Date:         Thu, 27 Apr 2006 21:25:22 -0400
Reply-To:     robert shawn feller <feller@CARBONCOW.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         robert shawn feller <feller@CARBONCOW.COM>
Subject:      Re: Ethics & CarFax
In-Reply-To:  <397.1f2ede3.3181abac@aol.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

Ah yes, the old day when everything was better!

Do people really lose sleep over thinking about car fax ethics?

This is the most overly opinionated board I have every been on, very
entertaining at the least!

Shawn

From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf Of
Jeff Oxroad
Sent: Thursday, April 27, 2006 1:08 AM
To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: Re: Ethics & CarFax

In a message dated 4/26/2006 12:00:56 PM Pacific Standard Time,
motorbruce@HOTMAIL.COM writes:

I have  been meaning to start this thread for a very long time.



I applaud the query into the ethics of almost any practice. It reminds me a
little of the old America. You know the one where people were held
accountable,  where lying wasn't OK just because one apologized or more
recently just
because one pretends they didn't lie even in light of overwhelming evidence
to
the contrary. The America where we didn't honor criminals rights so
excessively that we put bars on the windows of our own homes and car alarms
in  from
the factory. A time when we weren't bamboozled into thinking that  ATMs are
taking jobs Americans don't want. And a time when weren't being  bamboozled
into
believing the illegal immigrants in the home depot parking lot  offering to
do
carpentry, plumbing, dry wall installation, painting and the like  all for a
substandard wage are also jobs Americans don't want.

Here's what I think about the most recent thread. VW, probably by some
corporate edict or not, makes their staff so often unhelpful and incompetent
that
stealing ETKA from them is fine. Also, this in light of the fact that  they
don't make ETKA available to the public, and then their staff often is
unhelpful and/or downright incompetent, their service departments are snake
oil
salesmen, and none if this is what we signed on for when we bought the
vehicle
from the showroom entitles us to break parts of our ethical contract them.

All this because they have broken their contract with us. We had an
expectation of buying a vehicle they would be willing to service and offer
us  help in
the maintenance, and they have left us high and dry. If VW were at all
interested in repairing our vehicles for a fair price and properly we would
have
no need for ETKA on our own. If their parts department were willing to help
us...well, different story, maybe. (Some folks at VW of course are extremely
helpful. Some of us have encountered them. But since we don't always have
the
benefit of dealing with a "good" dealership we are often stuck in the mire
of
their unwillingness to help, so we are forced, I would argue, to help
ourselves--if you'll pardon the pun.)

As for Carfax, by the letter of their contract, you could not show the
carfax report to your spouse, sister, the person selling the car, the person
you're selling the car to, and so on. I think their contract is an effort
to keep
pirating on a major scale to a minimum. I had Carfax for a  time and
probably
ran 50 reports. Some were cars I was looking to buy, some  where just cars I
saw on the street and was curious, some were friends cars. At  the time I
never
thought about the contract and probably had not read it fully.  I didn't
think I was doing anything illegal.

I realize ignorance of the law is not an excuse. And remember I like  the
old
America were people were held accountable. But I don't think the spirit  of
the law is being broken if I show the carfax to the person interested in
buying my car, or if my friend in a car club asks me to check out a car.
The fact
is I'm interested in running the VIN on almost any car. That's why I  paid
for
the carfax service. So when someone in my club says, can you run a  VIN on
this 75 Gremlin, I'd say sure let's check it out. Technically the  law would
be
broken not when I ran the report, but when I shared the info.  with my
friend.

Similarly I'm guessing republishing classified ads to the list is probably
technically in many cases a copyright infringement. So then would be quoting
an
 article from a newspaper or Road and Track about the new Beetle on the
list. I'm guessing quoting Bentley manual is a copyright infringement.

But I would say since we are a modern day club of sorts, as opposed to  a
revenue generating business, we possibly are not violating the spirit of the
c
ontract with carfax. I think it's OK to show the carfax report to my spouse
or
to my friend or person interesting in buying my car. I think Carfax probably
thinks that's OK as well.

Having said that Carfax may have a different point of view, obviously I
can't speak for them. But in the real world who would buy Carfax if you
couldn't
show it to at least one other person.

"I'd like to offer you less than the asking price for your car because
carfax shows it was in an accident before you purchased it."

"I'm not aware of that. Let me see."

"I'm sorry sir. According to my contract with Carfax I can't show you this.
You'll have to take me at my word."

Best,
Jeff
83.5 Westy
LA,CA



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