(Some rambling thoughts ...)

Steve Kale wrote, in part:

>>What¹s wrong with a company (anyone) wanting to protect and
>>generate a return from its intellectual capital?

That's indirectly one of the legal issues: How far does the protection
(legal monopoly) extend? Several courts have stated that the monopoly does
not extend into adjacent markets, including after market replacement parts,
which seems similar to aftermarket ink sales.

>>Nothing wrong with shopping around for a free lunch but
>>you should be happy you had a free lunch this far.

I don't want to see Epson damaged by this any more than I want to see the
aftermarket ink and cartridge sellers damaged. I think the challenge here
is to come up with a win-win strategy. I agree we should not expect to free
ride on anyone, and at the low end we probably have been.

Being realistic, what may happen is that Epson's actions will cut off the
mass market of cheap, pre-filled carts, while more sophisticated and
determined people -- including probably the real photo enthusiasts as
opposed to average snap shooters -- will find ways to circumvent the
problem, such as buying the empty carts on eBay or from an oversees seller
and re-filling. Re-filling carts seems like a problem Epson will have to
fight by making the carts very re-fill un-friendly. Blocking all the
easy-refill carts from overseas will probably be too expensive to bother
with.


Tony Wells wrote, in part:

>... Low useage amateurs would be worse off while professional
>printers would be better off,

In the original IBM case where their tying of punch card sales to the
business machines was declared an illegal "tying" agreement, the economic
justification for the IBM conduct was said to be that the punch cards were a
method of "metering" usage. The way the high volume users paid more than
the low volume users, which seemed like a fair way to more closely equate
price with the value of the machine to the user.

If the scenario of the more sophisticated people more easily getting around
the ban happens, it may end up that the higher volume users in the real
world figure out how to avoid the meter, while the less sophisticated pay
the premium.

I have assumed Epson, in fact, is not selling the more sophisticated
machines at a loss. The Epson rep who visited me the week before they filed
the ITC matter seemed mostly concerned with the low end. The 220 was the
printer we discussed the most in this regard. He stated Epson lost money on
those sales, and to compound the damage, the 220 was so good it was seen as
cannibalizing the sales of the profitable, more expensive printers.

While B&W ink sales are hardly the main focus of Epson's concern, I'd be
rather happy to see a solution that allowed Epson to compete head to head
with the others that are doing this same thing at the 260 level (letter or
A4 size) if the 13" or 1800-2400 and up level was wide open.

Epson has made some fine printers for our purposes. I hope they continue to
do so. It would sure be nice if both sides saw each other as partners as
opposed to adversaries.

As a Hasselblad rep once said to me: photographers tend to be creative and
cheap. I can't see Epson succeeding in keeping at least the B&W enthusiasts
in their proprietary, expensive box. It's just not going to happen.

Paul
www.PaulRoark.com