Bad Scam or Just a Bad Idea

Some of you may recall my brilliant idea of getting a Zune through the Live Search Club sponsored by Microsoft. You may also recall that I earned enough points through their system to cash them in for a Zune.

Though I did earn the points required, and spent nearly six hours a day for a month earning those points, it now seems that I may never get the promised product. The Zune was supposedly to ship from Club Live on, or around, November 5. Well, when November 5th came and went without so much as a peep from Club Live, I figured I would wait a little longer. After all, it did say that it could take up to 12 months for the Zune to arrive at my house.

By the time 12 weeks had passed, and I still had no news about the Zune, I figured I would investigate the matter a little further. It turns out that I was supposed to get an email from club live when the Zune shipped. I contacted the lovely people at club live to see what the deal was with my order. I was greeted with an automated response to my inquiry.

Now, I really started to get a little suspicious. So I googled it, and it turns out that a lot of people have had the same thing happen to them. A lot of people legitimately earned the points required, and ordered the prize they had been hoping for. When these people emailed Club Live asking about the status of the order, they got an email that basically said, “Thank you for your interest in the Live Search Club games. Your order has been canceled because you cheated to get the points.”

How lame is that? I was really worried that I would get a similar email as a response. A few days ago, I noticed that I had an email from Club Live in my email inbox. I opened it, fully expecting to be notified that my order had been canceled.

Dear Live Search Club Participant,

Thank you for contacting Live Search Club Support. At this time, we are contacting our supplier for the status of your order. Your patience is appreciated as we will get back to you as soon as possible. In some instances, this may take up to 10 business days.

Please note, after your order is processed and is found to be in compliance with our Terms and Conditions (http://club.live.com/TermsAndConditions.htm) for fair game play as well as no duplicate software or hardware order, you will receive a confirmation email with any relevant shipping information. Upon review, all orders that are not in compliance with our Terms and Conditions, are cancelled. As noted in our Terms and Conditions, please allow 12 weeks for delivery of any prize order.

Kind Regards,

Live Search Club Support

I guess that my order isn’t completely hopeless after all. But it still seems a little bit shady to me. I’m not going to get my hopes up until I get that email from them confirming that they have shipped my Zune. To me it seems as if they are saying, “We haven’t found a reason to cancel your order yet, but we are trying to find a reason. Give us about 10 days and we will get back to you.”

End User License Agreement

So you know that contract that comes with pretty much anything that you buy? It even comes on the software that you buy. Well, do you ever actually read what it is that you are agreeing to? I’ll be honest, I don’t ever really pay attention unless I have to start entering in credit card information. I just assume that if they don’t have a way of directly taking money from me, they must not really care.

Well, I was really bored before my class, and I had nothing to do. So I began the ritual of rummaging through my backpack to see what all was in there. I came across the End User License Agreement for the SanDisk Cruzer Freedom which Roni and I had purchased on during the beginning-of-the-year-sale at our university. Mind you, I was really bored, so I thought “what the heck” and gave it a read. Here are some of the highlights. (oh, here is the key, so you know what is going on. Device = the thumb drive. Product = the thumb drive + all programs on it. Licensor = SanDisk. Documentation = paperwork that came with the drive)

1. “Do not click on the “I accept” button at the end of this document until you have read this entire document.”
– OK, so this is a piece of paper that I pulled out of my backpack. It is not on a computer screen. Unless this is a VERY high tech piece of paper, I cannot “click” on any button after reading this paper because it is a piece of paper. Does this mean that I cannot agree to the EULA, and that I am not bound by it?

2. “You may print and keep a copy of this License Agreement.”
– Again, this is not a computer. It would be awesome if I could print a piece of paper from another piece of paper. That would be like… getting the paper to clone itself, and I could sell that for a pretty penny. Now, you might be saying that this is being nit-picky and that I could just as easily copy the paper with the EULA printed on it, and save that for my records, but then we must keep in mind our next item…

3. “You may not copy the Documentation.”
– Now hold on a moment… I am allowed to print it off, but not to copy it? Really, what is the difference between me printing this thing or copying it? Especially considering that it is a piece of paper and cannot print a copy of itself.

4. “You shall promptly report to Licensor any Product that is damaged, stolen or lost or reported as damaged, stolen or lost.”
– Keep in mind that “product” means not only the flash drive, but everything that comes with it, including the EULA. So, technically, if my dog pees on the EULA, then I need to report it to SanDisk. If somebody steals the drive, then I have to report it to SanDisk. Isn’t that crazy? Why should they care if somebody steals my usb drive? Are they going to replace it for me?

5. “Upon termination by Licensor, you agree to destroy, or return to Licensor, the Software, Information, and the Documentation and all copies and portions thereof.”
– Again, why? Are they paranoid that I will be naughty and make photocopies of it? And where and I going to get these “copies and portions thereof?” I’m not even allowed to make copies of it in the first place. If I don’t care about the rules enough to the point where I am willing to make copies of it, why would I listen to them when they tell me that I have to destroy the copies?

6. “By using the Product, you are agreeing… and warranting that you are not located in, under the control of, or a national or resident of [Cuba, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Iran, Syria] or any other country to which the U.S. has embargoed goods.”
– Wow… I guess they are serious. I like the part about “under the control of.” Like I am a robot or something. And I don’t think that anybody that is from those countries and under the control of some wild regime will care about the EULA… Maybe they are worried that the North Koreans will get a hold of the EULA and ::gasp:: photocopy it! Yeah, I bet that is it. Or maybe they don’t want the servicemen in Iraq to use usb drives?

Do you have any fun stories about EULAs?

Success!!

Well, after several weeks of being entertained at work by Microsoft’s Club Live, I have finally earned enough points for the zune. It really did not take as long as I was expecting, only a few weeks. It actually happened yesterday and I am quite relieved to be done with the whole process. Or am I?

Last week, Apple announced the new iPod touch. Now, I am not one to be easily swayed by Apple’s latest gizmos, but I will admit to a certain fascination with the iPod touch. Not only does it look amazing, but it has such great potential! I’m sure that as new applications are released by 3rd parties, the iPod touch with transform into the next generation of PDA/mp3 player. Some might say that he iphone already IS the next generation, but I’m really not interested in a lot of the features that are present in the iphone. I know there are a lot of people out there that are disappointed with the iPod touch’s 16GB of max storage capacity, but let’s face it, all of the music on my computer currently takes up about 6 GB. I could probably fit my entire music collection onto the 8GB version of the iPod touch, and still be happy. Though it would be impressive to say that you have 160GB of storage, what would you really fill that up with? My hard drive isn’t even that big on my computer. Also, I like that the iPod touch uses flash memory, making it more suitable for exercise activities and the like.

Now, even the 8GB model at $299 is a bit steep for me (as a starving student). And after Apple’s $200 price drop in the iphone after only a few months, I am certainly not going to be the first person in line to get one of these guys, but how I want one! So here is the plan that I have schemed up in my head, let Microsoft pay for my iPod touch. And just how do I plan to make this work? Well, I have already explained club live, and how you can get all sorts of prizes for playing games that run the Microsoft search engine. I have earned the zune and it should be in my hands by mid November. There are a myriad of other prizes that are still available to me- bluetooth headsets, xbox 360 controllers, and the like. I figure if I win enough prizes from club live, I will be able to sell the prizes to earn money towards my real goal, the iPod touch. So what say ye? What do you think of my plan?