A Boston man has filed a class-action lawsuit accusing hardware maker HP and office supply retailer Staples of colluding to inflate the price of printer ink cartridges in violation of federal antitrust law. According to the suit, HP allegedly paid Staples $100 million to refrain from selling inexpensive third-party ink cartridges...
Everyone knows that printer ink is a swindle: they sell you the printer cheaply, then sell the colors — unremarkable commodities, let us not forget — at prices that would make a perfumer blush.
The companies have also turned to using the ink equivalent of DRM, the use of microchips embedded in ink cartridges that work with a corresponding technical mechanism in the printer that blocks the use of unauthorized third-party ink. Adding insult to injury, most printers are lying, filthy ink thieves, according to a recent study, misreporting that they are low on ink when they are not.
I can vouch for the latter allegation, based on my experiences with Epson and HP printers. But the problem with a class action lawsuit is that even when successful the bulk of the penalty $ goes to the attorneys, not the consumers.
