Goodrich v Alterra Mountain Company Settlement

[HardDaysNight]

That's not Ikon's fault…

You still don’t understand. It has nothing to do with fault. It has to do with lawyers putting together a class action (which doesn’t require a large number of participants), bringing suit and extorting the target, in this case Alterra, to settle because settling is cheaper than defending the case to the bitter end. Attempts to restrain this type of behavior at the legislative level have failed completely because a majority of both houses are comprised of lawyers and tort lawyers are major campaign contributors and have a huge lobby.

 

[Brian Finch]

I still don't understand why Alterra is getting sued. It's not like they, or Epic, or any of the independent areas, made the call to shut down. That came from governors and local governments not only for brick and mortar entities but ski areas as well. Would people be complaining and asking for $$ back on an unused pass if they figured on skiing Mammoth for 10 days in June but the snow melted by the end of May? Ikon and other passes sell on the basis of opportunity. Areas covered by Ikon were open for the most part starting in November or December. The OPPORTUNITY for everyone with a pass to ski was provided by Ikon/Alterra.

Whether people chose to wait (ski Mammoth in June) or hit up the first chair on the first day is up to the individual. @AKMINK got 2 days on her Ikon last season due to injury. That's not Ikon's fault any more than the Covid shutdown was. She *could* have skied at one of the local Ikon areas before the Gathering but chose not too. Again, not on Ikon.

I get the angst but I believe people's blame is falling on the wrong entity. The pass is for the ski season. In 2020 the season happened to end in early March through no fault of Alterra/Ikon.

I don’t think you get the angst.

These folks are bottom feeders, they prey on service workers and have perpetuated their “image” of Mtn lifestyle while wrecking the very environment they sell.

Bare minimum, Ikon / Alterra has 3x used pics of me skiing in their campaigns without compensation.

They sold record passes in subsequent years & have contributed lil to the community.

 

[Andy Mink]

I don’t think you get the angst.

These folks are bottom feeders, they prey on service workers and have perpetuated their “image” of Mtn lifestyle while wrecking the very environment they sell.

Bare minimum, Ikon / Alterra has 3x used pics of me skiing in their campaigns without compensation.

They sold record passes in subsequent years & have contributed lil to the community.

I don't doubt what you say, but my comment about angst is solely related to the early shutdown of the 19-20 season, whether or not pass holders skied or not, and if anyone is due compensation from a company that had little to no control over the matter.

Just curious, have you contacted them about use of your pictures?

 

[Brian Finch]

I don't doubt what you say, but my comment about angst is solely related to the early shutdown of the 19-20 season, whether or not pass holders skied or not, and if anyone is due compensation from a company that had little to no control over the matter.

Just curious, have you contacted them about use of your pictures?

Here, they refused to let anyone hike, skin or snowshoe.

Re - pictures: I requested to be compensated & asked that they stop using my photos in campaigns only to be told they owned the rights to my images.

 

[Brian Finch]

@Andy Mink - perhaps you site admins feel I should “suck that up” too?

 

[dbostedo]

Re - pictures: I requested to be compensated & asked that they stop using my photos in campaigns only to be told they owned the rights to my images.

Why do they think they own the photos? Who took them, and was that person working for Alterra or a related company at the time?

@Andy Mink - perhaps you site admins feel I should “suck that up” too?

Two things - 1) Andy asked a simple question and you answered it. No need to assume something more negative. 2) Andy responded as himself. There is no "site admins" implied in any way just because he's a moderator. The site staff isn't a monolithic posting machine or anything.

 

[skiki]

Apparently at times (or maybe always) the photo rights belong to the photographer/ the organization who hired them. There’s a photo of my daughter taken after the Cerro Grande fire in Los Alamos, NM. If we want a print without copyright stuff on it, we have to pay (I asked, I think it was a 10% discount granted us.)

 

[Pequenita]

I still don't understand why Alterra is getting sued.

They got sued because the ski version of ambulance chasers convinced a bunch of passholders they didn't get what they paid for. Why Alterra settled: they aren't paying out anything and actually get something (renewing passholders or day visitors) if a class member makes a claim and uses it. It's like the Ticketmaster settlement - no one actually got money; we just got credits good on future tickets. This is way cheaper than paying a bunch of lawyers to litigate.

 

[cantunamunch]

Why Alterra settled: they aren't paying out anything and actually get something (renewing passholders or day visitors) if a class member makes a claim and uses it.

Exactly.

This is why I am thinking if the lawsuit hadn't happened spontaneously, AMC might have invented a similar pseudo-payout on their own.

 

[cantunamunch]

The site staff isn't a monolithic posting machine or anything.

*cues Also Sprach Zarathustra intro*

 

[slidingmike]

Apparently at times (or maybe always) the photo rights belong to the photographer/ the organization who hired them. There’s a photo of my daughter taken after the Cerro Grande fire in Los Alamos, NM. If we want a print without copyright stuff on it, we have to pay (I asked, I think it was a 10% discount granted us.)

Correct, photographer (or who hired them) will have copyright. But to use that commercially, they will need a model release. Brian likely has a case if he wants to find a good copyright lawyer.

Of course, that has nothing to do with this case or settlement.

 

[Philpug]

These folks are bottom feeders, they prey on service workers and have perpetuated their “image” of Mtn lifestyle while wrecking the very environment they sell.
...

And Vail doesn't?

They sold record passes in subsequent years & have contributed lil to the community.

These issues have nothing to do with the topic at hand.

Here, they refused to let anyone hike, skin or snowshoe.

They are renting the land, they are responsible for what happens on the land while the lease is in effect. It was the same here in Tahoe, there was no uphill traffic allowed and I don't recall any resort that does not normally allow uphill traffic did during the shutdown allow it.

Re - pictures: I requested to be compensated & asked that they stop using my photos in campaigns only to be told they owned the rights to my images.

We were at a Vail Resort when we first launched the site, while we were booting up we were asked in if we wanted to be in some photos, we agreed and had to sign off on the use of our likenesses. I think you could have a lawyer send a letter.

 

[fatbob]

I don’t think you get the angst.

These folks are bottom feeders, they prey on service workers and have perpetuated their “image” of Mtn lifestyle while wrecking the very environment they sell.

Bare minimum, Ikon / Alterra has 3x used pics of me skiing in their campaigns without compensation.

They sold record passes in subsequent years & have contributed lil to the community.

There's a lot to unpick here.

I'm not a fan of the corporate Disneyfication of NA skiing while at the same time recognising it has delivered a lot of pass value to me across multiple locations.

And personally I think its fair to say that , editorally, on this site Alterra gets a far easier ride than VR. Look at the rolling cycle of gatherings for instance.

But it does look to me that you're conflating many issues that are better addressed separately.

1 Fairness or otherwise of compensation re Covid forced early resort shutdowns in 2020. This should be purely a consumer issue and not blurred with other local gripes.

2 America's attitude to legal risk and litigation which lies behind access to land.

3 The way the pandemic has rebooted people's living habits.

4 Locals' own life choices re home and work.

5 The question of how much a large corporate which dominates a town should give back to the community. The whole symbiotic relationship there with town businesses and services. I can see some possible extremes there if everyone wanted to be confrontational e.g. a town imposes exceptionally high targeted taxes/ fees on the corporate because most of its services go on serving the corporate and its customers. Alternately the corporate tries to impose high royalties on all local businesses that simply wouldn't have the footfall without the corporate bringing in the people.

6 Your own personal legal position re image rights etc. Don't know quite how the US works but seems to me if you are in a public place you don't get a lot of protection, income rights etc hence celebrity pap shots in the street.

 

[Laurel Hill Crazie]

I think the compensation is a little thin. I think a voucher for one day's skiing would be much better. $10 off a $100+ day ticket is not much of an incentive to pick that option. As has been pointed out by many, covid happened, and everything was shut down, no fault of Alterra. What's my grip? The "trip" insurance offered with the pass was useless. My wife's and my claims were denied. If there was going to be a class action suit against anyone, it should have been against the "insurance" company. That phony "insurance" was a scam. The insurance company gambled and lost but somehow avoided paying out on valid claims.

 

[jmeb]

In my view, the shutdown in March 2020 isn't Alterra's fault, but I can see the frustration of those who could barely use their passes that year. The business model is structured so that people favor purchasing season passes for a week-long ski vacation, rather than the old business model of a resort-specific multi-day discount.

I think this is an under-considered factor. When you use market power to heavily influence consumers into "unlimited" models -- you open yourself up to this.

I don't think the outcome is great for consumers, but I also don't really feel bad for Alterra.

 

[fatbob]

I think this is an under-considered factor. When you use market power to heavily influence consumers into "unlimited" models -- you open yourself up to this.

I don't think the outcome is great for consumers, but I also don't really feel bad for Alterra.

I think practically the specific circumstances of Covid are a non-issue. Yeah there were winners and losers (or rather "Didn't lose much or anything" and "Losers" bearing in mind that net everyone lost in some capacity from a loss in earnings or amenity or personal relationships for a non trivial portion of their life.

I think there would be a far better case against any megapass if the advertised or expected season were cut short for finanical reasons or because they'd failed to recruit or retain enough staff or whatever non external factor. There is a flaw in the model - effectively for a single product there are many different use cases - arguably the person who was going to only use 3 days peak season and then hoped to use again in spring was on the wrong product from a risk perspective, the ski bum who'd already clocked 50+ days was already on the best product as it's hard to see a product that would have got him that skiing cheaper.

 

[Seldomski]

I don't buy the 'you shoulda used your pass by then anyway' argument.

These passes and day tickets are priced specifically to entice someone who skis about 1 week a year to purchase them. So buying them specifically for spring skiing is plausible. If your kids' spring break happened to fall on the wrong side of March, you lost out.

 

[zircon]

These passes and day tickets are priced specifically to entice someone who skis about 1 week a year to purchase them. So buying them specifically for spring skiing is plausible. If your kids' spring break happened to fall on the wrong side of March, you lost out.

+1 on this. Spring break, whether school or college is peak season with big crowds. Not even “spring skiing” yet. Everything shut down right in the middle of spring break for my graduate program. Schools on a quarter system often have spring break the week after.

Note: I don’t care either way about the “settlement” (lol marketing campaign slickly disguised to make alterra look sympathetic). I got 25ish days on my pass that year anyway.

 

[Seldomski]

+1 on this. Spring break, whether school or college is peak season with big crowds. Not even “spring skiing” yet. Everything shut down right in the middle of spring break for my graduate program. Schools on a quarter system often have spring break the week after.

Note: I don’t care either way about the “settlement” (lol marketing campaign slickly disguised to make alterra look sympathetic). I got 25ish days on my pass that year anyway.

Yes I also agree with the sentiment that these were really unusual circumstances and getting any money back at all is to be appreciated, there were/are bigger fish to fry, etc.

Just voicing my opinion about the general philosophy of refunds related to interruptions in service for the Ikon as well as Epic passes. With the day tickets priced to feel punitive, I am very unsympathetic toward Vail/Alterra.

 

[cantunamunch]

Just voicing my opinion about the general philosophy of refunds related to interruptions in service for the Ikon as well as Epic passes. With the day tickets priced to feel punitive, I am very unsympathetic toward Vail/Alterra.

I don't know about your streaming adverts but ours have been on and on and on about Epic Day Passes being ~$37ea for an about-to-expire limited time.