I hesistate to wade into this, but what the hell... I don't think it's that simple, Rob.
Yes, if you pay for an item that you have not yet received, a transaction of some sort has occurred. You can sell your rights to that camera (to continue with the *ist D analogy) even if you don't have the camera in hand. Since there's an Latin legal maxim, "nemo dat non quod habet", "no man can sell what he doesn't own", and since you can sell your rights to that camera, you've obviously acquired something, even though it's not yet a camera. People actually sell their rights to something that they do not yet have possession of all the time. It's common in real estate to sell agreements of purchase and sale, during periods of a hot market. It's called flipping property. That being said. although once you've paid for your *ist D you have rights, and some sort of transaction has occurrred, we certainly can't say that the transaction has been completed, can we? What about the warranty? Would you want to say that it starts running when you paid the money, or when you received the camera? What if the boatload of *ist D's headed for the New World sinks. Could either Pentax or the store to which you paid the money say, "sorry, you're camera went down with the ship. The risk was yours, as the transaction has been completed; you lose!" No, the risk of such loss is upon the vendor, because the transaction hasn't been completed. I guess what I'm saying is that the transaction of the sale is not complete untill ~all consideration~ flows both ways, between buyer and seller. Until then, it's a sale still in progress. Looking at it that way, no *ist D has been sold to date - at least not outside of Japan, where someone on this list says a camera store that is out of stock says that they've sold some. regards, frank Rob Brigham wrote: > Yep, and the sales these dealers are making WILL result in the exchange > of goods/services. It is an order only if no commitment has been made, > once this has been done (usually financial, but could be a legal > commitment) it is a sale - ask the IRS. If you buy something on ebay or > any other way, the sale is made when you send the cash, not when you > receive the goods. Doesn't matter what part of the world you are in - > its all the same. > -- Honour - that virtue of the unjust! -Albert Camus
