Liability issues on our homebrew stuff

[pookycade]

Hi,

I was thinking of selling my arcade monstrosity on ebay or whatnot.  I've got two heavily modified Japanese Jamma sit down cabinets and per the wife, one has to go. My concern is this: although all of us are pretty meticulous in putting these things together, this stuff isn't exactly UL certified and I suppose there always exists some remote possibility of electrical fire or electrocution or such.  In fact, its quite obvious that anybody that bought one of these Japanese Jamma cabinets does not have adequate grounding on them. I've had the Sega reps tell me that these imported cabs are a remote shock hazzard and that they completely rewire the insides and properly ground them once they get them over here before selling them on the open US market. Has anybody thought about what exactly our liability is for this home built equipment when we sell it to someone else ? I am all for recouping my investment but reticent to sell to get back a lousy $800 - $1000 that I put into it if it potentially exposes me to multithousand (million ?) dollar lawsuits should anything go wrong.

[spectre]

if anything goes wrong they bought it...
tell them as is...
this way anything that goes wrong is out of your hands
or just have a disclaimer

::japanese cabinets may not be grounded properly to meet safety regulations::

soemthing like that
mameheads won't care... lol

[jakejake28]

yea, just do it the ebay way, and mention it in as little words as possible. then hide that inside a long winded description paragraph. put sold as is at the end of paragraph, and you have all your bases covered, by ebay law

[HeadRusch]

Sell it to a friend or family member, or dont sell it at all, and destroy it.  Its the only way to be sure.
I wont even do a tag-sale anymore...you get one nutjob who pretends to cut themselves on a glass ashtray you're trying to get rid of, and suddenly the $100 bucks you've made for the day doesn't mean much when that wont cover your first hour of attorney's fees.

[paigeoliver]

You don't have any liability. Only rich people and companies have liability. No one bothers to sue normal people because suing people is very expensive, and normal people do not have any money.

[Les]

You don't have any liability. Only rich people and companies have liability. No one bothers to sue normal people because suing people is very expensive, and normal people do not have any money.

This has to be the most uninformed post I have yet to see on these boards.

Yes, under some circumstances, if you have not covered your ass, you do have liability.

And yes there are people out there that will bother to sue normal people.  Enter small claims court.  In addition most people have money in the form of assets (house, car, ect...).  The comment that you will not be sued simply because your "normal" is pure stupidity.

Cover your ass!!!

There are plenty of grifts out there that look for suckers that will have liability.  They don't even have to sue you outright.  They can use the threat of a lawsuit to settle a claim (this is what happens in most civil cases, the case never goes to court, it is settled).

[paigeoliver]

Sure, you CAN sue normal people, but I have yet to ever see that happen.

Also as far as I have seen most Mame cabinet builders seem to be in their early 20s, and seem to have no assets to speak of. Thus they have nothing to be sued for. The sheer amount of "I can't afford to buy this $8 part" comments I see around here tends to back that up.

The few people with a large enough income to be worth suing wouldn't be building Mame cabinets for money, since there isn't any money in it.

If you are worried, then just leave the roms on and TELL them that it is illegal. They can't exactly sue you over a product they purchased KNOWING said product was not legal to begin with. I mean, no one sues their crack dealer, and no one sues the guys that used to sell bootleg audio tapes over the tape quality.

[anthony691]

Sure, you CAN sue normal people, but I have yet to ever see that happen.

Also as far as I have seen most Mame cabinet builders seem to be in their early 20s, and seem to have no assets to speak of. Thus they have nothing to be sued for. The sheer amount of "I can't afford to buy this $8 part" comments I see around here tends to back that up.

The few people with a large enough income to be worth suing wouldn't be building Mame cabinets for money, since there isn't any money in it.

If you are worried, then just leave the roms on and TELL them that it is illegal. They can't exactly sue you over a product they purchased KNOWING said product was not legal to begin with. I mean, no one sues their crack dealer, and no one sues the guys that used to sell bootleg audio tapes over the tape quality.

I agree w/ paigeoliver, it doesn't seem like something you need to worry about to me... last week my Pachinko machine fell on someone I don't know too well.. they just went home and even though they were angry; I don't think they wil sue me!

[Brax]

Jesus. I can't even believe this is a question. U.S......... gawd.

[Apollo]

I know, come and live in New Zealand we can kill, burn or MAME anyone and nobody can sue muahahahahaha!

[jakejake28]

d@mn capitalism... look what it does to people. and as far as "normal" people getting sued, how many of the people you see in small claims court are "normal"? just think of all the judge ___ shows you have seen.

[anthony691]

d@mn capitalism... look what it does to people. and as far as "normal" people getting sued, how many of the people you see in small claims court are "normal"? just think of all the judge ___ shows you have seen.

LOL! I hope you are jokeing!

Court shows are NOT a representation of small claims court AT ALL!

[spectre]

court shows = tv drama soccer moms watch until their precious oprah comes on, lol

[jakejake28]

d@mn capitalism... look what it does to people. and as far as "normal" people getting sued, how many of the people you see in small claims court are "normal"? just think of all the judge ___ shows you have seen.

LOL! I hope you are jokeing!

Court shows are NOT a representation of small claims court AT ALL!

oops, forgot the [sarcasm][/sarcasm] yea, i know they are just jokes for old people and soccer moms to watch.

[HeadRusch]

I'm glad I don't fit PO's "sweeping generalization" of the people who inhabit this board

PS: if you live in a house that your parents own, they sue your parents.  FYI.


Just because you don't think you are responsible, you probably are in the eyes of the law.  In fact, if you BUILD SOMETHING you are most definately 100% responsible.  

In fact, if I were to sell my mame cab (which I wouldn't, I'd give it away to a close friend or destroy it outright) I'd have a Contractural checklist going over how it was built and if there are any dangers, then I'd have parties sign it....then I'd have witnesses sign it, and then I'd have it notarized.

And I probably then wouldn't be legally covered, but it wuold look good in court that I attempted to do all the reasonable things to warn the purchaser of any potential faults.  

Of course if they can afford to buy your MAMECAB they *probably* aren't the suing type, but you never know.

[pookycade]

Well its been an interesting discussion to say the least    I happen to have aces up my sleeve on this one: my wife's father and several friends who are lawyers.  After a few long discussions, here is the condensed version of my findings which I thought all of us could benefit from. LET ME PREFACE BY SAYING THAT I AM NOT A LAWYER MYSELF AND THE SUBSEQUENT DISCUSSION SHOULD NOT BE REGARDED AS SOUND LEGAL ADVICE, IF YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS ABOUT YOUR LIABILITY THEN YOU NEED TO CONSULT A LAWYER YOURSELF. Anyway, with that disclaimer out of the way, back to our discussion.

BOTTOMLINE is that you are liable for whatever you build regardless of whether you sell or give it away or have others use it in your own home.  This doesn't apply to say a TV set you buy from best buy and then sell on ebay, which then malfunctions and burns down their house. It only applies if you made modifications to a device which could potentially cause a malfunction in that device and injure someone else.  There is however a potential way out of this. You have to sell it AS-IS. (no big surprise here). However, the AS-IS designation is actually a precise legal term (go figure), and you have to use that exact term in your contract.  So if you want to sell something, you need to type out a bill of sale, stating that you are selling it AS-IS and detailing as best you know what some of the known risks associated with the device are including electrical shock, electrocution, electrical fire, etc. You need to have both the seller and the buyer sign this form, stating that the buyer is aware of these risks and that no guarantees are being made as to the safety or suitability of the device and that he accepts this risk.  If you just state that you are selling the product AS-IS on your ebay ad that is NOT GOOD ENOUGH. You need to have the written signed contract. Even then you might still be sued, but you would likely prevail in court with that signed bill of sale in hand.  You need to do this even if you give the device away.  

Now knowing all of this I have still made the decision not to sell my arcade machine. I am just going to leave it in storage. Sure the risks are low for being sued, but the potential disaster that could ensue were anything to go wrong is just not worth the few dollars I might make off of it. Don't get me wrong, $1000 is ALOT of money to me, but it isn't worth the risk in my estimation even if it is for $1000. I'll wait until we buy a house and I have my own recroom to move two arcade machines into.

Of course, this can work to your advantage. For those of you looking to upgrade your MAME machine, I would build your second cabinet, tell your wife you are going to sell the other one and then whip out the liability issues once you finish the new one. Wallah, you now have yourself two MAME machines  

[paigeoliver]

I still think this is all nuts.

People sell tons of arcade games EVERY DAY. There is never a signed contract, you rarely ever even get a receipt.

The Mame cabinets you put together yourself are no different than any other arcade game. Any arcade game that isn't fresh out of the crate is likely to have modifications done to it (be it new sticks, repairs, new wiring, new monitor, or even a complete conversion, etc).

Vector game freaking catch on fire with startling regularity, and yet people still sell them ALL THE TIME.

I have never heard this mentioned by any of the arcade guys ever. It is basically a non-issue.

Go search through the old google archives, I doubt you will find any mention of this subject.

[MikeW]

Small point of law.  Many states DO NOT allow terms like AS IS or WHERE IS for consumer products.  The liability is there no matter what you do.  For instance, in Massachusetts a automobile CAN NOT be sold AS IS.  The vehicle MUST pass Mass. state inspection AND be usable for it's intended purpose of transportation or the buyer is entitled to their money back.  The ONLY way to get out of this in MA is to have the title changed to "Salvage".  I believe this can only be done by junkyards and insurance companies.
That being said, even if you have a contract stating the obvious safety issues you can still be sued.  A suit of this nature will cost many thousands just to win and more than likely you will settle due to your attorneys reccomendation.

[Chris]

Or the other solution is to go go to Bob Roberts' site and learn how to ground the cabinet properly...

In my original cabinet design, all the cabinet did was act as a box around a normal computer system, with everything using normal power cords going to a normal power strip.  Now that I've put in an arcade-style monitor and arcade-style trackball, I need to worry about grounding, because these do not have the regular consumer shielding and safeguards.

--Chris

[Wienerdog]

Now knowing all of this I have still made the decision not to sell my arcade machine. I am just going to leave it in storage.

Wouldn't it be funny if a capacitor in your arcade machine discharged, causing a fire in the storage facility and burning down the entire building leaving you facing a lawsuit for destruction of dozens of people's property?

[Wienerdog]

People sell tons of arcade games EVERY DAY. There is never a signed contract, you rarely ever even get a receipt.

Good idea, I agree.  The real concept here is to make sure there is no evidence of the sale actually taking place.  Only take cash, meet at a distant rural location,  file off all serial numbers from the components.  Only call the buyer from pay phones and hire someone off the street to make the actual sale.  Have that person tell the buyer after the sale that the cabinet was originally stolen, so be careful.

[shmokes]

If you really want to cover your bases you should kill they buyer.  Then you can keep the cabinet and the money and just put the cabinet back on Ebay.  You could probably do this multiple times.  You could even yell, "FATALITY!" at the proper moment.

[pookycade]

That being said, even if you have a contract stating the obvious safety issues you can still be sued.  A suit of this nature will cost many thousands just to win and more than likely you will settle due to your attorneys reccomendation.

Yegad people ! , looks like I've really touched some nerves here.  Honestly, I'm not hoping the sway anyones opinions one way or another. Everybody is going to do whatever they were planning on doing before and thats 100% fine with me. I just thought it should be at least something all of us think about for a moment.  The chances of anything really bad happening are really small for anything any of us sell. I am an electrical engineer and I have grounded the cabinets pretty well, but am I 100% certain that all of the solder connections I made are perfect, that wires won't come loose at some point after pounding for years on the machine and short out, that a 3 year old kid won't stick their hands inside and discharge themselves on a capacitor by accident because dad left the cabinet front access panel open. No, of course not ! Again, do I think this is going to happen: absolutely not. But on my potential personal cost/benefit analysis I'd rather not sell than sell, though admittedly I was sitting on the fence about this decision for a while. If I was factory assembly line producing this stuff I would have less of a problem, but this is best described as a one of a kind prototype. I've seen enough of others prototypes essentially burn out or blow up during my time in industry to be just a little more cautious than most. Maybe overly precautious, but thats a matter of experience and opinion. Most of us sell to one another so we know the score, and its not like I'm going to go suing Oscar or Andy or anyone else for that matter if their parts malfunction. Thats part of the risk I accept when getting into this. But god forbid anything catostrophic happens then this becomes an issue for someone else who doesn't share my views. Look, I hate our overly legalistic, assume no responsibility for anything society as much as the next person, but its a reality we all have to live in.  I am in residency training as a doctor and no matter what I do I can pretty much expect to be sued at some point during my lifetime, by some patient who will feel I didn't 100% satisfy all their expectations. Its a fact of life in this profession.  And the point made above is quite right, alot of hospitals settle even if they are in the right to avoid the lengthy trials and heavy legal costs involved. I still say sell away to your hearts content, its how this whole arcadecontrols hobby got started and none of us would have the great cabs we have without the sharing of ideas and parts. Just beware that there is always some peril involved when you get into something like this. Not much peril, but it is there nonetheless.