On Thu, 20 Jan 2005 12:09:05 US/Eastern, you wrote (with possible editing):
>> On Tue, 18 Jan 2005 20:13:56 -0800, you wrote (with possible editing): >> Hmm, that's really interesting. I'm a user, not a dealer. I bought >> my stuff from Ablecom who, I believe is a licensed dealer AND >> advertises his prices on the web. They were able to provide support, >> although I got quite a bunch of it from folks here as well. (prices >> aren't particularly low, however). >No, his exact markup is pretty well known, which is not bad for never >touching the inventory.... Hi Carl, I suspect if I were a dealer, I'd know exactly what his markup was! However, my point was that he publishes his prices on the web in apparent disregard of Panasonic's policies. >> It's obvious you're not a lawyer, because if you were, you would know >> that some of the stuff you are saying constitutes "restraint of >> trade", which is federal stuff. I know this only because I spoke to >> our attorney in regard to similar Sony policies and found out that >> they are completely unenforceable. He advised us to buy elsewhere, we >> did, Sony knew about it and did nothing. Apparently, you can not >> agree to something which is deemed illegal. If you do, you can't be >> held to the provision - that's the reason they stick the separability >> clause in contracts, at least in NH. > >If your dealership is pulled by Panasonic for violating a rule they >imposed to become a TDA dealer, you might sue them and win, but what are >you going to do if you don't and how deep are your pockets while you wait? Well, as I said, I'm not a TDA dealer, nor have I any intention of becoming one, but what I am suggesting is that if someone like George Gleason makes too big a deal about it, someone with political influence might try to persuade a US attorney to go after Panasonic. It certainly wouldn't hurt me any, nor would it cost me anything. FWIW, I think with the improvements in v6 of the Internet Protocol, we will see VOIP becoming a lot more common. With SIP becoming common knowledge and judging the size of the market, I suspect there will be a lot more competition and proprietary systems will either disappear or become a lot less proprietary. Many "features" are rather trivial to program. Likewise, I suspect the RBOC's will either adapt to the changing business model or disappear; certainly they have a huge investment in plant and equipment. Obviously, no flame intended. Best, -- Larry Mail may be sent to rapp at lmr dot com. Please use plain text only as html is filtered out as spam. _________________________________________________________________ KX-T Mailing list --- http://kxthelp.com/ Subscription changes: http://kxthelp.com/mailman/listinfo/kxt
