Microchip looses the plot ?

In article , boB Gudgel writes

As this is an international NG please specify which PO and government you refer to. The UK office AFAIK works very differently to the US one.

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\/\/\/\/\ Chris Hills  Staffs  England     /\/\/\/\/
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Chris Hills
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Sigh. Google is your friend.

"mcdonalds coffee lawsuit" turned up

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(McFacts about the McDonalds Coffee Lawsuit) as the first hit. From that page:

McFact No. 1: For years, McDonald's had known they had a problem with the way they make their coffee - that their coffee was served much hotter (at least 20 degrees more so) than at other restaurants.

McFact No. 2: McDonald's knew its coffee sometimes caused serious injuries - more than 700 incidents of scalding coffee burns in the past decade have been settled by the Corporation - and yet they never so much as consulted a burn expert regarding the issue.

McFact No. 3: The woman involved in this infamous case suffered very serious injuries - third degree burns on her groin, thighs and buttocks that required skin grafts and a seven-day hospital stay.

McFact No. 4: The woman, an 81-year old former department store clerk who had never before filed suit against anyone, said she wouldn't have brought the lawsuit against McDonald's had the Corporation not dismissed her request for compensation for medical bills.

McFact No. 5: A McDonald's quality assurance manager testified in the case that the Corporation was aware of the risk of serving dangerously hot coffee and had no plans to either turn down the heat or to post warning about the possibility of severe burns, even though most customers wouldn't think it was possible.

McFact No. 6: After careful deliberation, the jury found McDonald's was liable because the facts were overwhelmingly against the company. When it came to the punitive damages, the jury found that McDonald's had engaged in willful, reckless, malicious, or wanton conduct, and rendered a punitive damage award of 2.7 million dollars. (The equivalent of just two days of coffee sales, McDonalds Corporation generates revenues in excess of 1.3 million dollars daily from the sale of its coffee, selling 1 billion cups each year.)

McFact No. 7: On appeal, a judge lowered the award to $480,000, a fact not widely publicized in the media.

McFact No. 8: A report in Liability Week, September 29, 1997, indicated that Kathleen Gilliam, 73, suffered first degree burns when a cup of coffee spilled onto her lap. Reports also indicate that McDonald's consistently keeps its coffee at 185 degrees, still approximately 20 degrees hotter than at other restaurants. Third degree burns occur at this temperature in just two to seven seconds, requiring skin grafting, debridement and whirlpool treatments that cost tens of thousands of dollars and result in permanent disfigurement, extreme pain and disability to the victims for many months, and in some cases, years.

Regards,

-=Dave

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Reply to
Dave Hansen

[...]
[...]

As far as I know the UK office doesn't go by the moniker USPO either.

Regards,

-=Dave

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Reply to
Dave Hansen

I'll add that McDonalds had already (and within the last year, if I recall) hired someone (either directly, or through their investigating attorney's office) to run around and sample coffee temperatures in the same local area (this wasn't their first such case there.) That investigator's report became a part of this case and it supported the plaintiff's own similar investigations. But more to the point, it showed that these 15-20 degree differences in coffee temperatures, other vendors compared to McDonald's, weren't news to McDonalds management.

Medical specialists pointed out that this difference in temperature is what goes from "3rd degree burns after many minutes of contact" to "3rd degree burns in a few seconds of contact." In other words, it makes the difference between whether someone has a chance to do something about it, or not.

Also, beyond the quality assurance manager testimony about being aware of the risks, there was a memo I believe that surfaced showing that the purpose of the higher temperature was _saving money_ on the coffee beans consumed. They could get a few more cups out of it with the higher temperatures they used.

In short, they willfully chose to expose people to a much higher risk for a slight profit advantage and they did so despite having had past serious events brought to their attention -- these past events spanning back some 10 years, if I recall.

Even all that, I suppose, wouldn't necessarily mean that they should be held responsible -- if it were the case that McDonalds in that area was behaving like other vendors. If it were the case that their behavior was "normal practice," then it is somewhat possible that the burden would have shifted to the buyers, if it were normal practice and so many people so regularly managed to safely handle the dangerous products. But their behavior was way out of the bounds of other companies selling similar products. It was unique.

Put all this together and there are few cases with an outcome so clearly correct as this one.

It's not just a bad example of a court case gone awry. It's one of the few worst possible examples of that. It's actually a clear case of why people NEED to have access to the courts.

Jon

Reply to
Jonathan Kirwan

Neither does the one in the US. It's the USPTO:

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USPO _was_ the United States Post Office. They changed their name back a while back to the United States Postal Service (USPS).

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Reply to
Grant Edwards

From what I have seen, patent examiners do a good job. Remember Einstein was a patent examiner. The problem is that engineering patent examiners are not paid as much as engineers in the general economy, and are generally not given enough leeway to adequately research the claims.

Reply to
Scott Moore

I buy coffee from Mcdonald's. In fact, thats about all I buy from them, their food is atrocious. I figured out rapidly that their coffee is extraordinarily hot. I never attributed it to anything other than that Mcdonalds was trying to overcome the typical issue with fast food restaurants that the coffee temperature comes to you all over the map, from lukewarm to hot. I think the first time I got it, a slightly burned tounge was all that I needed to realize that the coffee needed to sit in the cup holder of the car while it cooled off.

This lady was handling hot coffee while driving a car. Why didn't she also sue the car company for not having a warning on the dashboard not to handle food while driving ?

The upshot of the case is that fast food outlets have warnings on coffee cups that "the contents may be hot", something any moron could have figured out. We have warnings on ladders not to place them on unstable ground because some idiot placed one on cowshit then fell off the ladder. We have warnings on the edge of lawnmowers because some mental zero picked one up while running and tried to use it as a hedge trimmer (these are all true cases). We have warnings not to hang yourself with bathroom towels, eat packing materials, tie plastic bags over your head, sniff the contents of hair spray, and other goodies that should, by rights be left unlabeled so as to advance the good works of Darwinisim in the world.

All of these warnings are useful. However, the lawyers in America are advancing a nanny state while lining their pockets and creating a contest winner mentality in the court system.

What is needed is a warn> >

Reply to
Scott Moore

Reply to
Scott Moore

Reply to
Scott Moore

But where? In the US or Germany?

The US system AFAIK is different to the German/UK/Euro ones

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Reply to
Chris Hills

Chris Hills schrubbelte:

Switzerland :-)

-peter

Reply to
Peter Kannegiesser

Bone up on the facts a little before you spout nonsense.

1) She was a passenger, not the driver.

2) The car was parked.

3) The woman received third degree burns over more than 6% of her body, requiring a seven-day hospital stay including whirlpool treatments, debriding (look it up), and skin grafts.

4) Before contacting a lawyer or filing suit, she tried to settle with McDonalds for her medical expenses -- about $20,000.

Were you aware that contact with the coffee at the temperature McDonalds served it would cause a third degree (full thickness) burn within two to seven seconds? McDonalds was. They had reports of over

700 incidents, several similar to the subject case, and had spent about $500,000 settling some of them.

After she brought suit, two mediators recommended McDonalds settle for about $230,000. McDonalds refused.

At trial, a McDonalds executive admitted the company knew its coffee was served at a temperature about 20 degrees (F) higher than most restaurants, and that the possibility of severe burns was much greater at that temperature, but decided to do nothing about it.

McDonalds knew of the risk and knew scores of injured customers, but did nothing to mitigate the chance of injury.

The jury found compensatory damages in the subject incident of $200,000, of which McDonalds was found to be 80% responsible, reducing the award to $160,000. The remaining damages were for the company's "willful, reckless, malicious or wanton conduct." The amount ($2,700,000) was chosen as representing the company's revenue for 2 days worth of coffee sales.

The award was reduced on appeal to less than $500,000. And was subsequently settled (secretly) out of court to avoid further appeals.

I'm no fan of frivolous lawsuits, but IHMO, this ain't one of them. McDonalds knew there was a problem, had several opportunities to get out from under it, but through corporate inertia (or just plain arrogance) decided not to.

Regards,

-=Dave

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Reply to
Dave Hansen

... snip ...

Helvetia :-)

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Reply to
CBFalconer

O si sic omnes!

Reply to
Paul Burke

However, the urban legend charges on. To test this theory, call up your local radio talk show. You can bend any conversation into the topic of the McDonald's lawsuit.

Reply to
Richard Henry

This is because: (1) there was a concerted 'talking point' effort to make this case into something it wasn't, in some cases for other agendas; and (2) people are generally very lazy, don't want to do research or bother to study facts before coming to conclusions (which I argue were shaped by some with malice aforethought), and (3) they do not take serious responsibility for their own opinions -- thinking in some vague and confused way that "an equal right to an opinion is equivalent to having an equal opinion," which is definitely not true.

As I like to remind people, "If you're willing to be selective in the evidence you consider, you could reasonably conclude that the earth is flat." Comprehensiveness is a rare commodity in people.

Jon

Reply to
Jonathan Kirwan

An Update on this entertainment:

Zilog have appointed lawyers [ to waste money on fighting this plain-nonsense ] :

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but perhaps more significant, is this NEW expansion of the MSP430 family from TI :

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The astute will realise that this moves the 16 bit MSP430, inside the coverage of the '450 patent, as the new members have only 14 pins [10 i/o < 16] !

Now, Microchip will have to sue TI as well !! - they really have bitten off more than they can chew on this path.

Also, the WHOLE smartcard market will have to be sued, as they universally have IO pins less than the internal data bus width....

Q: Will this ever actually make it into open court, or will Steve wake up, and quickly move to stem Microchip further embarrasment ?

-jg

Reply to
Jim Granville

In article , Jim Granville writes

The smart cards use the ISO 7816 defined interface. SO Microchip will have to take on ISO. In any event it is just the serial port + power lines+ clock that is on a smart card it is an interface like RS232 or Centronics.

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\/\/\/\/\ Chris Hills  Staffs  England     /\/\/\/\/
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Reply to
Chris Hills

Arn't there some 32 bit MCUs with less than 32 I/O pins ? Wont they also fall under this patent ?

Regards Anton Erasmus

Reply to
Anton Erasmus

Yes! - and it also exposes the nonsense of which "data bus" might they mean, and the simple lunacy of the patents :)

There are uC with 22 bit opcodes, for example, with < 22io, so their pin count is clearly < the opcode-data-bus width.

What about the ARM variants that fetch 128 bits at a time from FLASH ? Again, these do have an internal bus > I/O Pin count.

How about VLIW Graphics controllers, especially those with on chip, or stacked memory. Very clearly they have internal bus widths > i/o pins....

Then there are simple ones like Atmel's AT91SAM7S32, showing 21 i/o...

The list goes on and on, all showing that there is an orthogonal relationship between IO Pin count, and any internal bus(es) widths on Microcontrollers. In no way, does one number dictate the other.

-jg

Reply to
Jim Granville

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