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Think Secret's Nick dePlume Revealed
Nick dePlume has a name, after all. Apple filed a lawsuit against the pseudonymous founder and editor of Think Secret, who correctly predicted two just-announced Apple products and has been the subject of several cease-and-desist letters from Apple in the past; dePlume's identity has now been revealed. Reader willibeast writes "The Harvard Crimson reports that 'Apple Computer, Inc. is suing a Harvard undergraduate who runs a popular Mac information website for disclosing details about unreleased Apple products, including two unveiled at this week's Macworld conference. Nineteen-year-old Nicholas M. Ciarelli '08, known on the internet as Nick dePlume, has run the site, thinksecret.com, since age 13.'"
[sarcasm]Dang, if only that had sued him 2 years earlier he'd still be a minor and wouldn't be responsible....[/sarcasm]
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
Well, Nick dePlume will have to find out via his website contact page, which offers tipsters "complete anonymity," and urges visitors to submit "news tips" and "insider information".
Who knows? Maybe he'll get another insider tip reassuring him that Jobs was quoted as saying "Just pull a lawsuit stunt to scare the shit of this kid, bwahahaha."
Rock that crushes, Paper & Scissors that don't matter.
What Apple should be doing is finding out who is suppling Nick with this information. He isnt just pulling this stuff out of his ass.
Nick DePlume, like nom de plume but for nerds...I get it!
"Me? Lady, I'm your worst nightmare -- a pumpkin with a gun."
Oh wait.
"It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it."
So how much love do we have to give apple before we can admit they are dicks to?
Religion is a gateway psychosis. -- Dave Foley
Great public relations coup, Mr. Jobs.
Remember when you and the Woz were just kids in a garage?
Apparently not...
You can't talk about Wikipedia's flaws on Wikipedia
Aw, come on now. I was under the impression that Nick's identity has been widely known and documented over the years as Nick Ciarelli. After all, even in 2003, eweek had stories co-authored by Nick Ciarelli and Matthew Rothenburg.
Visit Jonesblog and say hello.
Yeah, right.
From the article:
"Usually you would want to sue your enemies and not your friends," said Gary Fine, a Northwestern professor of sociology and expert on rumors. "I can't think of an instance in which a corporation would sue its own fans. I haven't heard anything like this."
Hasn't this guy heard of the RIAA?
Tell me, Apple (or rather article author even). You're worried about market advantage 'being measured in nanoseconds'.
:(
I can see no case where disclosing information a week early would do irreperable harm to the company.
Sure, you could argue customers will hold off buying products if they know the next generation is around the corner, but I tell ya....you're an idiot to buy ANY Apple products directly before a MacWorld expo.
If you're going to buy, you buy directly after an upgrade. Or at least wait until the next expo comes around.
So far as the competition...sure, I suppose a Dell or an HP could counter the MacMini, or the iPod Shuffle or whatnot, but really.
I can't help but think Apple is suing over an issue of pride. They want to know who the leak is, so they're going after the person posting the information from the leak(s).
That being said: I hate lawsuits. Period.
Karma: Chameleon (mostly due to the fact that you come and go).
Getting sued for correct predictions is stupid. Even if he had insider information, proving it will be very difficult.
I hope they have some serious proof that he had access to confidential information under a non-disclosure agreement or something along these lines.
From the article : "The suit, filed on Tuesday in the Superior Court of Santa Clara County, California, aims to identify who is leaking the information and to get an injunction preventing further release of trade secrets. However, in filing the suit, Apple identifies specific articles that contain trade secrets, indicating that at least parts of those reports are on the mark."
At least they're not suing him for damage, but to obtain the source of the leak. I'm no lawyer : can a court order someone to reveal its sources?
Eureka Science News - automatically updated
I'm a little stunned by this revelation, but here's the real issue. Someone is feeding this kid. Someone who doesn't like Apple.
All of Think Secret's commentary seems to be negative spins on Apple and Apple financials.
I would not be surprised if we find out this guy's father was a fired Apple employee or someone involved in this reseller lawsuit. Nick DePlume just seems to know this infomation to intimately.
There has to be some sort of bribery or maliciousness here, because I would consider Macrumors more of a premeir rumor site with MUCH wider base of followers and info providers.
Yell & scream & rant & rave... it's no use... you need a shaaaave ~ Bugs Bunny
A man who has been predicting the end of world was issued a cease and desist order today. The world rejoiced at the threat to humanity being ended. In other news, the government has begun issuing cease and desist orders to individuals predicting war, famine, plague, and other such sundries as part of their "early prevention system"
You are who you are, let no one tell you different. But, never close your mind to a new point of view.
Honestly seems that apple is just try to creatte more buzz about their products. Banning distribution of Jobs speech, subpoenas against unnamed individual who leaked the information .. it's all the same, and the press eats it up. Yeah, they might have kept the secret for like 5 days longer but that really is going to have no affect to their sales nor will they get any money from these fools . my new chick roommate works at apple store and she knew about some of the stuff before think secret , it just gets around..
i'm not a big apple fan, too expensive, but this new 500 pc has me rethinking, but prob not because no upgradabilty =p.
How did he induce these people to provide tips? It is not like a college undergrad is going to pay people off. Apple really contradicts themselves when later they blame the ability of people to place "anonymous" tips on his website. Doesn't sound like they are being "induced" but rather lured by the option to remain anonymous.
True, I think it is wrong that employees are violating their C.A.'s, but it is not Ciarelli's fault. Find the employees that do it, and fire them. Don't go after a kid that discovers where you leak...
For years, liberals and pinkos have rattled on and on about supposedly "superior" computers produced by the California lefties at Apple Computer. I will explain why this company is nothing more than a front for the International Communist Conspiracy, aided and abetted by their liberal fellow-travelers in the American computer community.
This so-called "company" was founded by a pair of dope-smoking phone service thieves from Berkeley, a hotbed of Communist activity even today. "Apple Computer" supposedly went on to pioneer a graphical interface - actually developed by the good American patriots at Xerox - and develop its own hardware monopoly, just as its Communist creators would impose a state monopoly on all computer-using Americans.
For a short time, this Red front tried to infiltrate the American business community by facetiously engaging in free trade practices, but this only served to disillusion its enthralled socialist followers who complained about a supposed drop in quality. What they really couldn't stand, like all liberals, was choice and capitalism. They only returned to "Apple" when it returned to its old crypto-Stalinist practices.
"Apple Computer" is nothing more than a liberal-backed fifth column intended to subvert the American computer industry, and ultimately bankrupt good capitalist companies such as Microsoft and Intel. "Apple" isn't the only front group run by the International Communist Conspiracy. "Sun Microsystems" engages in similar monopolistic practices, trying to enforce a single hardware and software standard on all users, instead of the choices offered by Microsoft. Worst of all are the smaller Red fronts using the communist Linux operating system, with names like "Mandrake" (a French front, of course), and even really obvious ones like Red Hat! Linux is distributed under a Commie license that forces developers to give away the fruits of their labour, just as Marx ordered all good Communists to work as much as they could for a pittance in return in an illusory equal society.
All of these so-called companies are just fronts for Communists and liberal fellow-travellers. Remember, when you buy Apple or download Linux, you're supporting Communism. Good Americans support real freedom-loving businesses like Microsoft, SCO, and AMD.
Laugh at me now, remember me later when you're all forced to used slow computers with horrid, fruity interfaces foisted upon an enslaved public by the commissars who used to fester in American business under the liberal myth that they were an independent company that loved capitalism called Apple Computer.
""California is one of approximately 44 or 45 states that have adopted [the] Uniform Trade Secrets Act. That statute makes it wrongful to acquire or publish without authorization information you know or have a reasonable basis to know is a trade secret of another," Milgrim said."
IANAJ, but does his capacity as publisher of ThinkSecret confer upon him the status of member of the press, and the "anonymous" tipsters then function as his sources?
Normall, the penalty for failing to reveal your sources is usually a contempt charge and 6 months in jail.
But since he doesn't know his informants, does this
1) create a loophole or
2) exclude him from asserting his status as a journalist
I have a plan. Using mainly spoons, we'll tunnel our way out of the city...
I envision a commercial where a Linux pengiun is running from a bunch of long-hair hippies in business suits. The pengiun escapes into a building and throws a sledgehammer at a screen showing a big Apple logo.
Ummm.. No, it doesn't. Mike was sued because he had mikerowesoft.com. Wich, when pronounced out loud, sounds *exactly* like microsoft.com. He wasn't sued because he was posting Microsoft pre-release material/rumors/whatever on his web page.
These are totally different cases.
bork bork bork!
Ahh yes.. Mac the Knife... and his lesser known cohort The Mouseketeer.
Once upon a time (gather round kiddies) Mr Mouseketeer used to publish a hardcopy newsletter. It would appear infrequently, mailed from various locations, and usually poke fun at Apple during the days of King Steve I... Then one day I get this fat envelop from MrMouse. Inside was the usual newsletter along with a yamalka, a small piece of black plastic, some felt and the instructions on how to cut and glue this all together to make your very own Mouseketeer Cap.
Ahhh.. those were the days of big time fun !
This msg is brought to you by the letter 'W'.. for Worthless Wuss
has run the site, thinksecret.com, since age 13
No offense, but this is the kind of kid/guy that you'd think Jobs would be hiring, not suing.
Why again does everyone see Jobs as some sort of geek pariah that *earned* his way to fame? He just rode on Wozniak's coattails!
The article says Apple is suing 19-year-old Nick Ciarelli. But surely they are actually suing The DePlume Organization, LLC, the limited-liability corporation that claims copyright to everything on the site? It seems unlikely that Ciarelli himself will suffer financial liability for this.
Breakfast served all day!
No, not familiar at all, not even close.
"Microsoft" is a trademark. You are required to vigorously defend trademarks, or else you lose the right to use them. MSFT had no choice but to go after him.
Of course, slashdot stopped covering it when it settled. MSFT paid the kid for the domain name, and agreed to redirect all the traffic to the old site to his new one (MikeRoweForums.com IIRC).
In the end, everyone was happy, and MSFT weren't such a bunch of assholes after all (which of course, is not a happy ending for slashdot, which is why it wasn't covered).
All this kid did was run a website on which someone else supplied information about an Apple product. Apple will sue and win, and help set a new precedent in which forum moderators are responsible for what their users say. That won't be covered on slashdot either.
But, if a little birdy ever tells me about an upcoming Apple product, I'll be sure to crapflood slashdot with it, so Malda can feel the mighty cock of his beloved Apple shoved straight up his ass. I wonder if that will stop the constant iPod astroturfing?
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Yeah; because everything on that website is wrong. It seems that even if his information is negative that it still turned out to be true. Doesn't that mean something? Oh; that's right; Apple Zealots - my bad.
Seriously though; if someone is going to feed you information you have the right to do what you wish to it. If Microsoft was in this position this website would be all over it; screaming about how a they are going after the little guy. But when Apple comes into the picture, they get some kind of negative force-field aura that dispells all the bad (and true) information about them.
I'm f#$king magic!
Get your priorities straight QuantumG.
If you want to complain about what Apple is doing, restricting free speech is the wrong target. Apple is protecting itself, legally, forthrightly, and up front, according to the law.
Someone violated an NDA to tell Nick DePlume these 'trade secrets'.
Apple is trying to get out of Nick DePlume the identities of those who violated those NDAs.
To put it abstractly, Apple and a third party signed a contract. Said third party violated the contract without Apple's knowledge. Apple finds out about the violation from Nick DePlume. Apple then tries to find out from Nick DePlume who violated the contract.
If there is anything scummy in what Apple is doing, it's in not being gentler and more friendly towards 19 year old Nick, but that's not what you're complaining about.
GPL Deconstructed
so wait a second..
i'll post my OWN trade secret to some guys mailing list and then I can sue him in the states? wtf you need patents for when you have such more powerful tool in your portfolio then, why bother patenting anything when you can just say that it's your trade secret and forbid anyone from talking about it?
someone 'published' the information to him - or are all the websites that reported on this quilty? would slashdot be quilty if i posted my own trade secrets on slashdot?
or maybe he'll just say that he pulled it out of his ass and say that "look, i've made so many predictions that at least once in 10 years i'm going to be right about something".
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Sure Apple could sue an employee or former employee for divulging this type of information, but I don't see what duty the kid has to keep it a secret. Once he, as a member of the public, learned the secret, it was no longer a secret.
Go read the Uniform Trade Secrets Act. Basically, if you knew it was a trade secret and knew that it was obtained improperly, and you disclose it, they can sue you for doing so.
However, it's possible that he could weasel out because knowledge of the existence of a product might not fall into the category of "trade secret" according to the definition of "trade secret" in that law.
It's also possible he could get out of naming names using the California Shield Law. This protects journalists from revealing their source (most of the time) and is written directly into the California Constitution, so it supercedes a lot of other laws there.
In short, if he hires a good lawyer, he can probably get out of it, and maybe even get his attorney's fees paid using the anti-SLAPP legislation. Depends on the court, really. His best bet is probably to turn the whole thing into a First Amendment issue in the eyes of the press. He'll be quite likely to get some support on that angle, you can be sure.
- Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
Why is that?
Mike Rowe attracted the wrath of Microsoft due to his parents giving him that name. He wasn't spreading secrets about the new products from Microsoft, he was simply trying to run a business.
If Mike Rowe had been running a website displaying unreleased Microsoft-products then yes, I could see some kind of connection. Seeing as he wasn't, then I don't really see any connection other than the parallell of a huge corporation stepping on some guy (which isn't exactly unique)
I enjoy large posteriors and I cannot prevaricate.
If you order a mini mac then that's you, voting with your wallet, to support Apple and this lawsuit.
For a long while I always said I'd look to get a mac if they were marketed at an affordable price. Now that they have one, I won't even waste the time to look at it.
People leak news about Longhorn and other in-development MSFT products all the time, why aren't they suing webmasters? They're supposed to be the big litigation assholes, after all.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
All he did was pass on information that was passed on to him from an insider in violation of that person's contract. You can hardly call what he did "prediction." Really he just passed on information that somebody else had given him. No educated analysis required.
Not only that, but Apple probably wouldn't be giving him such a hard time if he'd tell them who leaked the information to him.
There are many financial news websites posting articles about Mac mini and iPod Shuffle. After reading them, I can better understand just WHY Apple took the action it did against Think Secret.
In summary, the articles stated that the stock price of Apple ran up more than 7% in the days preceeding Mac World in anticipation of the leaked rumors of a $500 Mac and a flash iPod. Further, the stock dropped about 6% during the key note primarily because Apple sold "only" 4.5 million iPods. More than the 4 million many analysts predicted, but less than the 4.6 and 4.8 million other analysts had.
Now, if the share price of Apple can drop 6% because the wildly sucessful iPod "only" clobbered-the-shit (technical term) out of the competition versus some analysts estimating it would clobber-the-ever-lovin-shit, imagine what would have happened if Apple had NOT released the said rumored products.
Further, imagine how big the POSITIVE impact would have been if the Mac mini had remained a secret until Jobs' announcement.
I only came here to do two things; kick some ass, and drink some beer...looks like we're almost out of beer.
$50 says that Apple had plans BEFORE these "secrets" were published to announce them at MacWorld. So the judge is going to look at this and wonder why, if it's such a secret, they announced it to the largest gathering of journalists, developers, and customers in the world.
I suspect Apple may win their suit and be awarded $1 in damages. If Nick's smart enough to file a countersuit, he's liable to win and be awarded $1 in damages and attorney's fees.
Actually, no. "A whole bunch" is a major overstatement.
Just saying ...
Matthew Rothenberg
Executive editor
Ziff Davis Internet
MacWEEK alum 1989-2000
would slashdot be [g]uilty if i posted my own trade secrets on slashdot?
If you divulge your own trade secret it is no longer a trade secret. If you divulge somebody else's trade secret you've broken the law. This entire situation is dependant on the assumption that the informant who sent the trade secret to Think Secret was not authorized to divulge the information. If that isn't the case, neither the informant nor Think Secret has done anything wrong. It would be pretty hard to prove either way...
It's like blanketty but a bit thicker and possibly warmer.
DROS - Open-Source Robot Software
LOL -- That's the first time I've seen my surname used as a punchline for Mac gay-bashing, but I have to admit that it's kind of pungent and snappy. (Like a sweaty jockstrap.)
Mulling T-shirt Possibilities,
Matthew Rothenberg
Executive editor
Ziff Davis Internet
...until somebody looses an i.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I.E. Did he obtain them via NDA, or did someone else give them to him. If they gave them to him, he's off the hook as it's no longer a Trade Secret and the ones who gave it out are in trouble.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
If the plaintiff wins a suit, or even has a reasonable basis to believe they may win (as determined by a court in possible countersuit -- and US legal tradition is pretty friendly towards the original plainiff here), then the defendant will not be awarded costs or fees related to that suit.
California breaks this down by cause of action: if the plaintiff pursues a single frivolous cause of action, even if every other part of their lawsuit is sound, the defendant might be able to recover costs related to defending from the frivolous cause of action.
As a non-lawyer, I would think Nick's best course of action is to move for a change of venue or dismissal due to lack of personal jurisdiction. Apple could probably not show that he had a presence in California.
As a side benefit, the two states where he is undoubtedly present (New York and Massachussetts) apparently have not passed the Uniform Trade Secrets Act. NY uses common law for trade secrets, and MA has some other statutory protections, so he may not be home free, but Apple would have a different burden of proof.
Your talking about "secrets", not "Trade Secrets" which are different. An IP lawyer is going to ask what "Trade Secret" was published and won't find any.
And the idea that a journalist can be ordered to reveal his source of information is against the first ammendment.
Is it now? Where specifically in the First Amendment does it mention anything about journalists protecting sources? The First Amendment proscribes government interference with the freedom of the press - it does not give the press a magic pass to avoid any and all consequences of something they may report. According to your reasoning, if I publish your entire credit and medical history online, I should be able to do so without any fear of repercussions, and furthermore it would be your fault for not protecting your information better. Give me a break.
Please stand clear of the doors, por favor mantenganse alejado de las puertas
Wait wait.. Everyone here seems to be supporting the notion that Jobs manipulates the timing of events to get up to a 10% or more boost in stock price surrounding Mac World. Once the truth is out, it will be priced into the stock, regardless of whatever blips occur on the day of. So who cares when it comes out except the people who want to make profit on pre-existing knowledge of said truth? Certainly not Apple (unless they're planning a new issue of stock to raise more capital). This is the definition of insider trading
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
Sorry for the failure to properly articulate my point. I was referring to Apple's corporate phone logs, if the particular tipster was dumb enough to call from work (which many of them are - I forget the company, but a while back a guy was calling the NY Times from his office and was caught at it)
Whether pre-announcing a product is to a company's advantage largely depends on that company's position in the marketplace. Microsoft now pre-announces products because doing so tends to "freeze the market", because companies will often hold off on buying an existing third-party product that Microsoft will be shipping "real soon now". Microsoft often uses pre-announcements as a form of FUD to solidify their market position.
A company in Apple's position has a different calculation to make. Certain pre-announcements are just going to tell companies with greater resources (like Microsoft) what innovations they should start copying.
Companies that aren't the market leader will often play their cards close to the vest, just so their bigger competitors don't figure out a strategy to beat their hand. When Microsoft was a small shop, they weren't crowing from the rooftops about Windows 1.0 months before it was released. It wouldn't have been to their advantage, because they didn't have the dominance they do now. Things have changed.
Shame on Google.
but if someone else knows it, is it a secret?
still, if it was posted on their mailing list - insta publishing it , could think secret be responsible, even if they didn't publish the information(it was their informant directly)?
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Ahh, yes, semantics. I guess it's only to be expected that a conversation about law would fall to it. We can go that route, if you like. In legalese it is considered a "breach", correct. But simply put, "illegal" is used quite broadly in common parlance and, as I understand it, doesn't fit perfectly with any of the more specifically honed legal jargon.
Since you can't provide a legal cite
For someone so hung up on semantics, you can't seem to grasp first order logical and related concepts. Just because I didn't provide a cite, doesn't mean that I can't or couldn't. Frankly, your point didn't seem worth the effort, but now at the end of a long work day and with you insisting on your somewhat lacking point, I'll bite.
I'll offer you the opportunity to point to any authoritative lay source which refers to contract breach as "illegal."
So, you yourself accept that it's an issue of common usage. Therefore, I'd first point to common language definitions of the word "illegal": first, from webster's:
and then from:hyperdictionary:
So then one is forced admit that it hinges on just what "law" is. Wikipedia states:
Going further, with the understanding the the legal system in the United States is based upon the British Common Law system, we look to the area of law that is Civil Law, specifically, the contract law, which owes its existence to concept known as the Law of Obligations :
Going further, the Legal Information Institute at Cornell University has much to say about contract law but specifically:
Therefore, it seems clear that inasmuch as a contract is a promise enforceable by law, and that contracts are regulated by a specific area of law, and that failing to fulfill the duties required by a legal contract have penalties enforceable by law, breaking a contract is going against the law, inasmuch as it's going against the specific, accepted rules of contracts, as understood through contract law. This is similar to other things that are held to be contrary to law (be it civil or criminal law such as murder) inasmuch as the law has systematic methods for the prescription of remedies for
The first amendment is what's called "statutory law", which means law written by legislators. Other laws passed by Congress are also statutory law.
When you ask "where specifically does it say in the 1st amendment", you're asking where is the statutory law that says so-and-so, with the implication that if it's not in a statute, it's not law. That's how it works in, say, Germany or France, which are what's called "civil law countries", which means "the law" and "the statutes" are the same thing. But that's not how law works in the US.
The US (and the UK, Canada, etc.) are what's called a "common-law country", just like the UK and various others. That means there's two kinds of law: statute law, written by legislators, and case law, written by judges. BOTH ARE LAW. And legislation is written taking this into account. In civil-law countries, legislators have to anticipate all kinds of details and contingincies into the statutes. So the German civil code has a lot more sections and subsections than the US statutes. Something is either in the statute or else it isn't. The law is fairly sharply defined, which sometimes leads to Procrustian results.
In the US, the law instead has a fractal boundary. The Constitution and the statutes are sort of a seed crystal. They state a generality and express an intention. Figuring out how to apply the generality and interpret the intention is left as a complex judgement call assigned to certain highly trained people called "judges" whose job, as the name implies, is to make judgement calls. Whenever a judge above a certain level makes a judgement call, that call becomes part of the law, binding on other judges, and in some cases (where the Constitution is involved), binding on the Congress. The law thereby grows a new tendril based that governs what happens with similar cases in the future.
This isn't some cockamamie idea invented by Bill Clinton---it's what was written into the Constitution by the Framers, based on 300+ years (now 500+ years) of English legal tradition that governed the American Colonies before the US became independent. If you're proposing that we throw out the Constitution and every other law on the books and start over with a civil law system, well fine, there's nothing wrong with having such a philosophy (might as well make us a monarchy while you're at it). But you don't get to pick and choose, living in the common-law system for things that you like and expressing outrage at it for things that you don't like. It's all or nothing.
So to answer your question, it doesn't matter whether the 1st amendment's wording specifically mentions journalists. There's ample case law (written by judges interpreting the 1st amendment) protecting journalists and that's what Nick is relying on.
IANAL, but IIRC he's only under any obligation not to publish Apple's trade secrets if he obtained them while under some form of agreement with Apple to keep them confidential, or if he obtained them from someone who he at the time was or should have been aware was under such a confidentiality obligation. Note that Apple telling him the information is confidential and secret doesn't constitute his agreeing to keep it confidential, so legally Apple's warnings have only limited effect (basically they oblige him to check carefully if he receives that information from someone he knows has connections to Apple after he received the warnings). Apple's going to have to show that the person who supplied the information to Nick was under a confidentiality agreement (should be trivial) and that Nick knew this at the time he received the information (not so trivial).
That's one of the gotchas to NDAs: people who didn't sign them aren't bound by them.