The Apple Inc (NASDAQ: AAPL) iPad apparently overheats when left in the sun, which makes it like almost everything else left to bake. A suit filed in federal court in Oakland, California claims that “does not live up to the reasonable consumer’s expectations created by Apple” because it “overheats so quickly under common weather conditions,” Bloomberg reports after a review of the complaint. The plaintiffs seek unspecified damages.

The legal action gets added to a lengthening list of complaints based on the idea that Apple’s perfect products are imperfect. Two weeks ago there was a national catastrophe when it was found out that some iPhone 4 handsets might have less-than-perfect 3G reception. Apple solved the problem, which it said was overblown, by offering rubber cases for the latest iPhone.

Apple has suffered for some time from the by-product of great success as it faces a rising number of legal challenges over how well its creations work, how much power the company has, and even why its does not do anything with the nearly $40 billion in cash and securities it has on hand. Many of the challenges come from fortune hunters who look at Apple’s balance sheet as a source of funds. No matter what the motivation, Apple’s legal costs must be a large multiple of what they were several years ago.

The overheating iPad and trouble with the iPhone 4 are the most well-publicized of Apple’s troubles because they involve millions of consumers and attract media attention. The real challenge to Apple’s dominance in its major markets is that the governments of the largest countries were it does business have begun to look at it as the next Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT), IBM (NYSE: IBM), Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), or Intel (NASDAQ: INTC). It has cornered one or more markets, and that fact is inherently bad for its competitors and therefore consumers.

The law is the law and there is no getting around that. What the law does not take into account is that people who would rather use Google to surf the web because it is the superior product in its industry. The same can probably be said for most of Apple’s products. Apple may charge its customers a premium price because people will pay it. Most of those customers do not object. They stand in line in the rain for hours for the privilege of owning an Apple product.

Regulation will never take into account consumer demand. Monopolies are bad by almost any measure, and that includes the measure of justifiable market share due to real demand.

Douglas A. McIntyre

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