Posted by Gerry_VT on 5/30/06 10:49pm
Msg #123135

OT-Unlikely combination: Electronic signatures and humor

I was researching electronic signatures and came across a federal court case (http://www.emlf.org/Resources/cloud.pdf). The case is between the toy maker Hasbro and one of its suppliers. It seems Hasbro was marketing a toy named "Wonder World Aquarium". The purchaser of the toy would mix up a gel, put it in the aquarium, and stick plastic fish in the gel. The supplier in question was producing packets of "pretend blood" which was sold with some versions of the toy. The court elaborates:

“Pretend blood,” included in some of the packages, can be
added for even greater verisimilitude. The consumer can
choose among versions of Wonder World Aquarium that
range from “My Pretty Mermaid” to “Piranha Attack”—the
latter a scenario in which the pretend blood is doubtless a
mandatory rather than optional ingredient.

Where the electronic signatures come into play is that Hasbro sent an e-mail that increased the amount of "pretend blood" they wanted to buy, and the court decided that that the sender’s name on an e-mail satisfies the signature requirement of the statute of frauds, so Hasbro would have to pay for the "pretend blood".