Slashdot Mirror
Apple Pushes to Unmask Product Leaker
Zack Wells writes "Should online journalists receive the same rights as traditional reporters?
Apple claims they should not. Its lawyers say in court documents that Web scribes are not 'legitimate members of the press' when they reveal details about forthcoming products that the company would prefer to keep confidential. That argument has drawn stiff opposition from bloggers and traditional journalists.
This is related to a case of an Apple news site, PowerPage.org, who leaked information about a FireWire audio interface for GarageBand that has been codenamed 'Asteroid.' The subpoena is on hold during the appeal.
In the lawsuit, filed in late 2004, Apple is not suing the Mac news sites directly, but instead has focused on still-unnamed 'John Doe' defendants. The subpoena has been sent to Nfox.com, PowerPage's e-mail provider, which says it will comply if legally permitted."
apple bad.
Is it just me, or do these guys sound like they really wan't to name the source...like they simply can't wait to do it?
And, heh, this post's security word/image was 'Safari'...
Apple gets so much attention, publicity & free defense from the bloggers.
It would be stupid of them to alienate their biggest fanbase - but that's precisely what they're doing. Seems more like a personal vendetta then a business....
There are shills on slashdot. Apparently, I'm one of them.
Over the last few years I've seen companies fire employee's over their blogs, its not exactly a new idea. Ok in this instance the person used a online news site to 'get the information out'. It seems pretty clear whats going to happen. This employee probably broke a confidentiality agreement as well, these aren't things whicvh you can choose to ignore because your excited about your campanies new product. As much as bloggers like to be considered the new form of journalism they aren't, they are just people (often with overinflated ego's) who want to have their say.
But I have to ask if that person had gone to a newspaper where would we be legally?
The differences in laws that are applicable ONLINE and in RL are quite significant. I remember a time when if an online shop published the wrong price on thier ecommerce website that they were abound to honour orders placed for goods at that price.
That was changed.
Being that the online world is intensly different to RL, i would have suggested that certain aspects of everything should be governed differently on the net as in RL
Different countries have different laws...prephaps we should think of the net as a 'different country' in its own right, as opposed to an extension of the host country? And thusly, apply a separate set of laws.
>>>Scanning for I.D.I.O.T.S. >>>
>>>I.D.I.O.T.S. FOUND! >>>
One thought came to my mind. In all, I can't imaging any other explanation why Apple would want to throw money on such litigations.
Imaging scenario. Company X (Apple in the story) develops new cool product. Employee A leaks (for money or for fun) info about the product. Patent holding companies/competitors Alpha, Beta, Gamma, etc start patenting *everything* possibly related to the product. Product comes on market. Patents as usually get granted and competitors start sueing company X.
What Apple (or any other company) can possibly do to avoid such situations???
All hope abandon ye who enter here.
This whole case still has me puzzled. Apple apparently was working on a product to provide a firewire break-out box for use with their GarageBand product. Someone inside Apple (or outside and on an NDA) leaked it to an Apple rumours website, which published it. Apple then fired off a lawsuit against John Doe, and decided to drag the website(s) in question to court to get them to reveal the identity of the source of the leak.
All well and good, except one thing: where is the product? Whatever happened to this GarageBand break-out box? It has never materialized, and it's what -- a year-and-a-half later? You can't tell me that Apple suddenly decided to cancel this product just because news of it got leaked to the web. So far as I'm aware, it isn't like any of their competitors have such a product on the market, or that the leak has caused them any actual harm.
It makes me wonder -- did this product ever really exist to begin with, or was this some sort of fake product "trap" to try to find the source of product leaks to rumour websites?
Or is this product still in development, to be released at some later date?
Something about all of this just doesn't strike me as right (besides the whole freedom of the press, and confidentiality of sources issues). It isn't as if this is the first Apple product to be leaked to the press. Perhaps this one was leaked well before Apple was ready to announce something? Does Apple think it knows who is leaking this information, but wants sufficient proof to fire them? Does "Asteroid" even exist (and it sounds like a useful product to me -- with GarageBand '06's new Podcast creation features, even I'm starting to think of interesting ways I can put something like this to use)?
There is something more to this that Apple doesn't want us to know. I just can't quite pinpoint what is going on...
Yaz.
...the San Jose Quicksilver reports that according to court filings, "Segway" Delmonte Jr. said that an Apple director, former vice president Al Gorithm, told him to leak the information, saying that he had direct authorization from Steve Jobs to do so. Under Apple law, Jobs has the legal right to declassify documents, but Delmonte said this was the only time he recalled in his experience when he disclosed a document to a reporter that was effectively declassified by virtue of the CEO's authorization that it be disclosed.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
The days of exciting Apple product releases is rapidly coming to an end.
Is anyone really desperate to know the details of the next iPod tweak?
An iPod that is a little bigger?
An iPod that is a little smaller?
An iPod that has a corkscrew built in?
An iPod...
Is anyone really desperate to know the details of the next Apple x86 box?
Just go to Dell.com and see what Apple will be releasing in their next six month product refresh...
The days of Apple as a hip and innovative company are over - they are primarily a mass market digital music company that also is an very expensive niche x86 OEM.
Journalists should receive protections for when the information is in the public interest, which is different to whether certain (fanatic) members of the public are interested.
Trade secrets leakage are probably NOT covered by first amendment freedom of speech. If the general public are protected by leakage, then yes. But if the only people this serves are self-interested, then should the laws designed to protect the public apply?
Ok, hear me out on this. While I'm certianly one of the first to laugh at bloggers that seem to think they are real journalists and are the same as newspaper reporters, I do think they should be afforded the same protection. Why? Because we don't want the government deciding who is and isn't a member of the press. Press protections should be a function of what you are doing, not who you are. If you are reporting news (even if it's trivial news) you should be protected, even if you don't work for a paper. If you aren't, you shouldn't, even if you do.
Take two cases:
1) What we have here. A source leaks information from a company to a website (blog), who then publishes it. The website operator (blogger) did nothing wrong, they violated no law. The person leaking it broke an NDA, but that's not their concern. They should then be allowed to pretect their source because they are acting as a journalist, they are reporting the news to the public. Doesn't matter that their day job is clerk at Walmart, they are acting as a journalist in this case, thus should be protected.
2) A person decides to leak some major secrets to a journalist for a major newspaper. However that journalist decides they don't want to publish them, but would rather to go a competitor and sell those secrets. It all gets found out and goes to court. Here, the journalist shoudl not be able to shield their source. Doesn't matter that they work as a journalist, they weren't acting as one. They were not reporting the information to the public, thus no protections.
The protection should be in the act, not in who you are. Otherwise we are down a dangerous road to the government being able to decide who is a member of the press and who isn't. Publish something they (or their big donors) don't like? Oh look, all of a sudden your journalist license is revoked. You aren't allowed to protect your sources anymore and oh look, here's a subpoena for their names as well.
We should give anyone who acts as a journalist the same protections as it relates to the reporting of informaton to the public.
Was that supposed to be legally compelled or is the email provider anxious to give up their information?
...and that's the way the cookie crumbles.
online journalists receive the same rights
... guess what, they are _not_ journalists, however they might like it to be so. If a real journalist or a journal starts a web page (yeah, you can call it blog or any buzzword you can imagine) and they start publishing writings on it, they deserve all the rights they had as a non-internet journalist. But if mr prick comes around and starts a page of his own where he writes stuff, he should not feel offended when nobody that counts will treat him as a journalist. Because he ain't one. Just because everyone can afford to have a blog, they will not become instantly journalists. And no, because you can use dreamweaver you won't become a web developer either.
I must call BS here. Journalists are journalists, sixpack bloggers are
I am putting myself to the fullest possible use, which is all I can think that any conscious entity can ever hope to do.
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 Macintosh news sites) are doing nothing more than feeding the public's insatiable desire for information," Kleinberg wrote at the time.
so now the caveat to freedom of the press is: print what you like, so long as what you print is evidence of a health, safety or welfare hazard affecting all, or a government employee who reveals mismanagement.
Heck, Apple can't have any of that word of mouth that might actually excite the market about their products! How could they keep that 4% market penetration with all those people talking about their products?
Trade secrets leakage are probably NOT covered by first amendment freedom of speech. If the general public are protected by leakage, then yes....
IANAL but I would guess that Congress shall make no law abridging one's freedom to leak trade secrets. Hypothetically, what if you worked for AT&T and wanted to make known the fact that the company was (secretly) giving the NSA broad access to your company's switching equipment? (I know it doesn't sound much like a trade secret, but I bet that label could be flexed to cover such a case.)
Basically, it is none of the Feds' business whether Joe Employee decides, for whatever reason (maybe money, maybe conscience) to spill the beans about something going on at work. If Joe is violating his NDA, then there are already state laws that will take care of that problem.
The scenario you are suggesting is that if Congress passed such a law, non-disclosure agreements would be pretty much unnecessary, and it would be a Federal crime to reveal a trade secret! Bad scene.
And where then would the EFF be in its suit against AT&T?
$META_SIG_JOKE
If someone is able to obtain a press pass to an event by company A, company A considers them a journalist.
Further, if a blogger can get a press pass at MacWorld or WWDC, more power to them- they are journalists.
Otherwise, they are not, and they don't have a company behind them to protect them from lawsuits.
$0.02
One individual, buying a cd-key from a dell owner, no one will come after you- but the grander market here, the one that the GP post is referring to- is the large, corporate, lawyer controlled, and sometimes silly- business market.. where 1000 pcs on 1000 desks can get a licensing lawsuit going.. and if they try to purchase 1000 xp cd keys from dell linux users, that lawsuit is smoking depending on which court you live near.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_sale_doctrine
esp the section that reads in part
The acts specifically excluded:
A computer program which is embodied in a machine or product and which cannot be copied during the ordinary operation or use of the machine or product; or
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
In this case, the blogger was GIVEN the information without solicitation.
When ass-kissing, don't let the shit get in your eye, it can affect your sight.
The Large, corporate, lawyer controlled businesses probably have corporate licensing if they are smart and chances are they blow away the OS that comes with the computer and ghosts from a preconfigured image.
"Yahoo! Allegedly Helps Beijing Arrest a Third Reporter"
Okay, if Online organisations have the right to prosecute "real life" journalists, AND online journalists, why can't online journalism have the same rights? - perhaps not the best argument towards the case...However, the raw fact of it is, no one can police the internet, no matter how hard they try.
Fair enough they can arrest one person for "breaching" or "leaking" certain information, but whos there to stop the next person. Every second we breathe someone is publicising so called "secured" information. Give journalists their rights and maybe they might think twice about fucking you over!
g00p.
For all their die hard fanboys no one ever noticed a "do no evil" line in Apple's corporate plan.
Sorry to say, but Apple can do anything it wants -- including this current bit of litigation -- without the Apple fan base really being able to do anything about or in response to it.
In fact over the years they've proved quite keen to release the legal hounds whenever they've felt that such a situation has occurred. What mystifies me is why this sort of move is considered to be "unprecedented" every time it comes up.
My sig is too lon
A journalist is a person who practices journalism, the gathering and dissemination of information about current events, trends, issues and people.
Reporters are one type of journalist. They create reports as a profession for broadcast or publication in mass media such as newspapers, television, radio, magazines, documentary film, and the Internet. Reporters find the sources for their work, their reports can be either spoken or written, and they are generally expected to report in the most objective and unbiased way to serve the public good.
Depending on the context, the term journalist also includes various types of editors and visual journalists, such as photographers, graphic artists, and page designers.
Origin and scope of the term In the early 19th century, journalist simply meant someone who wrote for journals, such as Charles Dickens in his early career. In the past century it has come to mean a writer for newspapers and magazines as well.
Many people consider journalist interchangeable with reporter, a person who gathers information and creates a written report, or story. However, this overlooks many other types of journalists, including columnists, leader writers, photographers, editorial designers, and sub-editors (British) or copy editors (American). The only major distinction is that designers, writers and art directors who work exclusively on advertising material - that is, material in which the content is shaped by the person buying the ad, rather than the publication - are not considered journalists.
Regardless of medium, the term journalist carries a connotation or expectation of professionalism in reporting, with consideration for truth and ethics although in some areas, such as the downmarket, scandal-led tabloids, the standards are deliberately negated.
A company like Google gets chided for "doing evil" by providing its services in China, but Apple is defended for trampling first amendment rights. Just more evidence that the Slashdot crowd has become nothing more than rapid, stupid, fruity Apple fanboys.
So in your world, "traditional journalists" - let's say the editor of the New York Times or the Washington Post - would just as readily publish what they reasonably expected was a trade secret covered in an NDA so they can scoop some blogger? They wouldn't touch this with a ten foot pole. They'll report on your reports and let you dance.
And let's stop arguing over the "chilling effect" this case could have on people who are already bound by contract to shut the hell up about whatever it is they're keen to tell you.
I've signed Apple NDAs, and there's nothing worth breaking to the world that I'd risk going up against lawyers who work for a company with so much cash they invented a brand new investment firm to handle it.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
Bloggers are just like journalists, only without any sort of journalistic integrity. Oh wait....
I have for a while believed that I see a trend where major companies tries to go around the normal press protection by attacking internet media. Maybe they have a point sometimes, there is a whole lot of crap published on the net that would never be printed in a "serios" publication, but nevertheless I find it alarming. Why? Simply because if they manage to get the law systems to treat different media in different ways I believe that it won't be long until the tighter rules (that protects the interets of big companies) will be used also for media that are serious in their journalism. Every day the balance of power shifts a tiny bit more in favour of those who have money.
Seems like there are at least 10 Apple related stories on Slashdot's front page daily. Remeber when this was an actual tech site that had stories about interesting new technologies and open source projects? Now it is only a marketing tool for Apple and its fruity fanboy cult.
Why journalists need extra protection for their right of free speech? This did not come out right. Let me rephrase:
Why we have less rights than journalists? Only because it is their full-time job?
What about full-time employed bloggers? There are probably on-line only mass-media that employs oped columnists, right?
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
Regardless of medium, the term journalist carries a connotation or expectation of professionalism in reporting
Yes, and that is why these terrorists, I mean bloggers will be treated as enemy combatants instead. Gu-an-ta-naaaa-mo!
Over the last few years I've seen companies fire employee's over their blogs, its not exactly a new idea. Ok in this instance the person used a online news site to 'get the information out'.
Apple has the right to fire this employee if they find out who he or she is. They don't have the right to force the publisher to reveal confidential information (the employee's name). This isn't a criminal investigation; they don't have a search warrant; Apple is not the FBI; they do not have the right to force the publisher to help them enforce an agreement the publisher was not a party to. Their right to control their PR strategy just isn't important enough to trump several amendments of the Bill of Rights.
Should online journalists receive the same rights as traditional reporters?
What special rights do traditional reporters get? I think the aftermath of Plamegate has proven that reporters can be compelled to reveal a source in some cases.
No matter where you go, there you are.
You do realize that telling all of your employees to STFU is a lousy thing to do in the first place, don't you?
Also, your adoration of Time Magazine (TM) falls in line with Apple's unAmerican "legitimate members of the press" fallacy. The former Soviet Union had a "legitimate press" which the state defined. "Truth" and "News" were the only organizations allowed to publish. It was so silly that copy machines had guards to make sure nothing "bad" was ever published. The result made true the old Russian proverb that "there's no truth in the news and no news in the truth."
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Why would the poster write the blurb so poorly on Slashdot? Apple is not saying bloggers aren't journalists; it's saying illegal leakers aren't journalists (with the implication that this is true online and off).
Someone asked why a Microsoft employee's blog is on Google's Blogger? This is why.
- RG>
Hey pal, this isn't a pleasantforest, so don't waste my time with pleasantries!
The difference *I* see is that the supposed anonymity of a blogger - working from their home behind the front of whatever service they use , using whatever handle they choose - allows them to lash out irrationally. Journalists on the other hand are tied to their real name and to a paycheck. They can hide sources but they can't hide who they are and who they represent. There is a missing layer of credibility in the blog system, and yes there are journalists who lose their credibility but generally when they do they also lose their paycheck and their post.
You have to come up with a good reason before you take away my ability to tell my neighbor something that might amuse them. Your financial losses don't really sway me, nor do arguments about your ideas being property in some way. I might respect your patent or your trade mark, but I'm not getting anything from you to keep my mouth shut.
Trade Secrets should remain part of civil law. They are typically enforced through a non disclosure agreement between an employee and an employer. This is an odious agreement in and of itself which is often abused. If an employee breaks that agreement, the employer may recover losses from the employee but must prove their damages. No one outside the agreement has any obligation. Putting those obligations on others gives companies the benefits of a patent without the public benefit of disclosure. Nothing is more dangerous to freedom than restrictions on press.
Espionage, however, is criminal. Breaking into someone's office or computer to get information to embarrass or damage a company is against the law, but that's a separate issue from publishing the results.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
...when will you learn? Any minor product leaks are easily worth the tons of press and hype you get from your supporters, far more hype than your dumb little product unveilings generate on average.
It's 2006. Time to stop fighting the internet and start embracing it.
Corporate (and large University) accounts license the OS for ghost imaging. They don't rely on OEM discs from the distributer. In fact, in many cases the computers are bought sans OS so the money isn't spent twice.
Sounds like apple is going to have to clean house to find the leak. If Press is protecting their sources and competitors are gaining an edge, and someone in your company is leaking the info how do you find them without some kind of draconian tactics inside the company itself?
Who wants to go live at Apple Compound, CA where you can't leave? Great! Everyone else, you're fired!
It only takes one person to ruin it for everybody. The press should reveal their sources with some kind of deal to protect themselves(the press).
Just because you are the press does not mean you HAVE to protect your sources, just like to don't have to reveal, you don't have to protect them necessairily. It's a bad, difficult situation we have here.
From their actions during the Iraq fiasco and many other defenses of corruption in the establishment, it is clear that the media does not deserve more rights than the citizens and clearly an establishment press should have no more rights than a citizen press.
How about rights for everyone to security against Apple enforcers who would like to bust down the doors. Just because they have a signed agreement that the info would not be disclosed does not mean that everyones' rights should be trampled because they cannot figure out who violated their agreement.
Next time it will be over DRM, "trusted computing", etc. Apple has no admirable public ethics worth mentioning.
The acts specifically excluded:
A computer program which is embodied in a machine or product and which cannot be copied during the ordinary operation or use of the machine or product; or
Great job taking stuff out of context. That was from a section specifically describing "acts of rental, lease, or lending," not acts of purchasing and selling. It means that I can't rent out the copy of Windows that I got with my Dell or lend it to a buddy. If you read the section just BEFORE that, the one actually relevant to the topic at hand, you'll see that "Many state courts have also ruled that a sale of software is indeed a sale of goods under the UCC at the point where funds are exchanged for the physical copy of the software," therefore making it perfectly legal to resell it under your own terms.
Here's the most recent precedent set by the Supreme Court. The "do not resell" clause on the book in this case is practically identical to the EULA in software, and the court ruled that "The purchaser of a book, once sold by authority of the owner of the copyright, may sell it again, although he could not publish a new edition of it." (quote from the official Supreme Court ruling.)
By the way, this case was one of company vs. company, not company vs. individual. The publisher sued a retailer that bought many copies of the book at wholesale and resold them at a lower price, so this ruling is definitely (even especially) applicable to "the large, corporate, lawyer controlled, and sometimes silly business market." It still applies to the individual, of course, which leads me to my hero; David Zamos showed that even if a huge company like M$ wants you to give in, as long as you fight for justice when you know the law is on your side you'll be able to beat the big-wigs. W00t for rights!
Should online journalists receive the same rights as traditional reporters?
That's easy. Journalists should receive no special rights at all that other people don't have. There should be no statutory distinction at all between a journalist and a person. And then it becomes clear that bloggers are just people, with the same rights as everyone.
And what rights does a person have in this kind of case? Well, unless you and I have some kind of agreement to the contrary, I don't owe you anything other than to respect your rights. If you want me to keep something secret, require me to sign a non-disclosure as a condition of knowing it.
Secession is the right of all sentient beings.
Actually, no they aren't bought without OS. MS Select and Enterprise programs state that in order to install that licensed copy of the client OS you must first have a legitimate copy already installed as they are upgrade licenses to Professional edition.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
I don't think blogging should count as journalism. Though it most definately is free speech and should be protected as such. I don't think they should have the same types of protection as recognized journalists.
If a person writes in a diary does that make them a reporter? Does that put them on the same level as Melville, or Hemmingway?
I don't think it does. It's an online journal. Now if you want protections for the same things as journalism then
I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
Corporate users probably have site licences and standard, customized desktops anyway. For the individual, the description for the GP is probably enough; the large organizations probably already have the infrastructure.
It's me. Steve Jobs's illegtimate half-brother. But the real shocker is that WOZ is our father! When Jobs refused to pen the preface to WOz' bio, Woz was distraught and I took it upon myself to teach Job's a lesson!
This post is proly the most inteligent thing posted on slashdot today.
I often think no one notices.
What physical copy of the software are you going to give them on a ms-minimum purchase Dell?
if yer buying dell cheaply to install linux.. then the xp backup is a partition (the cd is $10 extra) so what are you going to give the purchaser as a physical copy?
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
Their other avenues for protecting their creations (patents, copyrights and trademarks) I presume they are already aware of. But when more onerous people with less benign intent come calling, we'll all have Apple to thank for the precedent.
Dear Sir or Madam,
The word 'their' refers (loosely) to ownership or possession. Unless you're talking about avenues that Apple already has ownership or possession of, I believe you should have used the word "they're", a contraction for the phrase "there are". Since this is your first offense, I'm going to let you off with a warning. Type carefully.
-Grammar Police
Wer mit Ungeheuern kämpft, mag zusehn, dass er nicht dabei zum Ungeheuer wird. --Nietzsche
I think ZDNet got it wrong. This is not about online journalism. This is about a rumors site publishing trade secrets.
Apple certainly never said that online journalists aren't journalists. They probably said that rumor sites publishing trade secrets are not journalists, and they're right. No real journalist behaves like that and simply prints a company's trade secret if there's no public interest in doing so (and please not that an interested public is not the same as public interest.
Apple's in the right here, and it has got nothing to do with online journalism, a blogger's rights or anything else like that.
Companies should have the right to protect their trade secrets for competitive advantage. Journalists and boggers should only be able to disclose such information if it is in the public interest. In this case it was only in the public curiosity.
A professional code of ethics.
//Information does not want to be free; it wants to breed.
Well - it depends on the definition of the press.
Which has changed - as many other things - with the raise of the Internet.
Let's take music distribution, for example.
Can we say that iTunes is not 'legitimate member of the music industry'?
The oh-so-mighty journalists really do seem to think they're above the law.
You don't get it do you. STEVE JOBS IS THE LEAKER!!!! Saw that coming a mile off.
The journalist label lends no more credibily to a specific individual than the blogger label takes away. There are plenty of recent events where journalists that should have been credible(The New York Times!) where not. There are also plenty of blogs that are identifed with a credible individual. To me, the journalists that lose their credibility take some credibility from journalists as a whole. The more credible the journalist to begin with, the greater the damage done. Also, it seems at least possible that someone could be both a journalist and a blogger. another.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/03/27/D8GK1QTO
"
Bloggers would be entitled to the same exemption from the campaign finance law that newspapers and other traditional forms of media receive.
"There will be no second class citizens among members of the media," Toner (FEC chairman) said.
"
I realize that this is in an entirely difference sphere of influence, but it could definitely be used as an argument against Apple's case.
Q is free. And, it it allows live switching (without rebooting) between virtual contexts, unlike BootCamp.
- First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then ???, then profit.
I don't think they should have the same types of protection as recognized journalists.
Why not?
If a person writes in a diary does that make them a reporter? Does that put them on the same level as Melville, or Hemmingway?
If a person writes in a newspaper, does that put them on the same level as Woodward, or even Judith Miller? This is a ludicrous argument.
And if a pulitzer prize winning journalist starts a blog, and blogs something Big, they're a journalist... shouldn't they still be protected? But... it's still a blog...
It's not who they are, it's what they do. If what they're doing is journalism, then it's protected. If it's not, then it's not. Is publishing anonymous rumors without applying eny editorial control "journalism"? Or even "blogging"?
I was at the hearing yesterday morning when the case was argued to a California state appeals court.
This case is mainly about the extent of the protections that California gives journalists as a matter of state law: if you're a journalist (whatever that might happen to mean), and someone wants to have a court order you to discover your source, they have to make a strong showing of necessity to get that order issued.
Apple did originally (and, in my view, wrongly) argue that the bloggers in question weren't journalists, but nobody in the case seems to be seriously debating that point anymore. The lower court assumed without deciding that they were journalists, and found that the journalist protections don't apply; at the appeal hearing yesterday, Apple's lawyer made clear his position that if his opponent were the San Jose Mercury or the New York Times, Apple should still win.
This case will almost certainly be decided on the question of whether Apple could compel any journalist, including a newspaper reporter, in this position to disclose a source.
The journalist label lends no more credibily to a specific individual than the blogger label takes away.
No, its the credibility of the paper they write for. The paper can turn around and fire them, and their name is tarnished. A blogger who gets backlash can close shop, change their nickname and domain name in a matter of minutes and be back in business again. A journalist has far more to lose and will think a little harder before s/he speaks.
The difference *I* see is that the supposed anonymity of a blogger
... like Publius.
Exactly. That's why people writing on paper always use their real names
In a sudden twist of events, it has been revealed that the source of the leak regarding Apple Computer's product code-named Asteroid was none other than CEO of Apple Computer, Steve Jobs. When asked his motivation for leaking this information to Apple rumor site Powerpage.org, Jobs confessed that "I just wanted to see what life was like on the other side. I mean, I'm so tired of being the only one who knows what that 'just one more thing' is going to be. I wanted to have the inside scoop on what I . . . er . . . Jobs . . . I mean Apple was going to reveal. You know. It's not just Apple who wants products that are greatly insane . . . I mean, insanely great. I want to know what what I'm going to reveal! That's it. . . . Could I be excused now? I have an appointment with my . . . uh . . . nutritionist."
This whole case still has me puzzled. Apple apparently was working on a product to provide a firewire break-out box for use with their GarageBand product.
Assuming the rumor sites are true. Do you believe all of the rumors on the Apple rumor sites? OK, we'll assume this was true -- it makes no difference.
All well and good, except one thing: where is the product? Whatever happened to this GarageBand break-out box? It has never materialized, and it's what -- a year-and-a-half later?
I guess you've never done commercial product development. One of the main reasons for keeping development secret is so people don't come to expect it (like you did!). No company ships *every* product it ever built a prototype of. And Apple has *really* high expectations from their customers. They have good reason to keep product development secret until they're sure they're going to ship.
Look at Google. Do you think that they've shipped every program they've ever started? Doubtful. But if they had announced every 20% project anybody there ever started, how would that help them?
You can't tell me that Apple suddenly decided to cancel this product just because news of it got leaked to the web.
That's fine, because I won't. That's just paranoia. I see no reason why that would be the case. This is good business sense, not spite.
The leaks don't help Apple. There was a time when rumor websites were very very accurate. The problem with that is that when product announcements were actually made, there was no news value to them. By stopping the leaks, Apple saved themselves a ton of money on advertising by generating millions of dollars worth of free press.
The cost of losing some bloggers is nothing compared to that. From Apple's point of view, stopping the leaks is absolutely the right thing to do.
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
OK, so it's legal to sell the physical CD. It still doesn't mean you can legally USE it.
Ok, I think I see your point now. I still don't think you can cleanly seperate journalists/bloggers this way, there are plenty of bloggers with reputations that they will want to protect.
Appearing in the New York Times certainly lends more immediate credibility to a writer than appearing at whatever.blogger.com, but appearing on whatever.blogger.com does not inherently limit the credibility of the blogger...
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
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Then they should have kept it confidential, its not the public's job to protect Apple's secrets. Unless the leakee actually broke in and stole the information then the blame is entirely at Apple's end.
----- I refuse to have an argument with an unarmed person
The idea that a journalist can and should protect his sources really only makes sense in the case of criminal actions and serving the public interest. A free press is crucial to protecting the public's interest when Government or Industry knowling acts in a manner that is against the law or runs counter to the public interest.
This is the reason for the protection, so that when a whistelblower i.e. "Deep Throat" has information on government wrongdoings, that person can get the word out without being a target of his now enemies. It is essential that the People be made aware of instances when Government has sold out the public, or Industry has knowlingly misled the People and sold a dangerous product.
In Apple's case, Apple is attempting to protect its privelege to privacy. Note I say privelege, because corporations really ought not be granted "rights" per se, but that is a different argument. Maintaining the secrecy of future products is a key to a corporations success not only to maintain, gain, or increase market share, but also to help sales. When runors or confidential information is leaked regarding a product, it can result in the corporation losing its advantage, and thus negatively impact the corporation in economic terms.
The question should then be asked, is did the leaked information have value significant to the public interest in uncovering illegal or criminal activity or did it merely serve to bring hithereto confidential information into the public domain? In the former case, the protection ought be granted to the "journalist", whether professional or not, as the disclosure had significant value. In the latter case, the disclosure serves only to advance one or more parties agenda to the detriment of the corporation, an action with no value to the common good. In this case, I would argue that the information was either illegal or ubjustly obtained or leaked and therefore the protection ought not be granted.
I can legally sell a book to someone at a garage sale. Are they not allowed to read it?
If there is a seal on the book which said that "By breaking this seal you are accepting the terms and conditions specified herein... The book may only be sold with new reading glasses... This book may not be used with any reading glasses other than the reading glasses the book was supplied with... The user may not bypass the use of reading glasses or use reading glasses not specifically authorized by this agreement." If you read the Microsoft EULA for an OEM version of Windows, this is basically what it says.