MaximumPC 2008 10

Blame It on Canada

Dog, two months ago I ordered

a SumoSac from Sumolounge.

com. It’s basically a giant

foam-filled beanbag chair

covered in microsuede. The

order process went fine, but

after waiting two weeks, I

still had not received any

notification that my order

shipped. I emailed and called

twice. I was assured my order

would be fulfilled soon. It

has been more than a month

and still nothing. To make

matters worse, now when I

try to email or phone, there is

no response. The only saving

grace is that my credit card

has not been billed yet. I’m

willing to wait a bit longer

if the company is truly that

backed up, but I don’t want to

wait forever, and now I can’t

even get in touch with anyone.

—Logan Holmberg

The Dog spoke with Andrew

Milligan, owner of Sumo

Lounge, about Logan’s order.

Milligan said the company

had experienced problems

getting its Canadian bro-

kerage account up and run-

ning. He also explained that

the SumoSac has been a hot

seller and demand has been

overwhelming.

Milligan said a fix for

the Canadian problem was

in place and he would issue

a $50 credit to Logan for the

delay and offer compensation

to other customers in Canada

who had to wait more than

7 to 10 days for their orders.

Milligan also posted a mes-

sage addressing the problem

on the company’s website:

“All together, we dropped the

ball with our customer service

and have just recently final-

ized a long-term solution to

ship to Canada.”

The Dog spoke with

Logan, who said he was sat-

isfied with Sumo Lounge’s

response. The Dog himself

was pleased with Sumo

Lounge’s prompt actions. In a

time when most companies

find it easier to ignore custom-

ers rather than provide great

service, Sumo Lounge is doing

the right thing and should be

applauded for it.

A Trojan Mouse?

I’ll admit I don’t know a whole

lot about Trojans. But I was

installing the drivers for my

Logitech wireless mouse and

keyboard combo along with

the desktop advisor when

Kaspersky Antivirus told me

there was a Trojan in my F:

drive. That’s my CD drive. I

halted the installation and did

a virus scan, which came up

clean. I explored the disk and

Kaspersky identified a file on

it as the Trojan. Could a repu-

table company like Logitech

be infecting its customers?

— Joshua Parnell

Josh, you’ve run into a false

positive. Kaspersky is iden-

tifying LDMClient.exe as a

generic Trojan because of

what the executable does.

LDMClient.exe downloads

updates and news flashes from

Logitech, which Kaspersky

is identifying as Trojan-like

routines. But just to make sure

Logitech didn’t somehow

distribute a Trojan on its install

CD, the Dog contacted the

company; a spokesperson

explained that the Logitech

Desktop Manager is safe and

that, no, it had not unwittingly

distributed a virus with its key-

board and mouse combos.

Judge, Jury, and

Resetter

My son and I have been

fans of the Battlefield game

franchise since Battlefield

1942 and have purchased

every game and expansion

pack for the series. I’ve heard

many horror stories of play-

ers getting their stats erased

by cheating or stat padding

but never thought it would

happen to us, as we play by

the rules. Recently, I received

an email from EA saying my

son’s account stats were reset

due to exploitation of the

game/service mechanics/

scoring system. There is a

mechanism for disputing the

accusations, but the result

was less than satisfactory.

EA told us: “Thank you

for contacting the Battlefield

2142 EA Support Team. After

reviewing your account it

has been found that you have

abused the scoring system

in order to achieve an unfair

advantage. Unfortunately,

evidence was found that

matched or exceeded our

current criteria for this type

of abuse. Rest assured that

your account, its stats, and

the abuse were fully reviewed

and the evidence verified

before taking any action.

This action was taken for

the benefit of the Battlefield

online community and its

members. I’m afraid that

there is no further appeal

process in this matter, and we

hope that moving forward

you will not attempt to abuse

the Battlefield 2142 scoring

system again, as it may result

in the termination of your

online access.

Our consumer advocate investigates...

SumoSac Slowdown

Trojan Mouse

Cheating at Battlefield

wATChdog^

maximum pc ta@Es a 7itE out o; 7ad gEaG

22 q MAXIMUMPC | oct 08 | http://www.maximumpc.com

Sumo Lounge is compensating Canadians who had to wait more than

10 days to receive their sacs.