Date:         Wed, 26 Apr 2006 13:00:50 -0700
Reply-To:     John Bange <jbange@GMAIL.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         John Bange <jbange@GMAIL.COM>
Subject:      Re: Ethics & CarFax
In-Reply-To:  <BAY103-F1605A2B688EAD95A26C944C7BC0@phx.gbl>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

> Is it really ethical for any of us to put a CarFax request on the list? I
> would suggest that it is not.
>

Valid point. By the letter of the agreement, it ain't kosher. But then
again, you have to consider the "de facto" situation in addition to the "de
jure" rules of the agreement. CarFax quite certainly knows that when a
fellow signs up to look up a couple cars he's considering buying, that he'll
also probably let one or two of his pals look up a couple cars. After all,
what's the difference between one guy looking up 12 cars and six guys
looking up two cars each? Judging by their pricing ($20 for one lookup, or
$25 for unlimited) they're not really interested in the the occasional
onesies and twosies guys. Their policy is zero-tolerance on sharing, but the
real purpose of that is likely to allow them to cancel egregious sharers
based on loose, subjective, "I know excessive sharing when I see it"
analysis. Clearly some sharing is tolerated. Whether this tolerance is more
without care, like a restaurant allowing two people to order one entree, or
more with resignation, as with retail acceptance of inventory "shrinkage",
it's impossible to say without asking. I tend to believe the former, as they
clearly have made little effort to provide a reasonably cheap "one shot"
lookup price, say something around the $4 mark.

--
John Bange
'90 Vanagon - "Geldsauger"