Motorola Aura Contract Illegal?
I was reading Motorola legal tie to pull pricey Aura phone off eBay, and it struck me that some scary stuff is going on if you are going to have to spend $2000 on a phone, only to never be able to resell it:
A source close to the company told Register Hardware that in order to maintain Aura’s glow of exclusivity, buyers will be required to “sign into a contract that states they can’t sell it on eBay”. The source added that if an Aura owner wants to sell their phone after they’ve bought it then they’ll only have one option: to sell it back to the manufacturer.
Presumably, each Aura sold will carry a unique id number, possibly above and beyond an IMEI code, that’ll be linked to a specific buyer. So should you shirk your contractual obligations and offer your handset for auction, then Motorola’s legal department will come knocking on your door.
I would think that reselling your own phone would be covered by the first sales doctrine or consumer protection laws. What do you think?
| This entry was posted on Monday, November 3rd, 2008 at 7:44 pm and is tagged with consumer protection laws, imei code, ebay, scary stuff, contractual obligations, exclusivity, handset, motorola, auction. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback. |
I don't think you would have that problem with the Motorola Krave. It's got a full touch screen and a 2 MP camera. I've been a huge fan of it ever since I started working with Motorola. Has anyone seen it online? (motorola.com/krave) It's definitely my top pick.