How would you like $500?

[Guest MarvinisaLunatic]

BONZI CLASS ACTION

 

A nationwide class action lawsuit was filed on November 25, 2002, in the Superior Court of Spokane County against Bonzi Software, Inc. Bonzi is among the world’s most prolific issuers of Internet advertising banners. Bonzi’s website has been ranked as one of the most frequently visited websites in the world.

 

The class action complaint alleges that Bonzi deceptively and fraudulently commandeered millions of internet users to Bonzi’s commercial websites through dissemination of tens-of-millions of fraudulent Internet advertising banners that impersonated computer error messages. The Complaint states that through use of such Fake User Interface (“FUI”) dialogs that gave the false appearance of being computer error messages, Bonzi tricked millions of Internet users into interrupting the work they were performing to respond to the fraudulent error message, only to unexpectedly find both computer and computer user thus hijacked to defendants’ commercial website.

 

WHO IS A MEMBER OF THE PROPOSED CLASS?

 

The class action Complaint was brought on behalf of all persons residing in the United States who have, while operating a computer, encountered an advertising banner like those illustrated on this website (see link on actual page - Marvin).

 

In order to proceed as a class action, the trial court must first enter an order certifying this case as a class action. It is anticipated that a motion seeking such an order will be sought early next year.

 

WHAT RELIEF FOR CONSUMERS DOES THE COMPLAINT SEEK?

 

The Complaint asks the Spokane County Superior Court to award punitive damages against Bonzi in the amount of $500 per class member, as well as compensatory damages in the amount of $5.00 per deceptive advertising banner issued by Bonzi. The Complaint also seeks an order enjoining Bonzi from issuing similar Internet advertising banners in the future.

 

Linkage

 

As soon as I can figure out how to join (I think its the contact form), I will because these things have annoyed the hell out of me.

[Guest Ozymandias]

Normally I oppose frivolous lawsuits, but those goddamn "You have an error" banner ads are SO irritating, I'm gonna relax my ideals and just laugh at the pricks.

[Guest bob_barron]

Marvin- when you find where to sign me up, hook me up too

[Guest Kotzenjunge]

Fo sheez, yo. I want a part of this. That $500 would be put towards the 5.0~! for BLACK MANTA~!, and I feel I've earned it, especially since Kazaa users are subjected to these fucking things every time they do so much as search for something.

 

Kotzenjunge

No You Fucking Monkey, I Don't Want To Be Your Goddamn Buddy

[Guest MarvinisaLunatic]

I filled out the form, since thats what I assume is the way for you to contact them about joining.

[Guest Kotzenjunge]

What I put in my message:

 

I should like to be kept abreast of developments in this case, as well as how to join the class filing suit against Bonzi. These pop-up advertisements have been a constant pain and often erroneously led me to call my cable internet provider and inquire why my modem wasn't performing at its optimum, as well as cause my computer to nearly crash at times, almost costing me a whole semester of college essays and projects.

 

Patrick Spoon

 

I want $500, dammit. I am willing to fib a little.

 

Kotzenjunge

Hates The Damn Monkey

[Guest cynicalprofit]

These adds are annoying beyond all belief, its good someone finally took a stand.

[Guest RobJohnstone]

I signed up. I can't count how many of my friends computers it has fucked with. To top it off it is hard as hell to uninstall, fuck bonzi

 

--Rob

[Guest LooseCannon]

I somehow doubt it's going to come out to $500 per user.

[Guest Kotzenjunge]

I'll take any money over no money. Even if it's a fifth of that, $100 for getting mildly annoyed is pretty damn good.

 

Kotzenjunge

It's All About The Benjamins

[Guest KingOfOldSchool]

Probably not. But so long as there's a chance for a bit of coin, even if it doesn't amount to the full $500, then I'm in.

[Guest MarvinisaLunatic]

My thoughts exactly. In the end, I figure the number of people who join up (this has been on Fark.com as well as TechTV, and will probably make newspapers and TV news soon)

will drive the amount of money per person down from $500, but even $50 is worth it.

[Guest red_file]

This is low. I mean really, really, almost below the fat kids suing fast food places low. Merely an abuse of the judicial system.

[Guest KingOfOldSchool]

Not really.

 

The fat dumbasses suing McDonald's are avoiding responsibility for ingesting food for years, which has been proven beyond a shadow of a doubt to be unhealthy. It's merely a case of someone blaming someone else.

 

Meanwhile, Bonzi's ads are completely and blantantly misleading, and are intended to "fake out" those surfing the web. Not to mention that these ads are very annoying and if some of this stuff gets on your comp it screws shit up, and it's often a bitch to get rid of. And that some people fooled by these ads aren't educated enough in the ways of the web to know that these ads are the product of an outside company that only wants to fuck shit up.

 

The fast food cases will most likely be thrown out for being a waste of time. But I think this case has some legitimate claims.

[Guest Jobber of the Week]

This is low. I mean really, really, almost below the fat kids suing fast food places low. Merely an abuse of the judicial system.

Someone was saying on SlashDot (I made my once-a-year trip there today) that it's probably more in the FTC's jurisdiction, but since the FTC won't touch anything related to the internet, this is just what happened.

 

Still, a group of players filed class action with a game publisher over misleading advertising of an online RPG and won. (I forgot the details, but it was vs Origin, I think.)

[Guest red_file]

It seems that most of the damages being represented in the lawsuit are that of annoyance; people are annoyed at the pop-ups and want them to go away. Annoyance, to me, seems a rather trivial reason to launch a lawsuit. I can't speak to actual, physical damages done by the pop-ups because they've never harmed my computers nor the computers of anyone I know.

 

But that's not even the centeral issue of why this is low. You yourself said:

 

But so long as there's a chance for a bit of coin, even if it doesn't amount to the full $500, then I'm in.

 

Others have said similar things. Would this even matter to you if there was no chance to get paid? If people have been legitimately damaged by the actions of this company that's one thing. Profiteering through the legal system is something entirely else. If you've been damaged by the pop-ups, you have my sympathies, but thus far you've merely presented yourself as looking for some quick cash.

 

So, again, this is little better than the fat kids now looking to get paid for ruining their health.

[Guest RobJohnstone]

It did temporarily damage afew pc's of my friends. I had to fix them They owe me for my time.

 

--Rob

[Guest LooseCannon]

This is the trivial sort of lawsuit people around here routinely rail against, except this one is worse. As soon as you can make some money, you sign yourself up, just like all of the people the people in this forum are always complaining about. At least the lady who sued McDonald's for the hot coffee had to put up initial resources at the risk of getting nothing. This is the sort of free-riding frivilous lawsuit that really does need to be removed from the legal system.

 

I can almost assure you that you're not going to see any significant money out of this. The class is going to be enormous and Bonzi only has so many resources to satisfy a judgement for one thing. But furthermore, the dollar price to put on the time wasted due to these fake error messages is quite insignificant. And you're only entitled to restitution matching actual damages. I'd guess you get a dollar or two tops.

[Guest Razor Roman]

While I don't know if suing for money is the way to go, maybe the should have tried for an injunction or something to prevent them from using those misleading "error ads". I do know people who have screwed up their computers installing Bonzi, Weather Bug, and all that other stuff.

[Guest DrTom]

This is the trivial sort of lawsuit people around here routinely rail against, except this one is worse.

I don't think it's worse, but I don't think it's any better, either. If you can conclusively show that Bonzi's ads damaged your PC and you had to spend time and money to get it fixed, then I'd say you have grounds for signing up. But just because you find the ads "annoying" is no reason. I loathe Doubleclick and scummy agencies like them, but I'm not going to sue them for making a buck legally. Bonzi's ads might be misleading, but savvy surfers know to avoid them, and I doubt they've caused much in the way of legitimate harm.

 

Besides, no one's getting $500 out of this. I'd expect the figure to be $200-250 before the shysters who took this one to court take their 40% of the pie.

[Guest DrTom]

These pop-up advertisements have been a constant pain and often erroneously led me to call my cable internet provider and inquire why my modem wasn't performing at its optimum, as well as cause my computer to nearly crash at times, almost costing me a whole semester of college essays and projects.

And Tough Enough 3 recaps, apparently. Damn Bonzi TO HELL~!

[Guest Kotzenjunge]

You people can laugh all you want, but when you're getting your DOUBLE SHOT~! of recaps late tonight, don't come crying to me!!

 

Kotzenjunge

Gives The Fans What They Want

[Guest griffinmills]

This is the trivial sort of lawsuit people around here routinely rail against, except this one is worse.

I don't think it's worse, but I don't think it's any better, either. If you can conclusively show that Bonzi's ads damaged your PC and you had to spend time and money to get it fixed, then I'd say you have grounds for signing up. But just because you find the ads "annoying" is no reason. I loathe Doubleclick and scummy agencies like them, but I'm not going to sue them for making a buck legally. Bonzi's ads might be misleading, but savvy surfers know to avoid them, and I doubt they've caused much in the way of legitimate harm.

 

Besides, no one's getting $500 out of this. I'd expect the figure to be $200-250 before the shysters who took this one to court take their 40% of the pie.

I can attest that I've had to repair at least 5 pc's where I work that automatically opened to Bonzi.com, automatically went there when searches were made, automatically installed Bonzi buddies that interuppt work etc. If only management would allow me to block more sites on the firewall it wouldn't be so bad. You are right though, savvy surfers avoid them, once they have been tricked. Since my time is worth about $85 an hour (salaried so it is hard to get an exact estimate) to the company they are pretty darn close to needing a $500 settlement.

[Guest LooseCannon]

Alright perhaps I jumped the gun a bit. Those that have been legitimately damaged by these ads, may have a cause of action, but those of us that were never stupid enough to be misled don't have a cause of action because we were slightly annoyed. And it is my understanding that you had to have been misled by the popup, otherwise you have no legitimate claim, and I'm sure the standard will be whether a reasonable person would have been misled by these pop-ups.