It is all about liability. A brick and mortar business has a reputation
to uphold and they can be tracked down when something goes wrong with a
product and as such take extra care to ensure they aren't bothered by
lawsuits for dangerous products.
Amazon and eBay have no liability and the sellers on these places have
no long term connection to the products they sell, so based on price,
they will make it as cheaply as possible. Yet it works for the first
month or two that the feedback is still valid. After that if it burns
your house down or kills the user what do they care?
My understanding is that back in the 40s and early 50s TV fires were
common in the US until UL was given the power to regulate production
(here in Canada we had CSA - same thing) and fires disappeared as a risk
in electrical equipment (for the most part). We are back in the wild
west (it wasn't really wild, towns regulated guns - I blame Wild Bill
Hickock for pretending it was) era for electrical stuff and I forsee a
LOT of people being hurt or killed before regulations are enacted (those
darn regulations!) to protect populations from unscrupulous producers of
cut-rate equipment.
John :-#)#
--
(Please post followups or tech inquiries to the USENET newsgroup)
John's Jukes Ltd.
MOVED to #7 - 3979 Marine Way, Burnaby, BC, Canada V5J 5E3
(604)872-5757 (Pinballs, Jukes, Video Games)
www.flippers.com
"Old pinballers never die, they just flip out."