14 DAY TRIAL // Advertising the iPad as “an outside computing device” is unlawful, maintains Scott Cole & Associates, APC. The firm is known to have already filed a lawsuit against Apple in San Francisco last month.
“Apparently undeterred by a rash of consumer complaints and the filing of a national class action lawsuit, Apple, Inc. has continued to market its iPad tablet as an outside computing device,” Scott Cole & Associates, APC, the law firm that filed the lawsuit, said.
In a report dated August 16, 2010, the firm said that Apple has been engaging in a marketing campaign that promises exaggerated functionality of the tablet device, both outdoors and indoors.
Temperature conditions are cited, with “the computer routinely [shutting] down quickly in such situations,” the suit alleges.
“Apple claims the iPad can be used in the sun, in your car, and in warm climates up to 95 degrees,” explains Scott Cole, the principal attorney for the plaintiffs.
However, “numerous reports, going back months now, explain that the device shuts down in temperatures as low as the mid-70s,” Cole notes.
“Did Apple really not know about this before it sold nearly four million units?”, Cole wonders.
The law firm points out that Apple has been advertising the iPad as being suitable for outdoor use, and even in warm environments (including as an over-the-stove cooking aid, the firm said), yet such usages are “unrealistic, if not outright dangerous,” notes Scott Cole & Associates.
“Sticking the iPad to your motorcycle’s gas tank with Velcro and expecting it to work for more than a block or two is absurd,” explains Cole.
In June, Apple highlighted a clever video by filmmaker Jesse Rosten who showed how he used his iPad just about everywhere, including on his motorcycle.
“Continuing this unrealistic marketing campaign may be profitable in the short term, but it denies consumers the right to make informed purchasing decisions,” he adds. “That’s unlawful,” Cole emphasizes.
Entitled “Baltazar, et al. v. Apple, Inc. (USDC Case # C10-03231EMC),” the suit seeks damages and a Court Order stopping all advertising of the iPad that is deemed “illegal.”
As of yet, Apple has not responded to these allegations.