Wii Have A(nother) Lawsuit: Straps Are A TV Danger
I just love he litigation-centric United States. Nintendo has once again been slapped with a lawsuit over their "faulty Wii Straps. What's different this time? Someone dug up some "buried" internal documents mentioning customer service reps dealing with the Wiimote TV smashing problem.
Filed on December 2nd by Colorado resident Molly Elvig, the new class-action suit mostly picks up right where the old left off: Wiimote Strap #3. Introduced mid-2007 by Nintendo in response to complaints that the small, sliding band designed to "lock" the wrist strap was insufficient for the task, Strap #3 is secured by a plastic locking clasp -- but attorneys for Elvig allege that at this juncture, all three straps continue to fail.Argued by the same lawyer who represented plaintiff Jon Leonard in the prior suit, most points in the complaint look remarkably similar -- despite Nintendo's encouragement of players with instructions like "Swing hard to make sure you clear the net!", the company allegedly didn't provide a product that could support such effort, etc. -- but there is one key difference.
This time, Nintendo is also being accused of covering up evidence from the very Consumer Product Safety Commission with which they created the Wii Strap replacement program.
"Despite actual knowledge of hundreds of incidents involving broken televisions over time and subsequent to December 27, 2006," reads the complaint, "Defendant failed to report the existence of even a single 'Incident' to the CPSC in its Monthly Reports to the CPSC."
This doesn't seem like a spurious accusation, either. Attached to the court filing as a matter of public record is the very evidence Nintendo allegedly tried to hide: actual, internal Nintendo documents where customer service reps received complaints of cracked televisions and broken Wiimote straps -- and the corresponding Monthly Reports that Nintendo was compelled to file with the CPSC as part of their agreement.
I'm going to just come out and say that I find this lawsuit as frivolous as it was the first time it was (unsuccessfully) tried. Yes, if you let go of your Wiimote, your safety strap can break. Even the most elementary of engineers could tell you that you apply repetitive stress on anything and it will eventually break, especially things like plastic. You want your TV to remain in tact, keep a firm grim on your Wiimote like the manual and just about every game for the system tells you to. Got sweaty palms? Use the silicone jacket they released. It will save you a television, and Nintendo a lot of pointless court appearances.
Nintendo Slapped With Strap Lawsuit Once Again [Gamecyte]
Asterick
Posted to Hot Stuff, Video Games on 12 December 2008
· Comments (6)
Other stuff like this: broken tvs, frivolous, lawsuits, nintendo wii, straps
Seriously? Who swings the wiimote hard enough to really do any damage? And why are these people not holding it? I don't get it. Such a joke. Learn to play tennis while sitting on the couch. Save yourself some litigation fees.
Trebor82 is bang on the money why aren't they actually gripping the blood Wii-mote tightly?
I don't even have the straps on mine and it has never fallen out of my hand once. Perhaps the people are the problem not the product and if Nintendo didn't bother with the strap then they would have dodged the lawsuits. Its only because they are there that Nintendo are "responsible"
I don't have the straps on my remotes either. People need to grow up and get lives.
Actually the Nintendo engineers could analyze the yield strength of the plastic used and compare it to the force placed upon the band to determine whether or not the little clasp thing will hold or not.
Why not just use a robot to swing remotes around all day? Ikea does it with their cabinets...
This country needs to re-learn a couple of words. "Personal responsibility". I am so sick of these whiny people.
this is ridiculous. I have a lunch Wii with the launch straps on my Wiimotes. not one has snapped. never once has one gone flying into my TV. as Blatz said, I think that people need to re-learn about personal accountability.