Elliott C. Back: Internet & Technology

I just got a great postcard in the mail. This last year I was charged a $200 early termination fee by T-mobile, after Wendy had to cancel her plan and move back to Shanghai. Now, there’s a class-action lawsuit which is promising to refund $125 of the contract fee! Awesome!!

A proposed Settlement is pending in a class action entitled Milliron v. T-Mobile USA, Inc., No. 08-04149(JLL) (ES) in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey. The lawsuit alleges that T-Mobile violated state and federal laws by charging customers a flat-rate early termination fee (“ETF”) in its wireless telephone service contracts. You are part of the lawsuit if you are a current or former T-Mobile wireless subscriber who paid or were charged a flat-rate ETF from July 23, 1999 to February 19, 2009, or if your contract for service included a flat-rate ETF from July 23, 1999 to February 19, 2009.

If you can prove you paid a flat-rate ETF, or T-Mobile’s records indicate you paid a flat-rate ETF, you may submit a Claim Form and receive up to $125.

You can go visit ETF-Settlement to read the details, and/or apply for a claim. I already did, as I received a postcard in the mail. However, if you meet the class-action criteria (pretty much anyone screwed by a T-mobile early termination fee), you should also fill out the form.

I’ve got three complaints about the print WallStreet Journal (WSJ) subscription that I have:

• Delivery is inconsistent. Some days it comes, some days it doesn’t. I’d say a good 40% of the time it doesn’t come at all.
• Delivery is often late. If I get, there’s a 20% chance it’s when I’m coming home from work, not when I leave.
• Delivery “on hold” didn’t work. I put the subscription on hold for two weeks while I was in Shanghai, so what did I come home to? A huge stack of Wallstreet Journal magazines, and two emails notifying me of the hold period start and end effective dates. Clearly, not very effective.

If you want to read the WSJ (and it’s a great magazine to read), I strongly suggest you pick up the Wallstreet Journal Kindle Edition and get it wirelessly without any of the physical delivery issues.

This year’s Black Friday tragedy is a Walmart stampede which left a 34-year-old temp worker (Jdimytai Damour) dead and four shoppers (one eight months pregnant) injured. 2000 shopper stormed the Queens-area Walmart gates at 5 AM after chanting “push the doors in.” People at the scene reported chaos:

“They were jumping over the barricades and breaking down the door,” said Pat Alexander. “Everyone was screaming. You just had to keep walking on your toes to keep from falling over.”

Kimberly Cribbs said “When they were saying they had to leave, that an employee got killed, people were yelling, ‘I’ve been on line since Friday morning!’ They kept shopping.”

The deals included a $798 Samsung 50-inch Plasma HDTV, a Bissel Compact Upright Vacuum for $28 and Men’s Wrangler Tough Jeans for $8.

The Wallmart in question, in Long Island NY

I was wondering why this would happen. I’ve been in huge crowds–concerts, for example, regularly have many thousands of rowdy, excited riotous fans–but they’re always carefully controlled to minimize the chance of a trampling rush. The Walmart itself is not in a particularly bad part of NY; the average salaries, education, age, and racial composition are more or less normal.

On the other hand, there’s a thread on slickdeals where seancashmere disagrees:

Yeah, really and truly, the people who live in Valley Stream and some points to the East have nice homes and are educated enough, but the people who shop at the Valley Stream Walmart are terrible. They are under educated and poor. Many come from Jamaica and South Ozone Park, Queens, the projects, Rosedale and the surrounding areas…

I don’t buy that particular argument; any tightly-packed large crowd is dangerous, whether filled with the upper or lower crusts. Pictures of the scene show the problem: a small doorway, and way too many people.

A picture of the crowd waiting for Walmart to open

Interestingly, there are other incidents driven by crowds, bargains, and human rage. For example, see Fatal shooting followed toy store brawl about a Black Friday skirmish inside a Toys-R-Us.

Just listen to Gizmodo (oh how I hate to say they’re right on this one)–You Don’t Really Want This Crap. Deals aren’t to die for.