CD/DVD Distributors

[Jeff Spaleta]

On Sun, Aug 31, 2008 at 7:02 AM, Mani A <a.mani.cms at gmail.com> wrote:
> Vendors should clearly state the quality of the media being used.

I do not agree with this. I think vendors should be required to have a
stated warranty on the media to be listed.  Individual customers can
choose vendors based on the terms of the competing warranties and on
quality by doing the comparison shopping on their own. I think its
very inappropriate for "the project" to get into the business of
ranking individual vendors.  If they have a warranty on media, and
abide by the terms of that warranty then that is what matters.  If
they aren't abiding by the terms of the warranty they offer customers,
then they get pulled of the list.

I do not think we are equipped to make a media quality assessment in
any substantial way.  It's not like we are going to be pulling random
samples from their service and doing the quality assurance testing
ourselves.  Bad media happens, even when using media vendors who are
thought to have statistically few problems with their media products.
When bad media happens we must rely on the vendors to stand behind the
terms of the warranty statements in place at the time of sale.  If
they can't live up to the warranty statements then they get booted
from our list.  At the most we can set some minimum threshold as to
the expected warranty terms to be listed...for all vendors...including
our free media project.

> We also need to distinguish between those who do it for excessive
> profit and those who do not.

Market forces decide what is excessive and what is not.  If you find
one vendor's price is excessive then you, and every individual
customer, can choose another vendor.  For all we know the higher
priced vendors have additional quality control procedures which ensure
a higher quality service. I'm not going to punish a vendor who wants
to set a higher price in exchange for a more reliable retail service
than its competitors. If they feel the market can support the higher
price along side less expensive retail services...then they should be
allowed to compete. It's not our place to set the nominal market
price.  That's called price fixing.. and that's generally a bad idea.

-jef