A forum to discuss the pro's and con's of making problems public.
A few provocative questions to get things going:
- if fixing stuff yourself voids the warranty, why ask for help by the online community?
- where is the thin line that separates legitimate reporting of problems from slander/libel?
- if a company suffered as a result of poor reviews, based on poor product performance, would the competition then make good use of the lessons learned and advance the overall industry, or would the industry as a whole suffer a setback, delaying environmental benefits that could otherwise have been achieved?
- under which circumstances is a consumer entitled to break parts of warranty conditions without voiding the warranty?
Add any question you like - it's a tempting minefield....
TDA
I would like to think the truth is the truth and the truth can speak for itself. Well, that is, so long as we speak the truth that will be clear enough for anybody.
But... that does mean it's important to stay in truth and it's easy for many to stray into various things which aren't truth.
- David Herron, The Long Tail Pipe, davidherron.com, 7gen.com, What is Reiki
Holy crap, that's a long post.
Anyway.
- if fixing stuff yourself voids the warranty, why ask for help by the online community?
Because tech support sucks. Especially if you got the thing from Hong Kong.
- where is the thin line that separates legitimate reporting of problems from slander/libel?
What Tracy/Reikiman said. It's not slander/libel if it's the truth.
- if a company suffered as a result of poor reviews, based on poor product performance, would the competition then make good use of the lessons learned and advance the overall industry, or would the industry as a whole suffer a setback, delaying environmental benefits that could otherwise have been achieved?
I'm neither an economist nor a politician. I don't have the slightest clue.
- under which circumstances is a consumer entitled to break parts of warranty conditions without voiding the warranty?
I don't really know. I'm very mechanically/electronically inclined, so I never worry about warranty. If I can take it apart, I can fix it myself ^_^.
Well, short of maybe reprodicing a uchip or something.
The author of this post isn't responsible for any injury, disability or dismemberment, death, financial loss, illness, addiction, hereditary disease, or any other undesirable consequence or general misfortune resulting from use of the "information" contai
Well, usatracey, Esq., we now know what you do or did for a living!
Maybe you mentioned this already, but the legal bar for libel is a lot lower in other countries. Recall the the McDonald's libel case against the British activists who published a pamphlet on the health hazards of their food.
PJD, P.E.
WOW!
What a fantastic response from everyone!
If only the manufacturers came back with information in such a fast and comprehensive fashion, the whole forum would be unnecessary.
Thanks!
But now I think it's going off topic a bit, just a little....
In order to maybe rekindle the topic, lets just take an international company as an example, and lets assume that their shares are doing this:
And lets assume that their own report spells out that they might be in some trouble, like this one: http://www.hemscott.com/news/rna/detached.do?id=57266947158846
Now, unless someone rich, like Richard Branson, decides he likes the whole thing a lot, and helps them out with a few millions (hint, hint, Richard!!), there might be a chance that the Vehicle owners soon need not worry about breaking warranty conditions ....
And if the "flagship" of the industry was to go down in flames, what would that mean for the rest of the industry, and the environment? Opportunity or setback?
Would it be smart for Vehicle owners (in any country - tortured, brainwashed, skinny, fat, whatever) to make more problems public when this might be what tips the balance, potentially taking the option for later warranty claims with it?
I wonder where the discussion is going to go this time? WW III ???
Take it easy - there is enough trouble already!
http://prius.ecrostech.com/original/PriusFrames.htm
http://prius.ecrostech.com/original/PriusFrames.htm
Hurm, pretty precipitous. By itself falling stock prices aren't absolutely indicating anything other than scared investors. But as they say, where there's smoke there might be fire...
- David Herron, The Long Tail Pipe, davidherron.com, 7gen.com, What is Reiki
"If a company suffered as a result of poor reviews, based on poor product performances"
It is highly likely that this is a result in how a business is run. Thus, the business owner and how they treat
their customers. For example; there are a lot of business owners who will purposely cheat customers to tell you if something is wrong with their vehicle just to gain income. (I have seen this done)
It can take quite awhile for new business owners to replace the poor reviews into positive reviews by making customer apologies and contacting old customers to regain interest back of new management.
Poor reviews can also mean lack of new business coming into a company.
Poor reviews (be it online or on paper) doesn't dissappear either.
If Vectrix is in a little trouble it's far more likely their product and/or business plan that's the problem. I'm glad they've found people willing to pay out 12 grand for a maxi scooter but it's obviously too high a price for them to sell nearly as many as they'd like.
Hopefully they get it together and reduce the price. It'd be nice if their products became capable of the performance claims made as well.
I would buy a Vectrix tomorrow if it met the published specs and was reliable. I would even be an early adopter if there was a dealer near by to help me work through the problems. Sadly none of the above is true so others get to be the guinea pigs.
Maybe selling a scooter like this is not a business model that will work or maybe it's just too soon. Once you add up the cost for some decent engineering, good components, and a honkin' huge battery pack $10k to $12k is entirely reasonable. As gasoline climbs towards $20 a gallon hopefully more people will start to think so.
"we must be the change we wish to see in the world"
I like this point a lot. If we think about the range of vehicles that V members have tried out - XM-2000 had lots of problems, apparently the Z-20 has it's share of problems, both are sold at a low price. Maybe to get a good quality bike you have to be prepared to spend for good engineering.
Unfortunately there is a mass market who are accustomed to low prices from major bike makers (Honda, Yamaha, etc) who can amortize their R&D costs over mega-sales. E-bike makers don't have the same level of sales and can't amortize their R&D budget and so each buyer has to pay a larger chunk of the R&D cost.
- David Herron, The Long Tail Pipe, davidherron.com, 7gen.com, What is Reiki
Dave wrote:
I sent this on Jan 18th, 2008 to the Australian Vectrix salesman regarding guinea pigs ;-)
End of quoting myself......
So far, none of my questions were answered. I guess there is no law that says they have to...
But the plan is to get a new Vectrix delivered on Feb 5th or 6th, 2008.
I'll find out if it works any better than the old one then!
Check out the http://visforvoltage.org/forum/2789-trailblazers-early-adopters-or-guineapigs#new forum for more...
Mr. Mik
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