Slashdot Mirror
Apple Wins Against Bloggers
linuxwrangler writes "Saying that no one has the right to publish information that could have been provided only by someone breaking the law, judge James Kleinberg ruled that online reporters for Apple Insider and PowerPage must reveal their sources. No word yet on an appeal."
(Note: More coverage in this news.com story)
This judge has clearly shown that he has a grasp of the fundamental issues surrounding this case, and has realized that this is not a case about whether online sites are "journalists" or about the "right to blog". It's about when it's about when the dissemination of information in the public interest clearly overrides any other legal concerns or contracts and entitles journalists to not reveal their sources - and when it clearly doesn't.
And if you're not going to RTFA, here is some of the jugde's ruling:
"Unlike the whistleblower who discloses a health, safety or welfare hazard affecting all, or the government employee who reveals mismanagement or worse by our public officials, [the enthusiast sites] are doing nothing more than feeding the public's insatiable desire for information.[1]
[...]
Defining what is a 'journalist' has become more complicated as the variety of media has expanded. But even if the movants are journalists, this is not the equivalent of a free pass.
[...]
The journalist's privilege is not absolute. For example, journalists cannot refuse to disclose information when it relates to a crime.
[...]
[The information about Apple's unreleased products] is stolen property, just as any physical item, such as a laptop computer containing the same information on its hard drive [or not] would be. The bottom line is there is no exception or exemption in either the [Uniform Trade Secrets Act] or the Penal Code for journalists--however defined--or anyone else.
[...]
The public has had, and continues to have, a profound interest in gossip about Apple. Therefore, it is not surprising that hundreds of thousands of 'hits' on a Web site about Apple have and will happen. But an interested public is not the same as the public interest."
Note that the judge did not say that Think Secret and other online sites weren't journalists; indeed, he tacitly acknowledged that they, and many others, may in fact be "journalists". But that fact is, correctly, irrelevant. In other words, online sites or bloggers may in fact be journalists; this isn't about "the right to blog". However, being a "journalist" does not automatically mean the mechanisms of obtaining information, the information itself, and the sources of the information are automatically protected by journalist shield laws and exempt from discovery, especially when otherwise applicable laws (such as the UTSA) may have been violated. In other words, when a crime may have been committed (and the burden of whether or not this information constitutes a "trade secret" still rests on Apple, even after this ruling).
Further, the judge makes no distinction between online publications and mainstream newspapers, simply a distinction that any and all information gathering mechanisms are not necessarily protected if other laws are violated. The assertion on the part of some that "these subpoenas wouldn't exist if it was the New York Times or salon.com" is baseless at best.
No doubt someone will find issue with what is or isn't "public interest" and the fact that the courts (i.e. the "government") must make such a determination and is simply shifting the importance of whether someone can be considered a "journalist" to another consideration, essentially allowing the government to decide what is "acceptable" to be leaked and what isn't, and will make arguments that this will make it easier for corporations and/or the government to hide abuses, stop whistleblowers, etc. However, all of these arguments are red herrings. The court clearly acknowledged that sources information in the clear public interest must indeed be protected. Further note that the court DID NOT rule on the merits of Apple's claim itself, i.e., that the information was in fact a trade secret: "The order of this court does not go beyond the questions necessary t
Do we like this because it's Apple, or do we hate this because 'geeks' lost their case...
Dear Apple,
...
I heard it on Slashdot.org
There was this guy, I think he was call Anthony Coward or something, and he was telling me all about the fab new stuff.
liqbase
head spinning ...must stop self destruct sequence..
This isn't about protecting sources, this is corporate espionage plain and simple. They're not protecting reporting sources, they're shielding criminals.
The submitter was actually Steve Jobs, but he had to use the codename "linuxwrangler" since Slashdot couldn't post any information from an Apple employee. I mean, how can Slashdot distinguish between what Apple considers a trade secret and what they don't if Apple doesn't tell them before hand?
From Slashdot:
No word yet on an appeal.
From the article:
He said the trio would appeal the judge's ruling.
Oi, this is getting bad. I mean, do the submitter read the articles they submit?
-Valiss
Mod parent up. This is a dupe.
This blogger, whom I have become completely addicted to, wrote the best article I've read on the subject. It deals with only one of the several lawsuits filed, but the points he makes are real thought-provokers.
Sorry for being such a shameless pimp, but I really think people who are interested in this Apple story would be interested in this article.
(I got the link from MacSlash last weekend.)
This ruling is solely concerned with whether the journalists are entitled to be protected from Apple's subpoena of their records. Quoting the ruling:
"The order of this court does not go beyond the questions necessary to determine this motion seeking a protective order against that single subpoena, and it cannot and should not be read or interpreted more broadly," the judge said. "The court makes no finding as to the ultimate merits of Apple's claims, or any defenses to those claims. Those issues remain for another day."
Because nobody will want to tell them anything anymore, since they have no guarantee of identity protection.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
People who publish trade secrets that might hurt a company are forced to reveal their sources, but people who publish Top Secret documents are protected. (Anybody remember that stupid ruling on The Pentagon Papers?) I guess that proves that businesses are more important than National Security.
Good, inexpensive web hosting
This helps to ensure that the legal system cannot simply apply the letter of the law and steamroll over everyone. It also helps to prevent people from using laws to shield illegal activity.
Jesus was a compassionate social conservative who called individuals to sin no more.
You know, the one where "corporate business" *is* the new national security?
You don't understand the case or the ruling. Read this article (which I have already pimped elsewhere).
The employees stole and disclosed company trade secrets. The broke the law and are criminals, they should be treated as criminals.
The people that published this material are accessories to a crime and should also be treated as criminals.
This isn't about free speech, this is about a crime.
Saying that no one has the right to publish information that could have been provided only by someone breaking the law
It's about time Robert Novak was thrown in jail for outing Valerie Plame!
Oh - we're just talking about Apple insiders? Who gives a fuck?
Education is the silver bullet.
Yeah, but this isn't about those that violated an NDA, it is about those who revealed information that they obtained from someone who violated an NDA.
Yeah. That, and the small issue that they might have broken a law doing so.
What property right justifies the application of restrictions imposed by an agreement on someone that never signed that agreement?
The fact that the UTSA says that revealing information that can reasonably be believed to have been obtained as the result of the breach of a binding confidentiality agreement is prohibited. Do you understand that NDAs or any confidentiality agreements would be meaningless if all you had to do was leak them to someone else, who in turn publicly leaks them, all with no repurcussions of any kind nor any recourse for the employer?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
A dupe from when? Five minutes ago?
Jason Giambi's grand jury testimony was leaked to the SF Chronicle. That's how we all new he admitted to using steroids. Those transcripts are sealed, but someone broke the law and released them. Shouldn't that person be found and punished too?
Espionage is when Huawei steals Cisco source and uses it in its own routers.
Leaking a press release early is just more press. It is a farce and I would boycott apple if I was actually in the habit of buying their products in the first place.
My two "Mac the Knife" coffee mugs from the rumor column in MacWeek will probably rake in more on eBay after this ruling.
:-)
Gosh, I feel so sorry that the rumor mongers secrets will be revealed when they didn't want them to be, but it's all in my best interest of making money!
Hmm, where have I heard that argument before.
Your entire post is irrelevant to the topic at hand, but I'll pick just this piece:
You're wrong in a million ways, but the most important one is this. This particular expression of speech does not in any way present a clear and present danger to life and limb and consequently, it not only "ought" to be protected, it is protected according to the Supreme Court of the United States of America. Threatening someone's profit margin is not the same thing as threatening their safety.
The speech IS protected. No one is going to throw the proprietors of Think Secret, PowerPage, or AppleInsider in jail over their speech.
What is NOT protected are their sources, who are breaking currently in force, legally binding confidentiality agreements to reveal the information, and the fact that the web sites, by publishing said information, are also in violation of the Uniform Trade Secrets Act, versions of which have been adopted by 45 states including California.
This is not about speech. This is not about the right to blog. And if you think it's about the employees' right to "speak" about topics covered under confidentiality agreement, apparently someone forgot to tell them, and you, that they don't have to work there if they have that little respect for good-faith agreements with their own employer.
Dumbest comment ever.
... it's not telling. The law is what it is. It's written down. It's not tainted because some people you don't like decided to use it. And you say absolutely nothing about somebody's case when you draw such an unbelievably flimsy association solely for the purposes of inducing an emotional response.
"I think it's telling that Apple chose to file suit in California, the very same state that Richard Nixon is buried in."
"I think it's telling that Apple's complaint was printed on paper, the very same material that Hitler used to wipe his ass!"
Well, guess what, Sparky
Dumbest comment ever.
how many people fail to realize this. If they fail to enforce their NDA agreements I would thing it would set a bad precedent for them in the future when the leak might be something really damaging. It reminds me a lot of the enforce it or lose it aspect with trademarks and such.
Please explain what NDA is signed by a journalist that receives information from someone that is violating an NDA by providing it, such that the journalist's freedom of speech should be constrained.
there are laws that provide journalists with their *right* to play their role in our society,that is, to bring on the truth.
How there could be a free press with they are obligated to reveal their sources? Who in his right mind would step up to speak against anything if you are going to be prosecuted (or silenced in any other way)?
Thats plain wrong!
Constitution: Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech, or
of the press; ...
vs.
Judge: Kleinberg ... ruled that no one has the right to publish trade secrets that only could have been provided by someone breaking the law.
How can a law that overrides the freedom of speech be constitutional? If a whistle blower discloses embarrassing/incriminating "trade secrets" will the press / people be denied their constitutional freedom of speech to disclose the information?
I've been using Apple's products since the Apple II+ way back in 1980. 25 years of Apple hardware, software, programming, and sharing the goodness of the Apple way with friends and family. I've always had a warm fuzzy feeling for the company, their employees, and their products.
Over the last couple of weeks, though, the feeling started to fade. It's completely gone now.
Apple is just another company.
You'd think after the cancer scare Jobs would have mellowed out.
I'm not sure what the NDA situation is at public universities, but in private industry virtually everything bit of information you encounter is covered by an NDA. The free lunch I got today is probably covered by my NDA, as is any number of personal conversations had with friends and family.
Now obviously this was a high-level leak, and Apple has to follow up on it, but I'm quite skeptical of the "NDAs Ueber Alles" mentality displayed by yourself and the Apple defenders here. The reality is these agreements are very broad and could easily be used to run roughshod over other rights.
Whenever I hear the word 'Innovation', I reach for my pistol.
Bloggers have been calling themselves journalists for a while now. We'll see how seriously these guys take the responsibity, that is, we'll see if any of them be willing to go to jail to protect their sources.
Actually, all that actually exists is the _allegation_ that the sources broke the law. There is no cold hard evidence to support that fact beyond Apple's inability to imagine that the sources didn't actually work for them and may have obtained the information themselves via another leak where the law _was_ broken.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I think this is the first case of an "Inverted Dupe" for they duped a old article saying it was wrong.
It all depends on if the geeks were using Linux of not..
Boxing Equipment Reviews
Maybe I'm being stupid, but if a competitor (e.g. Dell) was planning to launch a mini computer like apple's, they could bring the launch forward to steal Apple's thunder (and thus press, publicity).
The same goes for something like the Shuffle. If Sony had released their new player before the reception to shuffle would have been a lot cooler.
Oh, come off it. Revealing the unethical and borderline murderous behavior of tobacco companies serves a clear and immediate public interest. What "public interest" does it serve to protect the guy who leaks confidential information about the next Power Mac revision?
As the judge wrote, an interested public is NOT the same as a public interest.
You're sure having a better day then Apple!
What is NOT protected are their sources, who are breaking currently in force, legally binding confidentiality agreements to reveal the information
Apple sure hasn't been able to figure out the source of this stuff except for a bludgeon-style court proceeding! But presumably, in order to state that as fact, YOU must know who the source(s) is/are? Why don't you just tell Apple, then, and get the whole mess over with?
Unless, of course, it's you?
and the fact that the web sites, by publishing said information, are also in violation of the Uniform Trade Secrets Act, versions of which have been adopted by 45 states including California.
Could you cite the ruling or source for that, please? I sure didn't see that in the opinion the judge gave.
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
If someone tells you something that they shouldn't have told you (because they would be violating their NDA), but fails to tell you that they are violating their NDA, does that make you a criminal for reporting it?
You are being MICROattacked, from various angles, in a SOFT manner.
Freedom of the press should not extend to:
1) actively soliciting people to break their non-disclosure contracts
2) publishing information which you actually know to be protected by a non-disclosure contract covering the person who gave you the information
There is no property right at stake here. The first place you start is tortious interference with a contractual duty. Then you get into trade secrets and it gets a bit more complicated.
This is a terrible day for anyone who thinks that being a "journalist" should give you a free ride to break any contract or trade secret laws you want in the name of "freedom".
I had to sign a confidentiality agreement with a former employer. Namely because we had some rich, famous and influential customers. It was company lore that the President of the company ordered a subordinate to violate a federal law because he was having a Senator over to his house for a visit. I'm being intentionally vague here because I'm still bound by the aforementioned agreement.
The point that I'm making here is that if I was going to give specifics or name names, I'd be smart enough to do it anonymously. If you're going to violate any secrecy agreements that you've signed, be smart enough to get a throw-away email address or use an anonymous remailer.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Let me explain something. Tortious interference is when YOU, the third party, actively try to get someone to break their contract. If THEY come to you and volunteer information it's not tortious interference. You may still be breaking trade secret laws if you know (or should have known) that the information was confidential. However, it would not be tortious interference. You make it out to be the tools of the devil when in fact it is a very important part of contract law.
The difference with Wigand may be that he was covering up criminal activity by honoring his NDA.
In the case of Think Secret, Nick is actively soliciting secret information. There is a difference between overhearing someone speaking about a product they are working on and going around asking people to tell you about stuff you are working on.
If this were just a case of information being overheard I'd be on the side of the bloggers. But this is about asking someone to give you information that they can't, without breaking an NDA, and then hiding behind the journalistic shield laws when you get called out for doing so.
No, you're a moron. The judge specifically mentioned that while such situations do exist, this is clearly NOT one of them. Did you even take a peek at the article?
Do you understand that NDAs or any confidentiality agreements would be meaningless if all you had to do was leak them to someone else, who in turn publicly leaks them, all with no repurcussions of any kind nor any recourse for the employer?
Poor babies. No recourse for the employer. Since there's so much recourse for employees, and consumers, and sweatshop laborers, when corporations get out of control, that sounds pretty unfair.
The difference here is that the information Apple wants to keep secret is not dangerous at all. It's just product information. No one will get lung cancer from this.
"It is better to risk sparing a guilty person than to condemn an innocent one." - Voltaire
People are trying to term these trade secrets like they are something that is just common water cooler talk and newspaper articles.
... NOT speech .... so no speech was abridged ... and besides Congress didn't make a law. A judge ruled and enforced the law.
These are business plans, schematics, insider corporate strategy NOT speech - these items are CAD drawings, supplier contracts
Yell & scream & rant & rave... it's no use... you need a shaaaave ~ Bugs Bunny
So these news/rumor sites that take tens of thousands of dollars a month in advertising revenue are just blogs now are they?
Gee, I wonder which side the comments will favor with this introduction!
I'm even more disappointed that they're pursuing it. I am in favor of the freedom of the press. I can't possibly know all the details, including what sort of agreement Nick DePlume has with whoever his source is.
Seems like somebody told him some stuff and he published it on the web. It must have pretty good stuff. But if Nick told the Apple mole, who I'll call Gerald, that he wouldn't reveal Gerald's name to anyone, then he shouldn't. Don't break your word. Should you break the law to keep your word? People have to answer that question themselves based on their values and character, but I'd say yes. Even if it means jail.
Now, in order to play both sides of the fence here, the Mole at Apple, or one of their associated companies - whether it's a manufacturer, or some dude at an Ad Agency - has signed an NDA, then he should be living by it. Again, don't break your word.
But I have a hard time with this fishing expedition. And that being said, I didn't visit thinksecret much before, but the publicity that is being generated keeps me checking the place out. I'm not sure if that was Apple's intention, but there you go.
You want me to get to the point? Here it is:
Stamp out leaks internally. Don't sue fans.
Having said that, I'm still going to recommend to everybody in sight that they wait until Tiger (which has been announced) comes out, then buy the 12" iBook with the airport card and max out the ram. Or a Mini. Depending. Unless you want to run Linux on it. In which case buy it whenever.
The other thing I was wondering about - TFA calls it a criminal act, releasing that sort of info. Is it a criminal matter or a civil one?
-Holmes.
Try cracking a book.
... suprise, suprise... based on 'common law.'
The concept of a leagal precedent is both wholly supported by the US Constitution (or at least by the Supreme Court, whom has the final say anyway), and is
-- Sometimes you have to turn the lights off in order to see.
And there will be booing all the way (remember the microsoft guy who where layed off because hhe sent picture of apple computer on the microsoft campusin fact he wasn't working for microsoft anyway, but whatever).
Apple is somehow protected by some funny sheild
Look, the judge may have a point but celebrating the victory of a corporation over an individual just seems fucked up to me.
You seem to be under the mistaken impression that an individual is incapable of breaking the law, or is at least "less able" to break the law than a corporation.
Also, Think Secret (I'm not sure about the others) is operated by The dePlume Organization, a limited-liabilty corporation.
The 'free speech' issue isn't' about wether or not you can go blabbing your companies trade secrets, it's about wether or not someone else, someone who has not signed an NDA or anything else should be able to re-spout them.
The law says that you cannot do this. The judge is doing his job by enforcing the law. Your gripe is with the law, not with the case.
These people, who are not under contract should be able (I think) to say whatever they want without repercussion even if someone would be harmed by the common knowledge.
To do that would mean throwing out libel and slander laws, as well. Freedom of speech (or freedom of the press, which is more accurate in these cases) is not an absolute right.
But it seems to me that simply telling the truth ought to be protected under the constitution, if you don't sign an NDA.
I would not describe the printing of illegally obtained information for a profit to be "simply telling the truth".
Yet, here these people are being forced to A) name their source, or B) Go to jail (or something). They're being punished for telling the truth about something, despite the fact that they signed no NDA and were not under any contract.
Apple was not, and is not, seeking damages against these sites. They were seeking information, and now the court has ordered them to give up that information. If they do not, they can appeal, or be held in contempt of court. I sincerely doubt that they will choose not to appeal this, but I doubt even more that they will choose to ignore the court's order should it not be overturned.
Don't become a regular here -- you will become retarded.
If you think it should only require that broad and self-referential notion of "public interest" to relieve journalists of having to reveal their sources when it's obvious they were privy to a crime, then it's hard to imagine any circumstances under which you'd think they should be forced to name their sources. Surely you don't believe there exist no such circumstances?
If someone tells you something that they shouldn't have told you (because they would be violating their NDA), but fails to tell you that they are violating their NDA, does that make you a criminal for reporting it?
Possibly.
"[...] the Uniform Trade Secrets Act, versions of which have been adopted by about 45 states, including California, prevents third parties from exposing information knowingly obtained from sources bound by confidentiality agreements.
Just because you don't have a relationship with the company doesn't necessarily immunize you, if you publish what you reasonably should have known was a trade secret," said [Andrew Beckerman-Rodau, who runs the intellectual property program at Boston's Suffolk University Law School]. "The First Amendment has been asserted more and more against intellectual property rights, but it's not faring well. Most courts haven't accepted it." (source)
They broke a law? Which one? Any evidence?
The judge didn't rule on any of that today. But assuming they did get their information from someone under a confidentiality agreement at Apple or a contractor, which, while circumstantial, seems overwhelmingly clear, then yes, they may have broken a law. The judge today said that REGARDLESS of whether any law has been broken - which is yet to be decided - the information at issue in this case does NOT constitute information in a clear public interest, and therefore, the web sites/journalists in question are NOT protected by journalist shield laws.
Can you think of any rational explanation where that info was leaked without someone violating an NDA?
Yes, I do believe Apple has the right to decide when it will publish information on an upcoming product.
No, I don't believe that a reporter should be punished for publishing the information. After all, they did not sign an NDA.
Yes, I do believe the judge was correct in ordering them to reveal their source. I can say this because I don't consider that order a punishment to those who reported the info (in this particular case). I do think there is a need to prevent what is essentially corporate espionage, when it does not serve the public interest. As was said an "interested public is not the same as the public interest".
Contracts should bind those that agree to the contracts, not third parties
Why? Contracts are a man-made construct. We can make them apply to whomever we want. I believe tortious interference only applies when the third-party is aware of the contract. As such, it will never surprise anyone.
There are good arguments for getting rid of tortious interference. The primary one would have to be that it discourages efficient breach. But given your other comments I bet your opinion is based more on some sort of conservative "personal responsibility" voodoo.
It just shows what slashdot was like before most of the "smart" people left for sites like "Fark". Their replacements leave something to be desired.
By the taping of my glasses, something geeky this way passes
Although that comment was even dumber.
If you watched the last keynote (which not many non-fanboy Slashdotters would have, given the predominantly Windows/Linux skills set here), you could also seen another impact: Jobs was visibly dejected by the "previews." He had no surprises to spring, just filling in the details. ALL the info on the new products had already been revealed - names, specs, even prices. The cheap Mac was already being assessed before it was even announced. For a company as desperate as Apple to get some attention for its pitiful 1.8% marketshare, I can imagine these leaks caused some disheartening sentiment.
... that hereinafter, any published "new" information about future products of interest is nothing more than bought-and-paid-for hucksterism from the PR departments of the hawkers of said products?
Cheers...
What is NOT protected are their sources, who are breaking currently in force, legally binding confidentiality agreements to reveal the information
Oh you know this for a fact, do you? For all we know, the "leaker" doesn't even work for Apple. Apple may force everyone at Apple to sign an NDA, but Apple doesn't manufacture anything. For all we know, the leaker works in Taiwan and never signed an NDA.
I find it interesting that so many Apple fanatics are so gung ho to violate someone's privacy because he *might* have violated an NDA.
You might be making drugs in your basement, I'm going to have the police check, just to be sure.
I wonder how responses would differ if there was real property involved... Let's say I obtained (e.g., purchases, or obtained through barter) real property (say a computer), that was later determined to be stolen. Do the police have the right to...
A. Take it from me and return it to the original owner?
B. Force me to say who I obtained it from?
Now replace this with intangible property (say some GPL'd source code). Let's say that I obtained a BSD license for some source code that was later determined to be stolen. Since I obtained the source code under certain rights (e.g., BSD license), do the police (or other authorities), have the right to
A. Take away the BSD license I obtained for it and replace it with the GPL license granted by the original owner?
B. Force me to say who I obtained it from?
Not sure the answer is different in either of these cases.
Of course if the intangible property is a trade secret, well, hmm, I'm not so sure it should be any different there either... You can argue that trade secrets aren't even property, but if they are (and the law is currently on that position), is there any other interpretation?
Here is all of *real* information regarding reporter privilege. Reporter Privilege site
I don't understand how apple is harmed by, let's say, the reveiling of a sub 500.00 low powered apple?
Leaked information can cause false expectations. There are many products that companies look at that have very little chance of actually coming to market. Unnofficial announcements create the expectation of the product. If Apple doesn't deliver, even if internally they knew it only had a 25% chance to come to market, they are penalized in public opinion and sometimes stock price
Information that turns out to not be 100% true can harm initial product sales also. Look at the new iPod mini, they were reported to be coming with a color screen. The color screen seemed so impressive that it overshadowed most everything else. When Apple did announce many people's first reaction was, "oh no color screen." The disappointment of not having a color screen overshadowed the great advance of battery life and incremental hard drive improvement. Sales have been lost because people are holding out for the color screen.
D6 63 0D 70 89 81 BB 8E 7B 7C 5F 5D 54 EA AB 73
Doesn't matter. It's like receiving stolen goods (actually, the case law seems to work similarly in both circumstances) - if you had reason to believe the goods were stolen, *even if* you had nothing to do with the theft, it's a crime. Similarly, if you had reason to believe the information was received in breach of contract, you are committing the crime of "receiving stolen information".
The contract is not binding on the journalist; the law is.
---
Mod me down, you fucking twits. Go ahead. I dare you.
(I read with sigs off.)
I am so tired of reading news based on sources that "decline to be named", speak "on condition of anonymity", or any of those phrases. It really means that either the reporter or the source, or both, are cowards, liars, or lawbreakers. If you have something to say, SAY IT! Use your free speech! Otherwise, be quiet!
;)
While your post started out hopeful, you lost me on the end part I quoted above.
Free speech only exists because you are free from being persecuted for excercising it. If those you are speaking against are powerful (boss, police officer, president), then they may abuse their power (fire, imprison, assasinate) to silence you.
While anonymity may be the refuge of the cowardly, it is also the last shield of the powerless.
That's why voting is by secret ballot.
I would have posted as AC if I didn't think the irony would be too corny.
Sig
Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars
I believe I said this somewhere else, but.
*Even if* the sources TS got their information from got it without breaking an NDA, would you argue that there is pretty much no way the first step of the information was in breach of NDA? That there is no *legitimate* way for that information to have exited Apple?
If so, the law pretty clearly implies that *anyone* receiving that information is tainted. Whether or not the person they received it from was under NDA, if the information itself was received in breach of confidentiality agreement, then anyone receiving that information and having any reason to believe (as I think most people do) that the only way for it to exist was for there to have been a breach of NDA *somewhere* would be in violation.
---
Mod me down, you fucking twits. Go ahead. I dare you.
(I read with sigs off.)
Look, the judge may have a point but celebrating the victory of a corporation over an individual just seems fucked up to me.
Not when the individual was the wrongdoer.
But he also might not have a point. The 'free speech' issue isn't' about wether or not you can go blabbing your companies trade secrets, it's about wether or not someone else, someone who has not signed an NDA or anything else should be able to re-spout them.
No, it's not about that at all. There is nothing in this to puniush the blogs for publishing the information, nor to stop them doing it again. It's purely that they have evidence that they must hand over to the court.
Yet, here these people are being forced to A) name their source, or B) Go to jail (or something).
Yes, that's it.
They're being punished for telling the truth about something, despite the fact that they signed no NDA and were not under any contract.
No, they have a duty to do something. Only if they choose to commit contempt of court would they be punished. And that would be for contempt of court.
Time for an update: EFF says they'll appeal.
Digital Citizen
Your interest in my mother has been noted, but you aren't her type.
From the article:
"Kleinberg, however, ruled that NO ONE has the right to publish trade secrets that only could have been provided by someone breaking the law."
Also from the article:
"For example, journalists CANNOT refuse to disclose information when it relates to a crime."
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
I won't dispute the fact that the most probable explanation for how they got the story was that somewhere along the way Apples NDA was violated, but it certainly wasn't violated by the magazine, and it may not have even been violated by any of the magazine's sources, yet the magazine's sources identities have now been ordered by a court to be revealed, just as if they _were_ criminals.
My point is that requiring to know these people's identites is tantamount to presuming that they are guilty until proven innocent (especially given the entirely plausible explanation that the magazine's sources never worked for apple and they heard it from someone else just the way the magazine did). That's what I object to.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
From the Judge's opinion, posted on the EFF's site:
In short, Apple had strong enough evidence that this information wasn't just accidently leaked to convince the court that trade secret laws had been violated and for the subpeonas to go forward.
Um... this isn't about whistleblowers. Leaking what the next Big Thing from Apple will be isn't whistleblowing, it's just violation of NDA, and leaking of trade secrets.
Now, if Apple were to, say, use Mexican immigrants for slave labor to assemble their machines, or a high-up was embezzling funds, and an employee leaked that information, that would be whistle-blowing, as it would be a wrongdoing that the public should know about.
By reading this you acknowledge that you have read it.
You might as well have said that anyone who doesn't agree with megacorporate "ethics" is thusly unethical.
... is protected according to the Supreme Court of the United States of America.
I think what he was saying is basically that anyone that doesn't agree with the court in this case is likely to have problems with much larger things than what this case was actually about.
If you subscribe to certain notions about intellectual property[1], then, yes, you probably think the judge is an idiot. That doesn't mean his legal opinion is wrong.
[1] or trade secrets, or corporations, or blogging, etc, etc.
I think that there's been a tremendous amount of rhetoric surrounding this case that has nothing to do with the case itself.
This particular expression of speech
Libel is not protected. Slander is not protected. Incitement is not protected. Shouting "Fire!" in a crowded theater is not protected. Printing trade secrets is not protected. Free speech is not an absolute right.
Don't become a regular here -- you will become retarded.
"no one has the right to publish information that could have been provided only by someone breaking the law"
Naturally these days everything and anything breaks the law, and it comes down to who haves the most money.
TruePunk | Games
"How can you think that the U.S. Government has any business forcing a third party--who has broken no laws, I might add--to start pointing fingers for Apple's benefit?"
The government is simply upholding a contract between two parties. They use such concepts as subpoenas, witnesses, and evidence to perform their role in our justice system. What's the problem here?
Am I the only one who reads the reactions of the fanboy multitudes to this and thinks about running out to buy a gun and join the Libertarian party or something?
Now before I get modded down, I be to remind whoever might read this that what I am saying is FACT. - bogaboga
Face it.
Just for your information, here is a "fun" comparison of Apple vs Microsoft.
Apple's employees are not allowed to blog about their activities in the company (except for 1 person - Safari developer). Almost all Microsoft employees blog about their activities at work/what they're working on,... and are encouraged to do so.
Microsoft has never sued anyone for posting screenshots/videos of their leaked software or suing someone because he leaked information about their new product. There are websites (winsupersite) with leaked screenshots/information/leaked information about Lonhorn. Thurrott is spreading info he got from MS's employees which wasn't supposed to be public.
Apple: ThinkDifferent.com, AppleInsider, PowerPage.
Apple forced the author of Y'z Dock (win32 application that acts as OS X's Dock) to cease development and put it off his site. I don't know if legal actions were used.
Microsoft hasn't sued or sad anything negative about Mono, Wine, Cedega, ReactOS etc,... which as we all know, are all aplications (some OS's) that walk on thin ice with MS. The only thing I remember MS saying about Mono was "we don't support it."
FreeBSD's founder was asked to wim down his FreeBSD public appearances, speeches, interviews, coding, blogs, you name it, after he joined Apple. Apple wanted him "contained" just like any other employee.
Apple is opening their stores in Britain with prices third party shops can't match.
Think about it what you want, but Apple _IS_ the new Microsoft. No other company is as closed as Apple. Everything they do works only on their hardware or is very tied with it. Bill Gates said this best when asked about the iTunes store - I think it went something like this: "Apple did, what they always do, they open a way for new possibilities but they always tie it with their products".
The difference between Microsoft and Apple is that MS comes after you with an AK. Apple comes with a polished magnum.
Just an FYI. Apple is VERY Careful about NDAs. A friend of mine did mock-ups for a product (now released), and they were NDA central before the prototype ever entered the building.
While I certainly don't KNOW if Apple employees / contractors all sign an NDA, there is certainly EVIDENCE that they do.
And when you sign an NDA, you give away some of your free speech rights -- willingly.
-Pie
Do you understand that the person who signs a contract is the one who should be constrained by it, and punished should they break it, and a contract should not be binding upon anyone that hasn't actually agreed to it?
You're confusing contracts with the law. A contract is an agreement that goes above and beyond what the law specifies.
The source of the information violated his or her contract. These sites violated the law.
I never signed a contract saying I wouldn't kill people, but that doesn't make it legal for me to do so.
If so, then its a dumb law that could easily be used to suppress legitimate journalism (and has been in the past).
There are plenty of legal protections and exceptions for "whistleblowers" -- you may not agree that they go far enough, but this case is absolutely not one that applies. Exposing a company's internal product planning information is not the same as exposing fraudulent accounting practices, or the dumping of toxic waste, or any other illegal activity.
Don't become a regular here -- you will become retarded.
The easiest way to get rid of guns in America is to make speeding a felony.
Saying that no one has the right to "publish information that could have been provided only by someone breaking the law," is like saying the First Amendment could be done away with by passing a law stating that it is illegal to publish information.
Think about it.
Usurper_ii
Ron Paul
What property right justifies the application of restrictions imposed by an agreement on someone that never signed that agreement?
The right to possess trade secrets. The Uniform Trade Secets Act, which factors heavily into this case, is just an extention of the common law right to hold trade secrets.
Now, the definition of "trade secret" varies quite a bit, but I can't imagine any jurisdiction where secret internal information regarding unannounced products can not be considered a trade secret.
Don't become a regular here -- you will become retarded.
...I, as someone who absolutely despises Microsoft Corp., would completely support them on this issue. Please stop whining about how people are supporting this because it's Apple. We're not, we're supporting it because we actually paid attention to what's going on here.
Journalistic sources are _only_ protected if they're blowing the whistle on wrongful things of public interest. In other words, if a plastics company is secretly dumping toxic waste in the Mississippi River, and an employee leaks this information to the press, they're protected. However, this is a case of someone releasing trade secrets to the public--including Apple's competitors--before the information was ready to be released.
By reading this you acknowledge that you have read it.
Back in 1995 Steve Young of CNN told me "CNN protects its sources." I was on the phone with him discussing having CNN send a camera crew to interview me the next day.
I had just told him there was no way he could put me on the air. Intel was at that time reeling from the consequences from the fiasco that was the math flaw in the Pentium processor.
What I had in my possession made that math flaw look like a minor hang nail.
I had trade secret documents from Intel, legally released to me under non-disclosure agreement (since expired, so now the tale can be told).
The contents of those documents revealed flaws in Intel 486 processors that basically rendered them "Unsafe at any speed".
Countless users were suffering crashes, data loss, God alone only knew what forms and totals of lost productivity, revenue, opportunities were being wracked up daily due to the serious flaws. And even Microsoft was being unfairly painted with creating even less reliable software than they genuinely deserved to be excoriated for (the infamous BSOD's weren't always their fault...)
Steve was trying to convince me that "the public good" out weighed my honoring Intel's non-disclosure agreement.
He told me that I could mail the documents to him and that "CNN protects its sources."
Here it is 10 years later and I wonder, how many folks would agree with Steve and how many will support my decision to not hold Intel accountable for their abuses of the public trust.
The simple math flaw had reportly cost Intel $600 million for a few million chips shipped. The cost of a recall for the far more serious flaws in the 100's of millions of 486 processors shipped could very well have bankrupted Intel, many 486 chips were soldered to their boards.
Or at the very least have damaged their reputation so badly they would have had a very hard time regaining the public's trust.
I just wanted to say, the Judge today served up a nice fat juicy sound bite for the press to report. But he's wrong. The right of large corporations to protect their trade secrets is not absolute.
I also can't help but wonder what the Judge in today's case would have had to say to CNN if I had been at risk in breaking my non-disclosure agreement with Intel?
Apple has their problems, and if enough customers are persistent enough they generally own up to them and take responsibility for making things right. And today's ruling didn't cover the kinds of information being disclosed that I had from Intel.
But if Apple rides success with their iPod's upwards and loses the ability to take responsibility, I hope today's ruling doesn't come back to bite us in the ass.
Yeah I know, sounds great coming from the guy that covered Intel's ass when he had the chance.
But for a moment, just a moment there, I was tempted to mail those documents.
What motivated me to silence wasn't a fear of CNN being forced to turn me over. No, it was the advice I got from the local Intel distributor: if anything about the 486 showed up on CNN, Intel would act like I had released it to CNN, whether Intel could prove it or not.
Turns out, the company I worked for had already gone to Intel and covered their asses... (and Intel paid them off very nicely too)
After today's ruling, I wouldn't even be tempted.
Bravo Judge, on this day that will live on in infamy for the actions of a few in Spain this date 3/11/4, you have indeed struck a blow to protect truth, justice and the American way.
...the Pledge of Allegence unconstitutional! Buy up lan in Nevada, when the next quake hits and California breaks off into it's own country of raging liberals, you'll have beach front property!
A classic example, from the early days of the personal computer industry was the demise of the very successful Osborne Computer Company, because of a premature announcment of the Osborne Executive. It killed the company because customer's stopped buying their older Osborne 1 in anticipation of the newer computer (which wasnt ready to ship). Their cash flow stopped and the company went belly up as a direct result.
The same thing happened to a company that I worked for and one of our most profitable product lines was killed. The delay of our follow-on product allowed our competition to take the market.
In both of these cases the damage was self inflicted by executives who couldn't keep quite. BUT the lesson by many, is considered a CLASSIC business mistake.
If someone did want to damage your company, this tactic, at the right time could well do the job.
What if the sources had actually been anonymous? This ruling sets a nasty precedent.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
What is it about the definitions of "cannot" and "no one" which are so hard for you to understand?
"Cannot" means never. "No one" means no single person. Is that so hard to understand?!
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
So, lets say Petrochemical Inc. was poisoning our water supply with a specific chemical. People are dying. That chemical is a trade secret. Are you SERIOUSLY saying it should be illegal for the journalist to publish the name of the chemical, merely because some employee of Petrochemical Inc. got it by illegal means?!
Because IF you believe that, then you believe that profit is more important than free speech. Heck, it's worse than that. You believe that profit is more important than human life!
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
No. What you think you reserve and what is codified in law are two different things. In fact you have to testify even if it incriminates someone other than yourself or you could be held in contempt of court. There are a handful exceptions to this, such as you can't be forced to testify against your spouse. But for the most part your wrong, you don't have that right, you never did, so STFU cus your entire post is crap.
Uh, the lastest conviction I'm positive about is last November, though I don't know what he published.
Dude went to jail for contempt for refusing to releveal sources. Vowed to appeal, I don't know how that turned out.
Other posts up in the thread say that two reporters are going to prison for contempt for the Novak CIA agent revelation fiasco. (Novak apparently named names.)
False, false, false, false, and WOW is that false.
Actually, the Constitution gurantees that you can be COMPELLED to testify. Amendment 6:
So would you rather the magazine be held accountable?
Here's the chain: Apple subpoena's the magazine (why do you call it a magazine?)
Oh, who is this? No one they know! So they subpoena HIM.
Oh, his brother works at a temp agency?
Subpoena HIM!
Oh, his temp agency has someone who works at Apple!
Subpoena HIM!
Oh! This person works in the kitchen!
So finally they have a lead to follow.
Do you rather Apple sue the magazines, then sue the person, then sue the temp agency?
GPL Deconstructed
I don't understand how apple is harmed by, let's say, the reveiling of a sub 500.00 low powered apple?
I think there is more to it than that. I honestly don't think that in this instance any thunder was stolen and any harm was done.
What I think Apple is trying to do is weed out their "mole" before next time when it may really matter. if a secret is let loose far enough in advance it could give competitors a chance to piece together a competing product for release at the same time. This could have serious implications for a company.
Besides that, by taking care of the insider now, it puts all of the other company employees/contractors on notice that they need to decide where their loyalties are while working for Apple.
Apple certainly thinks that taking all this negative publicity now is an investment that will pay off in the future. Probably akin to lancing a boil.
It certainly could be risky for Apple though, as they do employ people arguably from a 'free thinking' part of the country, and the next mac rumor might show up in a plain brown envelope that is completely untraceable, just to 'prove' Apple wrong on this lawsuit.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
As others have already pointed out, there's plenty of evidence that the 3 webpublishers knew well in advance the information they were given by their sources was protected under an NDA. That's not what I'm going to talk about, or freedom of the press. I'm all for it, my wife is a newspaper reporter for chrissakes. No I'm going to talk about the concept of trade secrets and how it applies to our capitalist economy.
Trade secrets are inventions,(new products) and revisions to existing products, if there are more things that might fall under the definition, they don't really matter in this case so don't flame me for omitting a few. If a company invents something(ipod) or revises a currently shipping company product(new g5 powerbook, new powermacs, etc) they are allowed to issue NDAs to their employees to keep their traps shut about them with good reason. If company x finds out about the new products before Apple in this case is ready to release it, and company x copies product and releases at the same time before patents have been issued, then Apple is screwed and loses revenue because of it.
As you may or may not know, under capitalism companies generally invent and innovate new products so that they themselves can gain the revenue from their research. With no trade secrets or NDAs there is no longer an incentive to do research as a company and capitalism fails.
With that out of the way, the judge was right to back Apple, if he hadn't many other companies would be severely put in a pickle fiscally by employees leaking detailed specs to other companies. Our economy would be in shambles, and you would all be out of jobs. Granted there is a bit of a slippery slope implied there but thats the fundamental logic behind the case.
The fact that people are upset about Apple getting a big boost in this stage of the case is absolutely astonishing to me. Freedom woohoo and all but there are limits to every freedom, press, speech, right to arms, every single one of them. The websites in question and the sources should be punished, for different reasons, the sources for breech of contract and the websites for publishing information they knew to be acquired in an illegal manner.
cheese logs keep my wang warm at night.
Well, obviously, this is the whole point in having the court, isn't it? To find out these things. It's not as if there isn't sufficeint evidence to presume that someone has broken an NDA, is it?
Those NDA's were set up so you couldn't sell the info to another company. Publishing it for everyone is a little diffrent and should be treated as such.
Though firint employees who do this kind of thing is AGAIN not something the government should be getting involved with!
How the hell is the American government saying it should get involved in stuff like this and the RIAA trials and not getting involved with American companies using child labour.
America seems perilously close to an ultra conservative free for all state while still making terrible decisions about responsability... I think we may be witnessing the birth of a new unfeasable and monstorous political system... I dub thee CareWhenIt'sInOurInterestship.
Any journalist that claims their sources were anonymous could instead be accused of protecting the identity of his sources, and if the identity of the source was required for a criminal investigation, the journalist would go to jail, all because he accepted an anonymous tip.
If, however, the journalist refuses to accept anonymous sources, then he doesn't get any more stories because after this ruling, nobody will ever want to give out their identity for a tip-off again.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Do you have proof it came from someone under an NDA? Otherwise apple is just taking a shot in the dark WITHOUT any real evidense.
Have you ever been to a turkish prison?
Offer money for information leading to the source of the leaks. Make it a very susbstantial sum. Put a explicit price tag on Steve Jobs' ego. I bet you'd get the information you wanted if you offered a few million. :-)
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
Don't betray your company's trust and NDAs. If they pay you they have the right to request that you obey the rules. It's fair. Don't like it? Quit and program for RMS.
However, this ruling does put "journalism" on the spot, now doesn't it? Now that the former mighty flood gates of information have been undermined by the little faucets all over the net, news and media sources are rethinking their game. Those of you mourning this day thinking, "alas, that unsinkable bastion of journalistic integrity known as source anonymity" should forget about this and be more worried that Comedy Central's Daily Show rules the roost. Dan Rather was the last Samurai. Welcome to corporate media: cue the hot chicks and violence. I'm thinking the "The Running Man" is probably coming soon. Down with The Man, man.
Man...what the hell is that smoke coming from that party next door doing to me...those brownies were good, too...I'm hungry, dude....
I might know what I'm talkin' about, but then again, this is Slashdot...
If so, the law pretty clearly implies that *anyone* receiving that information is tainted.
'Tainted' in exactly what way? Can Apple hire goons to weld them into a big steel shipping container to prevent them from telling Apple's not-a-secret-anymore to anybody they choose?
Sorry. Apple needs to police their ranks better. It's as simple as that, no matter how many judges they can afford.
That's the price to pay. If this is TRULY worth printing, it's also truly worth going to jail for.
MLK went to jail
Gandhi went to jail
So if the law is wrong, or the ruling is wrong, all he has to do to protest is go to jail, even if it takes months.
GPL Deconstructed
You would have a point if this were actually valuable trade secret information, but in this case, this whole "secrecy" thing is just a marketing and branding gimmick. What this ruling means is that a company can declare complete nonsense to be a "trade secret" and then compel the public and the courts to go out of its way to do intrusive investigations on the company's behalf.
Before something as extraordinary happens as curtailing anonymous speech, a company should have to meet a stringent test that the information that was disclosed was actually valuable, that the company took meticulous care to protect that information, and that the company was significantly damaged by the disclosure.
None of that has happened in this case. In fact, the information wasn't valuable at all, there is no indication that Apple took particular care to protect it other than generic employee agreements, and, if anything, Apple's sales have probably been helped by the publicity.
We can't change the judge's decision, but we can keep in mind how Apple has behaved towards its biggest fans next time we think about buying one of their products.
AFAIK, Think Secret haven't broken any laws, or atleast, they are not being charged with anything. All that has happened is that they must give their sources.
If someone tells you something that they shouldn't have told you (because they would be violating their NDA), but fails to tell you that they are violating their NDA, does that make you a criminal for reporting it?
Not sure, but it hardly matters, because once you had be informed that they may have been violating their NDA, then, although you might not have commited a crime, you must cooperate with the investigation. And in this case, that means disclosing his sources.
Look at it this way. If you had bought something from someone, and had then been told by someone that they were stolen goods, you would then be breaking the law if you refused to tell the police who you bought it from, but not for actually buying the goods.
IANAL
The government is simply upholding a contract between two parties.
So, the governent is 'upholding a contract' between Apple Computer and some mysterious person who may be six or seven layers down a rumor mill. By roping up and dragging into court as many layers as they can drill through.
Sorry. The government isn't a contract-for-hire Witchhunt.
By that reasoning, reporters should have blanket immunity against speeding tickets. Because you never know. They could be speeding in pursuit of a story!
You're not doing very well tonight with your commenting. Maybe it would be a good idea for you to take a little time off, maybe go have some pie.
You'll get your groove back, I'm sure of it.
To find out these things. It's not as if there isn't sufficeint evidence to presume that someone has broken an NDA, is it?
Indeed. And there's evidence that somebody in your county has been producing methamphetamines. Surely you won't mind the police having a walk through your cellar and that of all your neighbors, will you?
AFAIK, Think Secret haven't broken any laws, or atleast, they are not being charged with anything.
No, not correct. Apple alleges that Think Secret is guilty of three things: 1. tortious interference, 2. misappropriation of trade secrets, 3. unlawful disclosure of trade secrets.
Basically, the law says that you can't induce somebody to break a contract, you can't offer somebody something in exchange for trade secrets, and you can't publish something that you know is a trade secret. Think Secret did all three of these things.
These facts aren't really in dispute. They're kind of all in black and white. Think Secret's lawyer is arguing that the writer who did that stuff should be excused because he's a reporter. Apple's lawyers are obviously saying that he should not be excused, and that he's liable for damages.
No.
This is a California state court ruling. It carries no weight in a Federal court.
If it's a bad law, BREAK IT.
That also means you pay the consequences. Then break it again. Get everyone else to break the law. Over and over and over again until the law is changed.
It's called living according to your own standard, especially in the face of a bad law.
What 'bad law' exists here, in Apple's case?
GPL Deconstructed
I do have to ask how he's doing that. I think it makes a big difference. I mean, if I put out an ad, or on a website - send me info on stuff - that's very different than seeking out, contacting and encouraging employees under an NDA to break their contract and the law. I think the former ought to be ok, while the latter should be inciting a crime, or conspiracy to commit or whatever the civil term is.
Opera, Proxomitron-Grypen,GPG 0x0A1C6EE3
I would not describe the printing of illegally obtained information for a profit to be "simply telling the truth".
But is someone telling you information illegial? I mean, breaking into a place, either physically or electronically to get info makes the info definately illegially obtained.
However, someone telling you something at a general e-mail address is entirely different.
Opera, Proxomitron-Grypen,GPG 0x0A1C6EE3
The idea that dePlume solicited employees and entices them to break NDA is what really pisses me off. I mean sure, it may be completely true. He may have gone up to engineers in a cloak and fedora as they were leaving the Apple campus and offered them insane amounts of money to give him the goodies. Or he may have gotten an anonymous email from some random Hotmail account. The point is that we don't know. The only way we can know is by forcing him to reveal his sources. Unless there is some specific evidence of him enticing people to break their NDAs I don't see how this judgment can stand.
> By your argument it should be legal to yell the proverbial "fire" in a crowded theater... Arg! This is the worst anti-free speech argument there is, and I hear it all the time. The fact is, you have an INVIOLABLE right to yell Fire in a crowded theater, for the very simple and obvious reason that there might in fact be a fire. If there's not a fire, then you can be punished afterwards. But there is no PRIOR RESTRAINT against yelling Fire, and certainly no outright prohibition. If you see a fire, or if you even suspect that there might be a fire, please let us know.
Comparing the release of Apple's trade information is very different from the situation dramatized in the "Insider" the public interest is different from public interest. A journalist must be willing to go to court to protect their sources and yes they must be able to prove that their revealing of information must have served the public interest. Think of it this way, I can go and sign an NDA, immediately break it by speaking to a journalist and not expect any kind of consequences for breaking that NDA. This, you must admit, is very problematic.
Anyone who whines about being modded down should be.
But absolutely *NO* strong evidence that the magazine's sources were actually the violators.
Doesn't matter. In California, it's illegal to publish information that a reasonable person would know is confidential. The big label on the document saying "APPLE CONFIDENTIAL" would have been a clue.
Secondly, I'm skeptical of your conclusion that the "ruling sets a nasty precedent," seeing as how your comment didn't have anything to do with the ruling.
The judge is right. Since when is knowing if the next iPod mini will have a colour screen any of the public's business? AFAIK, the majority of what Think Secret reports are not to do with Apple knowingly shipping faulty goods or anything of such nature. Your very long, well written post entirly misses the point.
All the journalist has to do in that case to avoid being held in contempt is go in, and testify under oath that the source was anonymous. If the government wants to try him for perjury, they can give it a shot, but they'll have to prove it.
This space unintentionally left unblank.
Zeig heil was the salute Nazis used, you know Nazis the genocidal monsters who tore through Europe and slaughtered millions. Comparing Apple to the Nazis is truly and hopelessly wrong and you should be ashamed.
And you, like many others have entirely missed the point: Apple isn't pissed because of the release of the Mac Mini, they're pissed because of the release of information regarding Asteroid a product that is forthcoming, but not yet.
Jackass.
Anyone who whines about being modded down should be.
I think he did allow for such things, including acknowledging whistleblower laws, et. al. He noted that there is a difference between something in the public interest versus the interest of the public. That right there is a nice bright line between schematics and mere rumors.
Anyone who whines about being modded down should be.
"...who has broken no laws, I might add"
mmmm.... Well, Think Secret is somewhat of an accessory-after-the-fact. If an NDA was violated - and Apple did show that the leaked information was both very detailed and clearly marked confidential - then a crime has been committed. If a crime has been committed then the (alleged) victim has a right to pursue the criminal through the courts. Even a New York Times or Washington Post reporter would have been required to turn over their source if this fact pattern had applied.
Some people are offended at any restriction on the individual's right to say absolutely anything they want to [1]. That's fine. I just want to hear them make the case for a mandate of a totally transparent society, it's usually pretty funny. An absolute freedom of speach means a total lack of privacy. My usual argument is the classic 'give me your Social Security number', and follow any good defence of a refusal with 'if someone stole your info, should he be allowed to tell me ?'
Yes, that was a strawman - and they always need a brain - but it's locally scoped. And I wanted an excuse to make a point. And a reuctio ad absurdum, not that ther's anything wrong with that one.
Another argumaent in favor of this ruling is the fact that an NDA is a contract. 'If you promise not to tell anyone,w e'll tell you something' plus a signature make a contract. Courts exist to enforce contracts. If the court didn't demand the production of the offender then the public should have be outraged.
Most people complaining are ignoring a LOT of details, the others can't support the implications of their whole position.
[1] Any free society desperately needs this vocal minority, however annoyon gthey sometimes are.
Veteran, Bermuda Triangle Expeditionary Force, 1992-1951
So if you sign a contract for a loan repayment and then fail to make payments, it's the bank's fault for not policing their borrowers better? There's only so much policing you can do before you're locking people in cages for the entire time they work for you.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
The term "trade secret" has a specific legal meaning. Look it up.
Nice strawman, ignoring of course that if your analogy were to be applicable, you would be publishing pictures of this persons meth lab to the net, and thus the government would have reason to believe that you are connected to this person.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
You really need to read up on law and case history to realize that it is routine to compel journalists to reveal their sources. In fact, it's routine to compel anyone to reveal their sources. It hasn't had a chilling effect yet. Why? Because we have whistle blower laws in place, and in this case, it was decided those laws don't apply.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
But as I said, after this precedent, it's unlikely anyone would ever want to submit a non-anonymous tip.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
But is someone telling you information illegial? I mean, breaking into a place, either physically or electronically to get info makes the info definately illegially obtained.
However, someone telling you something at a general e-mail address is entirely different.
Let's distinguish the two parties here -- the NDA-violator and the website operator.
The former breaches his contract to provide the information to the later, the later, knowing, or having reason to know of the breach of contract, reproduces the information on his website.
What might not be clear is that this breach of contract is effectively the same thing as theft under the UTSA. (This doesn't mean it is equal to theft, it just means that it applies equally when dealing with trade secrets, which are defined in part by a company's attempts at keeping it secret, including such contracts.)
The other unclear part is that the website operator knows, or has reason to know, that the information was obtained through a breach of contract. In this case the burden of proof is pretty light, as the sites were openly soliciting insider information, and openly claiming that they had it. It's only reasonable for them to assume that they would get such information, and the sites themselves haven't claimed ignorance in defence, so it's a non-issue.
So, what I meant by "the printing of illegally obtained information" was that the sites were at fault for printing the information, not for illegally obtaining it. I recognize that it wasn't entirely clear.
For what it's worth, the sites *may have* obtained the information illegally, by inducement, or bribery. As far as I know they have not been accused of doing so, but it may be that evidence of such just hasn't been revealed yet, especially considering that the source of the leaks has yet to be identified.
That's just speculation though. I don't believe it's the case, but I think many people would feel differently about it if it were, all else being the same.
Don't become a regular here -- you will become retarded.
If you'd actually read the judge's opinion, you would realize that this ruling *FOLLOWS* precedent set both by California courts and the US Supreme Courts far more than it sets it.
As the Judge stated, the evidence was strong enough to suggest that the subpeona should go forward, and met the criteria set by a court in an earlier case for compelling journalists to identify their sources.
But that may have taken more than 30 seconds of reading and a knee jerk reaction, right?
That case would have been for the public good: a flawed and defective product was release into the public market place, screwing anyone that bought the thing.
This case revolved around information on an *unreleased* product; did you get that? *UNRELEASED* NO ONE IN THE PUBLIC WAS AFFECTED.
What you state is to be compared more closely with a car with a known, reproducable defect, that the company wants to keep under wraps, ie. not serving the public good.
There's a HUGE difference; get a clue.
but I think we should accept the judges ruling here. There is a significant difference between Apple-rumor sites protecting Apple employees who leak information and a news organization protecting a government leak. The difference is that ThinkSecret and PowerPage protect them to protect their business wheareas that hypothetical news organization is protecting something more- our rights. A government's secret activities are of greater consequence to public then product lineup of the next Macworld. In the end, we are going know all about them and be wow just the same. Let's be honest, their business is to published Apple trade secrets. If Apple sees this as a serious problem, the company has the right to seek protection in the law.
However, there is always a chance that Steve Jobs would use Mac OSX's pretty interface to send subliminal messages in a effort to take over the world. In that case, we should all donate our bodies to protect these brave bloggers. But, since he hasn't use his mysterious power of reality distortion to that end, we should all put down those aluminum hats.
You don't have to be smart to use a Mac, you just have to be smart enough to buy one
Sorry, I meant that the judge hasn't charged him with anything. But yes, you are right. I don't think there is much chance of Think Secret winning this case. And I have to say, he did have it comming. I don't think he needs to be made to pay for damages though.
My point is that requiring to know these people's identites is tantamount to presuming that they are guilty until proven innocent (especially given the entirely plausible explanation that the magazine's sources never worked for apple and they heard it from someone else just the way the magazine did). That's what I object to.
That's just your incorrect interpretation of the law. Revealing the identity of the source is in no way tantamount to presuming they are guilty. It is what it is, a revealing of an identity. If the person identified never worked for Apple, then presumably they also have a source for the information, and they will be asked to reveal it. Why is that so hard to understand?
And as I asked you elsewhere, how does this make the magazine "even more liable"? Do you know what the word means? Maybe you should check it out?
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
That's not a precedent. That's the way the law already works.
The exception, and the protection for journalists and their confidential sources, are the shield and whistle blower laws. These laws are in place because it is beneficial for the public to know when there is corruption in government or accounting improprieties at corporation (etc.). The person blowing the whistle on the wrongful behavior deserves to be protected.
In this case, there was no whistle blowing. No information about illegal business practices was revealed. What was revealed were trade secrets.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
Just so we are clear on what you are talking about. . . .
Do you have any idea how serious perjury is? The punishment of perjury is SEVERE, much worse than just refusing to testify and being held in contempt of court.
So what are the chances of not getting caught? Well, you're basically putting your life into the hands of someone you know does not respect agreements or signed contracts.
Oh, and there's no statute of limitations on Perjury. If the truth comes out in ten or twenty years, you can still be prosecuted in court as a criminal. And you're doing this to protect someone in a civil trial? So they won't lose their job?
The main reason not to engage in perjury is because it's wrong to bear false witness. But there are a lot of very serious reasons why it's not smart.
But don't take my word for it. Ask any lawyer about Perjury, the risks involved, the penalties, etc.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
As for Apple... see that category you are in? It's the same one Microsoft is in. I will never ever EVER buy a single one of your products for the rest of my life. No one actually needs you - the combination of AMD64 and Linux more than beats anything you put out. After Linux has killed Windows, OS X is next.
Thank you for putting that all so succinctly and without rancor, and reminding some of us (again) of the facts and the law.
I understand where Delmoi, the GP, is coming from. I don't think it's uncommon for us to feel sympathy for the underdog, for a David taking on a Goliath.
I also think Delmoi deserves credit for stating his views plainly, and not trying to couch it in legal arguments that he doesn't really understand, like so many are doing (repeatedly!).
Delmoi, if you read this, I salute you for your refreshing straight-forwardness and honesty. I disagree with you, but I don't think you're an idiot. You're giving us the truth of your gut feeling without resorting to half-assed sophistry.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
Can you cite case law where this actually happened and was ruled illegal?
No, and I suspect it never has actually happened as such. The phrase itself comes from a Supreme Court ruling (Schenck v. US, 1919) concerning the publication of Socialist propaganda during World War I.
If I remember correctly, many parts of the ruling have been overturned or supersceded, but the particular principle, that free speech is not absolute, still stands.
In fact, I'd say that speech is more protected now than it was at that ruling, when sedition laws were in full effect. Printing anti-government propaganda is a national pasttime these days, but back then, it'd get you thrown in jail.
You have the right to speak your mind, your beliefs, your opinions, your lies, your truths, your propaganda, you even have the right to tell people to rape and kill and steal and overthrow the government. You do not have the right to willfully endanger the lives of others by causing false panic or inciting immediate criminal behavior.
I am not a lawyer, but I play one on Slashdot.
Don't become a regular here -- you will become retarded.
Sieg Heil = Yay, Victory
Go figure. When's the last time you saw a reporter prosecuted, jailed, or, heck, just plain ol' censured (much less, censored) for revealing classified information?
Oh, please. Just because you were not interested in such cases prior to the Apple vs bloggers trial, it doesn't mean such cases did not exist! Check this link. If you don't bother to click on it, here's a brief quote: "Three times this summer, judges have held journalists in contempt of court for refusing to name their anonymous sources (...) Since 1984, a total of 14 journalists have been jailed ? some for only a few hours ? for refusing to comply with court orders demanding that they reveal sources or other information, according to the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press."
I'm looking on this case from across the pond. In Europe, we tend to have specialized law codes for, ummm, basically anything. We have the Press Code, Labor Code, Family Code etc., while you in the USA rather put anything into just civil law of the "someone versus someone" scheme. Anyway, European press codes both guarantee certain privileges to journalists and guarantee that journalists have to obey certain rules of professional ethics. In Europe it's simple: if you break your professional ethics - you're out of protection, buddy. In general, journalist ethics means that you can't break the law just for sake of getting a scoop - you can be protected by the code if you did it in genuine public interest. From European point of view, this ruling was not a surprise, actually the judge said just what we have wrtitten in our law regarding the freedom of press.
That's not to say I condone violating your NDA.
Your comment was definitely dumber. On the dumb scale it gets an 8.6, but that's only because of the Russian judges hurting your overall score.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
The fact that people look at the sites is proof there is a public interest in this information.
As to apple's sizzle, who cares? Who said Apple has the constituional right to "sizzle"?
You're the perfect reason to hate apple fanbois.
I know that it is hard for a lot of people to think clearly about his particular story, because they are so busy thinking differently, but does the entire significance of this ruling escape everyone? This ruling basically says, that unless there is some public good being protected, that a news venue can be compelled to reveal their sources, simply because a company wants them to. Now, perhaps on first glance people are too tied up in this particular example to grasp the ramifications of something like this, so let me point something out.
Every business deal ever done has been covered by some sort of confidentiality agreement. This isn't something that just effects geeks and Apple fan sites. People Magazine, Variety, Hollywood Reporter, Ain't it Cool, E! and imdb all cover an industry that pretty much by its very definition will never generate any news that actually constitutes a threat to the public good, and all of those outlets rely heavily on confidential sources that are all guaranteed to be breaking a confidentiality agreement, as there is no industry on earth more secretive and sensitive to leaks than the entertainment industry. Yet by this ruling, they might as well all shut their doors today, because if this ruling stands, any time they want, Time Warner, or Sony, or any other media company can subpoena their sources to find out who leaked the information. You can bet, that as soon as that starts happening, the amount of entertainment news coming out will drop to a trickle.
Now, I'm not saying that would be necessarily be a bad thing for the world, but it would certainly put a large segment of the media out of business. Could everyone please get over their "Apple is great, so anything they do must be great" mentality for a few minutes to think about the floodgates of problems a ruling like this can cause. No, I'm not talking about anything related to the legitimacy of blogs as journalism, I'm talking about the future of any business journalism in an era where the burden is on the reporter and editor to demonstrate some public good before deciding whether or not to publish a story.
The argument, and some case law has now been made that simple curiosity is not a high-enough standard to justify the publication of internal information a company does not want released, without the disclosure of sources. That means that *(theoretically) The Wall Street Journal now needs to decide if there is a demonstrable public good to be served in reporting a story based on confidential sources about a company. Of course, by this ruling, serving the public good now carries some meaning beyond just informing the public. There is now some requirement to inform the public of something 'important.'
Is that really how we want our press to be run? A system where by default companies are assumed to have the right to do everything secretly, unless someone can demonstrate a compelling reason that their plans should be public?
*Mind you, I say theoretically, because functionally I think this really does come down to an issue of the legitimacy of blogs, since I notice that while Apple has sued fan sites several times for outing their future plans, they have yet to sue Ziff Davis, or The Wall Street Journal for doing the same.
You don't understand the case or the ruling. Read this article (which I have already pimped elsewhere).
I detect that McGarry sense of humor on the third comment to that article. Am I right?
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
Geez, you and Leo are a tag team or something? I just woke up my dog and cats with my laughing.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
I'm dying to know: What did you have for lunch today?
e. The reality is these agreements are very broad and could easily be used to run roughshod over other rights.
So, what do you suggest, that all NDA contracts be considered null and void?
I'll agree that there is potential for abuse (does the NDA cover thoughts you have? while at home?), but there's no abuse of NDA contracts by Apple in this particular case.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
If you had read the judge's words (or a judge then saying the same) you would have been encouraged to believe that CNN would not release your name. "Unlike the whistleblower who discloses a health, safety or welfare hazard affecting all, or the government employee who reveals mismanagement or worse by our public officials, (the enthusiast sites) are doing nothing more than feeding the public's insatiable desire for information," Judge Kleinberg wrote. Given that Intel's dodgy chips affected the user's welfare, your name would have been protected. Of course, that would not stop Intel from finding you through other investigations - as you suggest they would have.
What needs to be made clear is the distinction between unlawful and illegal, which you seem to be hinting at.
Breaking a contract could be considered unlawful, but it doesn't necessarily follow that it is illegal and thus a crime. Also, something might be both unlawful and illegal. In some cases where an action is both, the state (or the people, as they say) might choose not to prosecute for whatever reason, but that still leaves it open for the injured party to seek redress.
A simple example of this is if someone ran a red light and smashed into you while you were driving your car. The other party might be guilty of numerous infractions (or worse than infractions), but for whatever reason they aren't issued a citation, arrested, or prosecuted. You can still sue them for your personal injury and for damages to your car in a civil court.
That's just an example. It's not an analogy of the current case.
Oh, and one more thing, just for your legal education. A judge doesn't bring criminal charges. A prosecutor of some sort does that (a District Attorney, a City Prosecutor, etc.). I don't think you're watching enough TV, or you'd know this. =)
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
So people have less reason to tear up the legally binding NDA they freely agreed to.
So a few rumor sites become obsolete. So did buggy whips.
These guys are really just in competition with each other to see who can spill the beans seventy-THREE hours before Steve takes the stage.
Whoo-hoo.
Speculate all you want, but once contracts are breached or laws are violated, you have to deal with the consequences.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
I'm not so sure that the facts are not in dispute in the legal sense, nor that this is the only defense that Nick's attorney's will offer up. It's an attempt to dismiss the case before it gets to that point (not to mention trying to win the case in the court of public opinion).
At some point, Nick's defense will have to file a document that lists all his avenues of defense. I can't remember off hand what this is called, but it's something like a lists of affirmative defenses, and once the defenses have been made (i.e., listed in the document) Nick's attorneys are pretty much limited to those defenses (though they need not use them all). For this reason, a good D attorney will list all the possible defenses he can think off, just in case.
If the facts are not in dispute, it won't go to a jury trial, but each side will have an opportunity to persuade the judge on how the facts should be interpreted. They will also try to "guide" the judge as to which laws apply, which precedents apply, and how they should apply.
But you do understand Apple's claim and you do have a grasp of the governing law on trade secrets, probably better than my own understanding.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
I think you just completed a hat trick! I'll keep reading to see if you manage a quadruple dumb.
/. (and there is plenty of competition).
Tortious interference has to be one of the dumbest concepts I have ever heard someone try to justify on
See the thing is that it's not just a concept, it's the law. It's not a concept that anyone here need justify. It's something you should take care not to do, if you don't want to get sued.
Yeah, thank God someone is finally protecting those poor multinational corporations from those evil non-professional journalists.
The laws would apply just the same if the trade secrets belonged to a single person, and it was a large corporation or an individual that broke an NDA and leaked the information to Nick. It's not likely that Nick would be able to induce a large corporation to break an NDA, though. Who knows, maybe he's really persuasive.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
So if you sign a contract for a loan repayment and then fail to make payments, it's the bank's fault for not policing their borrowers better?
Ironically, yes, it is. If a bank fails to do due diligence on a borrower, they're required to absorb the cost of a bankruptcy on the part of the borrower.
---
Mod me down, you fucking twits. Go ahead. I dare you.
(I read with sigs off.)
"Tainted" in the legal sense. Having received that information makes you subject to action under UTSA, specifically the part that says "acquisition of a trade secret of another by a person who knows or has reason to know that the trade secret was acquired by improper means; or (ii) disclosure or use of a trade secret of another without express or implied consent by a person who (A) used improper means to acquire knowledge of the trade secret; or (B) at the time of disclosure or use knew or had reason to know that his knowledge of the trade secret was (I) derived from or through a person who has utilized improper means to acquire it; (II) acquired under circumstances giving rise to a duty to maintain its secrecy or limit its use; or (III) derived from or through a person who owed a duty to the person seeking relief to maintain its secrecy or limit its use; or (C) before a material change of his position, knew or had reason to know that it was a trade secret and that knowledge of it had been acquired by accident or mistake."
Apple can, in fact, seek injunction and relief against those in breach of UTSA. Yes, they could seek economic damages against Think Secret, legally, in the amount of both their economic loss and TS's economic gain from the breach. That they're only seeking information reflects pretty well on Apple, what with the fact that I doubt they'd lose a request to receive all advertising revenue TS took in during the period surrounding the information at question's initial posting.
Sorry, but the law remains the law, and you remain wrong.
---
Mod me down, you fucking twits. Go ahead. I dare you.
(I read with sigs off.)
This ruling does to general information what the DMCA did to technical circumvention/enabling information.
- First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then ???, then profit.
Since when is knowing if the next iPod mini will have a colour screen any of the public's business? Since when is knowing if the next iPod mini will have a colour screen not the public's business?
GENERATION 26: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
Would you mind posting your Social Security number, your date of birth, place of birth, passport number, any credit card numbers (including exp.dates and security codes) and your banking pin here on slashdot? Maybe "GPL" them? (or BSD License. I'm easy.)
If you don't feel comfortable divulging your personal information, would you mind if someone else did?
Of course you don't mind! If you objected, you'd be violating my right to free speech.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
Do you have any idea how serious perjury is? The punishment of perjury is SEVERE, much worse than just refusing to testify and being held in contempt of court.
How can you stick someone with perjury if they don't actually admit that they lied?
Lets say that the journalist is compelled to testify. "I'm sorry, I can't tell you anything about the source. I just don't remember. I do not recall. I don't remember. I would answer if I knew. Sorry. It might come back to me some day. Gosh, I'm such a dumbass."
Exactly how is a court supposed to prove that he really doesn't remember right now? Last I checked, it's technically impossible to see what's going on in someone's mind. If I can commit perjury just because I honestly don't remember something, I'm never going anywhere near a courtroom.
So, basically you're saying that I shouldn't have trusted my 486 and that the value of Pi isn't 3? No wonder my rocket ships all crash!
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
This article is a pretty thorough description of how the mistake was made, and what the circumstances around it were.
A shorter description from another source (for those who just can't bring themselves to read TFA):
People who say "sheeple" have about as much sophistication as an AOL user, and in fact are probably actually AOL users.
a confidential set of slides clearly labeled "Apple Need-to-Knox Confidential."
Containing Apple's secret gelatin recipe!
Are you for real? Now we are determining which crimes are more important? Breaking the law is breaking the law. Period. End of story.
Considering this is a civil case, this isn't quite true. It's rare to be jailed for civil cases. It's all about getting hurt in the pocket book -- fines, liens, etc.
Then in the criminal system there are misdemeanors vs. felonies.... punishments vary.
-Stu
If it means no more dubious "magizines" like [i]Think Secret[/i] and their ilk then bust out the crystal and caviar!
Too many people fail to realize that this case was about people breaking NDAs and shielding them. [i]Think Secret[/i] isn't doing the world any favors. They are air Apple's clean laundry (as opposed to their dirty ones). I'm pretty sure that any other reputable journalistic publication would have scrapped any story that was based on the stealing of information like this.
Simply put, unless it had something to do with Apple using child slave labor or something equally henious against the public good, why does anyone involved think they can ignore Apple's carefully crafted NDA?
Personally, I think that if a precedent is truly being set that any publication can be forced to reveal any source who broke an NDA, provided that the material doesn't address a threat to the public welfare, then pretty much the entire tech reporting industry might as well pack up and find new jobs, because companies are quite capable of putting out their own carefully controlled press releases without all the expense of 'reporters' having to copy them down and parrot them back on websites and in magazines.
That was quite the run-on sentence.
This isn't a legal precedent. It's pretty much in line with legal history. What makes it a pseudo-precedent is the whole red herring of "are bloggers journalists?" and "aren't journalists protected?". If the New York Times published this , there WOULD be a similar action by Apple. The media and blogosphere has been spinning this as some sort of precedent... It's just the first case of a new medium, pushing the boundaries, being challenged by old laws.
And BTW, *most* of the tech press already is just regurgitations of press releases combined with some opinion / analysis columns. They really don't rely on leaked information. Infoworld, News.com, InformationWeek, eWeek, etc. have started to quote bloggers and rumour sites, but generally their stuff is based on conversations with spokespeople, analysts, & regurgitated PR.
Sure, this is why rumour sites are so interesting -- it feels like investigative journalism. However, investigative journalism has always had risk associated with it, especially by those who do the talking. You have to be DAMN SURE that what your leaking is in the public interest, because employers have a legal right to sue them in civil court for breach of contract. The journalists have to prove the story was in the public interest to withhold their names.
We have whistleblower laws to protect these people, and they were deemed by the judge to be inapplicable in this case. Even those laws tend to be of limited value -- because even with those laws, while you can't be sued for breach of contract, your career is effectively over -- no one will want to hire you because you've broken your word in the past.
Again -- leaking secret information -- not a good idea, in almost any circumstance. The law and even society at large is against you at every turn. People here probably don't agree with that, but it's a long, long road to come up with an alternative system....
-Stu
(blush)
does the entire significance of this ruling escape everyone? This ruling basically says, that unless there is some public good being protected, that a news venue can be compelled to reveal their sources, simply because a company wants them to.
This isn't about "Apple is great". Apple is using the law to squeeze out something many Apple fans, including myself, enjoy -- rumours and leaks. They're using it against individuals that don't have a lot of money. That's rarely something that one enjoys seeing.
Yet Apple isn't doing anything evil here: speech isn't getting squelched. We can talk about Asteroid and other leaked products freely. They're protecting their interests by finding out who breached contract so they can penalize them. A contract was broken, and consequences ensue.
What this whole affair seems to be doing is educating the techie masses on what has been the case for years. No one has a right to leak information protected under contract law. Journalists can be coerced through threat of contempt to give up their sources.
Whistleblower laws exist to only protect cases that are in the public interest. Otherwise, the law and society will be against you at every turn. Even if you successfully get protected by whistleblower laws, you'll probably leave your job, because it's going to be a hostile environment there. Unfortunately it will be very hard to find another job -- people won't hire you after speaking up.
Yeah, it sucks. It would be a long and hard road to change this, if enough people wanted to. Somehow I don't think "enough" will want to -- there have been much graver cases involving criminal actions and death that didn't stir up the public's interest to ensure whistleblowers could live a decent life afterwards.
-Stu
I'm not so sure that the facts are not in dispute in the legal sense
I never said nor implied that. I said that the facts aren't really in dispute. The bloggers got caught with their hands in the cookie jar.
I don't expect this case to ever go to trial. The bloggers will settle, because they don't have a leg to stand on here.
where i found that information. It worked for Bush Senior, Reagan, Oliver North and too many to list. For all we know they found it on the interent somewhere and that site might not even exist anymore, so how are you going to find that source? Especially if they can't recall?
-- I speak only for myself
BTW, I think the idea that you can't spread information that is under NDA is outrageously unconstitutional. If a rumor site isn't under such a NDA, then they are bound by nobody legally and like anyone else (journalists or otherwise), they have a right to keep their sources to themselves. I think Apple is going to lose this case. They need to go after the people giving out the info who are under NDA, not the secondhand sites who get the info.
--Rick "If it isn't broken, take it apart and find out why."
Trade secrets have nothing to do with personal privacy.
Corporations don't have rights. Only people have rights.
I support the Center for Consumer Freedom
And if they check him out and he's got a clean record? Then what?
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
Sure:
u reau/Reporters.Face.Jail.Time.For.Refusing.To.Reve al.Sources-875899.shtml
9 5
o nID=19&ArticleID=1810 (pay close attention to the bottom of that one)
7 44-2005Feb15_2.html
/ nw1102-5.htm
1) http://www.gwhatchet.com/news/2005/02/24/UWireDcB
2) http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=10731570243
3) http://www.hspa.com/main.asp?SectionID=4&SubSecti
4) http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A25
5) http://www.gannett.com/go/newswatch/2001/november
And thats just the first 2 pages of google.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
This is so wrong. Think about it. If my company is producing a product that can be dangerous to the society, and i want to blow a whistle on them, I could in turn be sued for giving up company secrets. I understand that this example is different than what apple is doing. Still, it now muddies up the waters and gives me less confidence to reveal plans my company is doing. What if a cigarrette company figured out that adding zinc to its cigarettes will minimize how much nicotine is detected? I tell a journalist about it, and I can be sued. I hope think secret and all those guys do not reveal its sources.
I agree that this is a well reasoned decision. Both sides were staking out nonsense positions, and the Judge found common sense inbetween.
Making a distinction between "print" and "web" media would be absurd. It would only mean that all bloggers would have to print ten copies and hand them to be friends to qualify as "print" journalists."
Even more absurd would be a decision that essentially grant immunity anyone claiming to be a journalistic blogger immunity to take part in any and all violations of confidentiality.
All SEC rules could be evaded by simply leaking information through an obscure blog that only your co-conspirators knew about. They'd have to prove that you had planned what you were going to disclose their, which would be next to impossible.
All Non-disclosure Agreements would be useless. Similarly for all privacy restrictions. Could credit agencies just claim to be "journalists" who were "reporting on" your credit to subscribers?
The key distinction is whether the disclosed information is somehting that the recepient could honestly believe would otherwise have been improperly concealed from the public? Or is this just leaking information that the leaker had no business leaking at all, that it is quite simply theft of intellectual property and/or confidential information?
We need to defend the ability of journalists to accept leaks of information that is being improperly withheld from the public. But it is time to stop allowing journalists to act as fences for stolen information or blatant end-runs around confidentiality requiremetns.
Trade secret leaks are actually minor here. The bigger abuse is prosecutors leaking information that they cannot bring. In these cases the disclosure is not in furtherance of public policy, but in fact directly contrary to it.
The bottom line is that journalistic privilege exists to facilitate release of information that should not have been concealed This is clearly a case where Apple's right to not disclose this information was never in question. The person leaking the information knew it was an improper leak, and the people receiving it knew or should have known.
I fail to see any benefit in protecting this type of "free speech". If this is protected free speech then there can be no confidentiality and no privacy.
You're suggesting the use of the "Reagan loophole", which is slightly different than znu's advice of saying the source was anonymous when in fact it wasn't.
It's much harder for someone to prove that you do remember a fact, so in this case perjury would be more difficult to prove. However, you would also have had to told your attorney from the outset that you don't remember, and there better not be any records. If your attorney knows that you actually do remember, then he knows you're committing an act of perjury, and he is legally required as an officer of the court to speak up.
Another weakness in your idea (although I'm not sure how this would play out) is that these people have just claimed they are journalists, as grounds to quash the subpoena. I think you'd be really testing the temper of the judge to claim you're a journalist one day, and then to claim you have a terrible memory for facts and that you keep no notes on the next day.
When a judge finds a person in contempt of court, the penalty is at the judges discretion. You might be fined a small amount of money each day you refuse to testify or you might be fined a larger amount or you might have to spend time in jail until you are willing to testify. I wonder which way the judge will lean if you've insulted him in this manner?
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
Trade secrets have nothing to do with personal privacy.
You're saying that there is no linkage whatsoever between privacy and trade secrets. It doesn't matter if the original holder of the trade secret is an individual?
Corporations don't have rights. Only people have rights.
I'm afraid you're just plain wrong on that one. Corporations do have rights. That's the way the law is written in the USA. I'm not saying it's right. I'm just saying that's how it is.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
That's what's known as "the cost of doing business".
Seriously. People default on their loans. Banks know approximately how often this happens, and build it into their rate structures so that they make money anyway. Just like retail builds in a "shrinkage" factor to account for shoplifting, and any smart engineer builds in an "annoying fucking marketing people" factor to account for all the useless shit they will inevitably be asked to add.
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Mod me down, you fucking twits. Go ahead. I dare you.
(I read with sigs off.)
Well, I do. If I've committed a crime, I should be able to tell journalists about it in confidence. I think a society in which a right like that exists is better than one where it doesn't. And the right has to be absolute, because otherwise you get a chilling effect that is as good as no right at all. If there is a very strong burden of proof on journalists to show there is a public interest, do I feel comfortable telling one about political corruption?
I am trolling
Just because you factor it in to your prices doesn't mean you eat it and ignore the criminals. Just because banks factor defaults into their rates doesn't mean they won't go after you when you do default. Likewise, just because stores build shoplifting into their pricing schemes doesn't mean they don't go after shop lifters. Simply put, businesses have the right to protect their property.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
However, when an individual goes bankrupt, the bank (usually) doesn't go after them. This is because they are a) not criminal and b) not worth it for the return.
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Mod me down, you fucking twits. Go ahead. I dare you.
(I read with sigs off.)
"Since when is knowing if the next iPod mini will have a colour screen not the public's business?" The question is when does the public get that information? Do you allow a reporter to leak NDA information before the company releases its product and so that all its investments could potentially go down the drain when another company steals their ideas or makes unfair use of the info? The judge is right.
>Kleinberg, however, ruled that no one has the
>right to publish trade secrets that only could
>have been provided by someone breaking the law.
I believe reasonable doubt comes into play here. There is no reason to believe someone who signed a trade agreement released this information, but then again, that's still for the next part of the trial.
There is every possibility that someone found out about this by seeing a box left somewhere it shouldn't have been. There is every possiblity that there was a source that never signed that agreement and therefore didnt break a 'law'. And there is also another possibility that if someone signed something, they didn't know what they were signing. It's called contractual fraud. And dat's illegal.
"Love is like pi - natural, irrational, and very important." (Lisa Hoffman)
Bankruptcy is different from defaulting on a loan, if you default without declaring bankruptcy I guarantee they will go after you. They'll just use a collection agency or some other method
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
actually passing along information that you know to be a trade secret makes you as guilty as those who aquired it and their speech is NOT protected. that was stated in the ruling. they will prob also be sued at some point.
i read the article fully. in fact, i read it close enough to note that the judge made and error in page 12 line 8 in his grammer.
Seriously, I think you have me pegged as thinking that it should be Apple's responsibility to find these leaks without aid. I'm on Apple's side in this; they're in the right. I find it funny that the law works so differently in trade secrets and in bankruptcy, that's all.
I was talking about bankruptcy. Defaulting on a loan without declaring bankruptcy is just fucking dumb, and anyone who does it should be locked up next to people dumb enough to leak NDA-embargoed information to the press.
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Mod me down, you fucking twits. Go ahead. I dare you.
(I read with sigs off.)
How is serving the public making "unfair use of the info?" The marketplace only is efficient if those who partake in it are properly informed; This means if there's a good idea, whether one company's employee's thought of it or another's company did, hiding it from the public actually makes the situation worse for everyone involved.
NDA's are vile and poisonous and must be resisted at all cost.
GENERATION 26: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
Yes, I agreee, however you are talking about unusual people here, and not exactly a small sacrifice.
You mean because these people are lesser people, they should be held to lower standards?
If the law is right, they should suffer it's consequences, even if it's only a subpoena. If the law is wrong then there are two consequences: If they broke the law they should STILL suffer it's consequences (for breaking a law) but they should work to get it fixed (which is what greater men have had done through peaceful protest).
My take, however, is that they did break a law and the law is not wrong.
GPL Deconstructed