything I am just saying that it could have happened to any number of currently produced lithium powered products and is just as much of a fluke as a tire blowout etc.

[onehandle]

14. What! Intense battery technology can be dangerous no matter what company makes it?

Why, I thought this was all Apple's fault?

:eyes:

[Xithras]

22. Exactly, any battery can do this. Any portable electronic device can do this.

Grab a cheap little 9 volt battery, short the terminals, and see how long you can hold it before it heats up enough to burn your hand.

Batteries are designed to hold a lot of power which they release slowly over time as they're used. When you short that battery, the power gets released all at once. The more powerful the battery, the more violent that sudden release is going to be.

[wtmusic]

19. Ditto

and we have no idea if it was dropped or someone tried to open it up and "fix" it.

People who have no clue do all kinds of weird shit to electronics and then blame it on the manufacturer. Unnecessary to pile on either party without more info.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

13. no one gets to be a multimillion dollar company by playing nice

i dont offer this as an excuse for apple. just that, i dont understand why people stand by corporations etc with passion.

i am sure microsoft has tried to get gag orders for things as well.

the rich dont get filthy rich by playing nice. pays to remember that.

[Sultana]

15. Pffft, I still love Apple

:D

[Fumesucker]

21. I had one of the early digital cameras overcharge the NiMH batteries ..

The batteries exploded, shot out of the camera, put a dent in the wall and then burned the carpet where they fell.

I found out later that the charger for the camera was under recall, the (very well known) maker replaced the camera, two sets of batteries and the charger.

I was never asked to sign a gag order to get the replacement.

[damntexdem]

24. Hey, they could remarket them as IExplodes.

Well, now Apple makes me gag.

[TerribleLarryDingle]

26. I never understood "Brand loyalty"

I mean what's the point of worshiping a product and the corporation who makes it?
That said I have had my iPod for 4 years and have dropped it(in it's protective case) a few times it still works fine and keeps it's charge.

[anonymous171]

30. Makes people feel special. Consumerism is the new religion.

You are what you buy!

[gmpierce]

27. Some things never change

Back in the 1980's I had to make a decision about writing software for the MacIntosh.

Apple set up a lot of rules about how you were supposed to write your code. Most of them were either obvious good practice, or obvious BS, but the Apple attitude came through loud and strong: Do it our way - or else.

If you bought the machine, you had one choice of replacement and upgrade parts - Apple. If they didn't make that bigger disk, you couldn't buy it. If someone else wanted to make it you wouldn't be able to install it - because Apple controlled the operating system.

The result of this attitude was that a lot of really good programmers simply chose to write code for the IBM PC. Apple still had a devoted circle of worshipers. Many of them are still on bended knee to this day.

All of the really good hardware companies made improved and enhanced hardware for the PC market. IBM was out-to-lunch and Microsoft did not do hardware. The PC lookalikes wound up owning the hardware world.

Microsoft wound up owning the computer software world. It wasn't entirely because they were evil. They were simply better at it. They were also pretty selective about when and who to get evil with.

The same people who seriously hate Microsoft are now left with the fact that Apple, (one of their white knights), is just as controlling as ever.

Having earned a second chance, Apple hasn't learned a thing in the last thirty years. They still think that being masters of the Universe is an achievable and desirable goal.

[Nordic65]

31. Just shabby journos - move along folks, nothing to see here...

From the article:
"The proposed agreement left them open to legal action if they ever disclosed the terms of the settlement."

Get it? Thew gag referrers to "the terms of the settlement". As in; SOP/lawyer-talk, as acknowledged by Apple.

The gag does NOT, I repeat, does NOT, in any way whatsoever prohibit them from telling everyone and their grandmothers about their exploding iPod.

[Missy Vixen]

32. The local TV station also did a story on this

The problems in the Seattle area are with iPod nanos. I listen to a self-hypnosis CD on my iPod before going to sleep. Well, I did. I'm now a little freaked out about having something evidently prone to overheating around bedding.