Think Secret Shutting Down

A number of readers are sending in the news that the Mac rumors site Think Secret will be shutting down, as part of the (secret) settlement of a lawsuit Apple filed in 2005. Apple had claimed that the blog, published since 1998 by college student Nick Ciarelli, had revealed Apple's trade secrets. The only other detail of the settlement that has been revealed is that Think Secret was not forced to reveal any sources.

Comments

Oh, the horror!

[Anonymous Coward]

Insert cloaked link to myminicity.com here, because I suck cocks.

Re:Oh, the horror!

[Poltras]

I'm torn between moderating you +1 troll or -1 insightful. Then again, I'll just reply shamelessly.

Hope He Got Some Money

[Apple Acolyte]

I really hope Nick got some money in exchange for agreeing to terminate his site. In any case, thank you for your years of work on behalf of the Mac community, Nick.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[srussia]

I really hope Nick got some money in exchange for agreeing to terminate his site. In any case, thank you for your years of work on behalf of the Mac community, Nick. Or he could just start another rumor site called "Vroom with a Pre-View".
c.f. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Apple_Inc._slogans

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[electricalen]

IMO, this is not a win for Apple. They have killed a very pro-Apple website which was read by Apple fans and customers. This was not some site that was trashing them, spreading damaging lies, and promoting non-Apple stuff. They were getting the fans excited and trying to sell more products, which is exactly what Apple is trying to do. If you kill off your friends, you are shooting yourself in the foot.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[falcon5768]

You can be pro-Apple yet severely damage them at the same time. Anytime you expose secret projects that the company does not feel is ready for prime-time, you risk losing any forward momentum that you would have had over opposing companies in development. This is why corporate espionage is considered a serious problem. As it stands now, the "leaked" project that started this whole mess has been to most peoples knowledge, canned.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[Yvan256]

This was not some site that was trashing them, spreading damaging lies, and promoting non-Apple stuff.

I'm not so sure about this one. When rumors of unbelievable Apple products get around the net, people's expectations get too high. And when Apple finally releases their new product, people are shocked that it's not as amazing as the rumors.

See also: dumb share traders who buy on rumors and sell when the real products arrive and aren't up to rumors specs.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[Anonymous Coward]

This kind of reminds me of Prince going after his fans. Nothing good ever comes of it.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[catbutt]

See also: dumb share traders who buy on rumors and sell when the real products arrive and aren't up to rumors specs.

Why is this a problem? If it's true, all you have to do is notice when they are stupidly selling, and buy, and notice when they are stupidly buying, and sell. Easy money.

Either that, or they aren't as irrational as you think.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[Anonymous Coward]

Bollox! The whole apple them vs us and hype-wagon is what keeps apple and its fans in their world. You need look no further than the iphone for a great example of this marketing method.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[erroneus]

Apple's success and failure are caused by their beyond-anal control-freak-mentality. It's to their credit because the extreme control over the quality and consistency of their products are directly related to their popularity and good reputation. (That wireless network sound device, though, should be recalled. It simply can't play music well enough without skipping!) But their control-freak-ness is also a tremendous inhibitor of their progress in the business world which affects how many homes Macs are found in. People often get the stuff for home that works like their stuff at the office... 'thinking different' is too risky when it comes to business needs.

While I have made numerous predictions about Apple in 2008 and in 2009, I also assert that the results of 2008's observations of Apple will determine if Apple gains a much more significant market share. And among the things that could prevent their growth and success in 2009 are Apple's attitude to customers both new and old and Apple's ability to handle a cultural change brought on by new consumerism and a surge of newbies -- in short, it depends largely on whether or not Apple can keep up with their public-perceived reputation and deliver on it.

A big part of what keeps Apple level in its market is the fact that their user base has little growth and little attrition. So for the most part, the same group of people using Apple 5 years ago are the same people using Apple today. But with the iPod breaking through that closed-culture barrier and heavy demand for iPhone, Apple's popularity surge will prove to be quite a trial for Apple in 2008. Are they prepared to handle it? Will they handle it? If they fail, the public will not forget it for another 10+ years... they won't lose their long-term base, but they will have lost credibility in the eyes of the general public. On the other hand, if they manage to deliver in 2008, 2009 will see a tremendous amount of market share for Apple.

The reality is that people have always know about Apple and have always had a kind of interest in it. But the part that always kept people a few steps away has always been the commitment necessary to make that change. But if more people make the change and are successful, that will bring the masses closer to doing the same... for the moment, much of those masses are still waiting and watching.

Apple will have to get over their control-freak nature, though. Their carefully managed culture will get utterly trashed by the public stampede they've been trying to generate. If they try to control that mob, they will be risking utter failure.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[PriceIke]

Correct, this is not a win for Apple. It IS a win for all the other Apple rumor sites though.

"Seweeeet, one of our competitors--a particularly GOOD one, good enough to get Apple mad enough to shut them down--bites the dust! More Web ad revenue for me! Merry Christmas boys, iPod nanos all around! See you at MacWorld, Nick! Ha ha ha!"

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[Yvan256]

As an outsider, then yes you can almost always be sure their shares will go up right before a keynote (on expectations from false rumors) and down right after that (from the true products that are still usually pretty great but not as good as the false rumors).

But you have to see it from the company's viewpoint. False rumors fluctuate the company's value in harmful ways, and then the aftershock articles on how "Apple missed their own target" adds to the damage... well, that's easy to see why it's bad.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

A big part of what keeps Apple level in its market is the fact that their user base has little growth and little attrition. So for the most part, the same group of people using Apple 5 years ago are the same people using Apple today.

Umm, what planet do you live on? Apple has not been level for growth or market share. Over the last 5 years Apple's market value has gone up to almost 20 times what it was 5 years ago. Not only did they add new markets and users, but their share of the home computer market has tripled. That's not even close to "the same users" as 5 years ago.

On the other hand, if they manage to deliver in 2008, 2009 will see a tremendous amount of market share for Apple.

I don't see it. Apple has had fairly steady 20-40% year over year growth in the computer market for years. Why would 2008 be a pivotal year that will decide the next decade? What is your logic behind this belief?

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[Anonymous Coward]

Not only did they add new markets and users, but their share of the home computer market has tripled.

And all six of them are right now beating games that you beat 5 years ago on pc! w00T!

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[Slack3r78]

You can be pro-Apple yet severely damage them at the same time.

Wasn't this case centered around an audio interface device that has never seen the light of day? Apple could conceivably have their reputation damaged due to the 'promise' of a device that Apple was never ready to publicly announce.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[cweditor]

The site's lawyer told Computerworld the deal doesn't allow Apple to get the name of ThinkSecret's sources, as the company had wanted. "The First Amendment has prevailed," said Terry Gross of Gross & Belsky LLP, "and every Internet journalist should feel some strength from what's happened."

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[necro2607]

"As it stands now, the "leaked" project that started this whole mess has been to most peoples knowledge, canned."

Are you sure you're talking about the right project? According to this article, the "leaked project" that provoked Apple's lawsuit was the Mac Mini, which was presented two weeks later at MacWorld Expo, and needless to say, has most definitely not been canned...

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[erroneus]

--> http://lowendmac.com/brierley/06/0824.html

by your assertion, let's look at the numbers you're suggesting:

According to this --> http://www.macobserver.com/article/2003/03/10.6.shtml -- article, Apple's market share was at 3.5% in 2003. That's nearly 5 years ago. Let's just go with the lower estimate of 20% year over year. (You cited a LOT of wild figures you know... going up 20 times over 5 years? Are you saying it went up 20 x 3.5%? Isn't that 70% market share? And if it tripled, wouldn't that be 10.5%? But then your metrics are also all over the place...) but at 20% compounding, we're looking at 4.2% in 2004, 5.04% in 2005, 6.048% in 2006 and 7.2576% in 2007. That does seem like a reasonable figure, but we're not looking at the staggering numbers I'm predicting. I'm predicting a great deal more than that. I'm looking for numbers that will actually humble Microsoft to the point of actually having to listen to Apple's demands rather than the other way around as it is presently.

Admittedly, I'm unable to quickly find any useful information indicating present market share, but in a conversation I had with an Apple store employee recently, I recall a statement of around 6 or 7% market share which doesn't quite reach your assertions even with a conservative interpretation of your numbers. (If I went with 40%, it'd be WAY off...) And to say "fairly steady" and "20-40%" is an oxymoron! Care to cite your references?

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[SoupIsGoodFood_42]

I doubt most Mac users have even heard of the site before, let alone care.

And Apple does have some good reason to worry, as when potential customers think they know when a specific product is coming out, they may hold off buying one of Apple's current products.

You can say all you want about Apple's decision, call them unreasonable -- taking unethical measures for something that probably doesn't effect them too much, whatever. But to suggest that Apple have shot themselves in the foot seems a bit silly to me.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

...Apple's market share was at 3.5% in 2003. That's nearly 5 years ago.

That was, of course, US market share, which lists at 8.1% today. 8.1 divided by three is about 2.7%. I think the numbers for 2002 were actually 2.2%, by sales. That's about triple, huh?

(You cited a LOT of wild figures you know... going up 20 times over 5 years? Are you saying it went up 20 x 3.5%? Isn't that 70% market share?

I said 20 times "market value" not market share. Please reread my post. In fact, Apple's stock evaluates today at 27 times the value it had 5 years ago today.

I'm predicting a great deal more than that. I'm looking for numbers that will actually humble Microsoft to the point of actually having to listen to Apple's demands rather than the other way around as it is presently.

Umm, okay, but you still don't list any reason why your prediction should be considered credible. I asked before. Why would Apple's market share raise more in 2008 than it did in 2007? They seem to be continuing a steady trend of chipping away, bit by bit. We might expect 10% of US sales in 2008, but the point at which MS's ability to hinder that growth with their monopoly is not until something like 20-30% of the market has shifted, so I don't see why we'd expect anything unusual.

Admittedly, I'm unable to quickly find any useful information indicating present market share, but in a conversation I had with an Apple store employee recently, I recall a statement of around 6 or 7% market share which doesn't quite reach your assertions even with a conservative interpretation of your numbers.

Do a Google search for "Apple market share" and the second result is this article quoting a report from Gartner on computer OEM market share as of Q3-2007, listing Apple at 8.1% of the US market up 37.2% from last year, right in line with the numbers I mentioned earlier. Does that seem fairly credible to you?

And to say "fairly steady" and "20-40%" is an oxymoron!

No it isn't. It is slightly off. Looking more closely it is more like 10% for two of those years.

Care to cite your references?

I'm not going to go link crazy here. There are plenty of number on Apple's market share available from Google. and I already gave you one of them.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[MojoStan]

"As it stands now, the "leaked" project that started this whole mess has been to most peoples knowledge, canned."

Are you sure you're talking about the right project? According to this article, the "leaked project" that provoked Apple's lawsuit was the Mac Mini, which was presented two weeks later at MacWorld Expo, and needless to say, has most definitely not been canned...

I'm almost certain falcon5768 was talking about Apple's Asteroid project, which was supposed to be a FireWire audio interface for GarageBand. Asteroid was never released and some think it never existed. Asteroid might have been a top secret pseudoproject meant to test the loyalties of Apple employees. The test failed because Think Secret, AppleInsider, and others reported on this project.

I'm not sure if Asteroid "started this whole mess," but the Asteroid lawsuit was apparently filed a month earlier than the Mac mini lawsuit.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money

[necro2607]

Oh. I don't think a firewire audio interface would have been very useful for Apple. I seem to recall hearing about that and hoping Apple wouldn't bother. Most people don't really need/want it, even far less so than Apple TV. There's only a pretty select market for a firewire audio interface, and it's already pretty well served by M-Audio, MOTU, Edirol and others.

Although, reading that the Asteroid/Q97 device was supposedly being worked on by former Emagic employees makes me think it actually could have been a worthy addition to Apple's hardware lineup. I just still feel it might have been quite a niche kind of thing when most of the new Macs already have audio I/O ports of quite reasonable quality anyways (with even the Mac Mini having digital I/O for that matter)...

nice tags...not

[stewbacca]

Since when is "protecting trade secrets" the same as "censorship". I think it's time for /. to abandon the tag feature.

Re:nice tags...not

[Anonymous Coward]

Since when is "protecting trade secrets" the same as "censorship". Uhh.. since always? Protecting any secret is only achievable through censorship. Look it up.

Re:nice tags...not

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, it's an automated tag. Do you see the icon to the right of the article? A face with a black strap over the mouth? Yes? Censorship. It tags the article automatically.

Re:nice tags...not

[niceone]

Maybe it's the "Sorry, comments have been disabled for this story" at the end of TFA?

Re:nice tags...not

[kellyb9]

If they really want to protect trade secrets, maybe they could try to make sure they don't get leaked in the first place?

When did speculation and reporting on rumors get deemed as private information? All I know is CNN is screwed.

Re:nice tags...not

[Anonymous Coward]

The tag feature is my favourite thing about Slashdot! It's like a brief analysis of the article, but by someone with severe Tourette's.

Adrian

Re:nice tags...not

[mstahl]

Just tag it "!censorship" if you disagree.

Re:nice tags...not

[cowscows]

I think Apple tries pretty hard to keep that from happening. You can speculate all you want, the case that Apple really went after Think Secret for involved very specific information about an unannounced product. It wasn't just a lucky guess by a well informed guy, it was obvious that he had received information from someone "on the inside."

I have no doubt that Apple has all sorts of restrictions on what their employees are allowed to discuss, and you surely sign all sorts of agreements when you go to work there. But people being people, sometimes an individual or two just can't keep secrets to themselves, and feel the need to share it. I'm not sure what else you expect Apple to do to prevent it, maybe replace all their employees with robots?

Re:nice tags...not

[tlhIngan]

If they really want to protect trade secrets, maybe they could try to make sure they don't get leaked in the first place?

When did speculation and reporting on rumors get deemed as private information? All I know is CNN is screwed.

It isn't. Which is how sites like AppleInsider, MacRumors and others get their information, legally.

However, ThinkSecret has been known to "entice" Apple employees into breaking their NDAs with Apple and give it certain priviledged information. Apple sued ThinkSecret in an attempt to find out who at Apple was breaking their NDA. They lost, mostly because it was proven that Apple did not do a sufficiently good job at their internal investigation, and thus, ThinkSecret shouldn't be forced to give up their source. (This makes sense, when you think about whistleblowers). From all we can speculate, said source is probably still working at Apple, since we've not heard of any lawsuit filed for disclosure of priviledged information.

If Apple did find the source, ThinkSecret could find itself under another lawsuit if it can be proven people were paid for espionage. But I suspect the terms of the settlement involve immunity for ThinkSecret from further lawsuits related to this matter.

ThinkSecret isn't exactly innocent in the whole affair. After all, Apple went after them, and none of the other sites like say, Gizmodo, Engadget, MacRumors, AppleInsider who report on rumors obtained through the grapevine and are often wrong. ThinkSecret's "rumors" often turned out uncannily accurate.

Re:nice tags...not

[Ngarrang]

Since when is "protecting trade secrets" the same as "censorship". I think it's time for /. to abandon the tag feature. I completely agree. Companies have the right to have their technology projects remain at whatever secret level they wish. But, the people who would call this censorship probably also don't think that sharing songs off their CD for free with the internet is wrong.

Re:nice tags...not

[catxk]

Not robots, Oompa-Loompas!

Re:nice tags...not

[stewbacca]

Not only do they have the right to do so, they MUST do so to survive. My company has a leading software package used the Department of Defense. If our source code and trade secrets weren't protected, the "big dogs" like Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, and Northrup Grumman (to name a few) would put us out of business in the matter of weeks.

Re:nice tags...not

[somersault]

wouldn't that be.. iRobots?

I'll get me coat..

Re:nice tags...not

[Ilgaz]

Since when is "protecting trade secrets" the same as "censorship". I think it's time for /. to abandon the tag feature. I expect same sensitivity from you if any Non-Apple company causes such thing to happen. For example if MS lawyers manage to get betanews.com closed down.

BTW, tags are considered a joke, turn them off via Preferences.

This "community" will make me give up Apple somehow, one day.

Re:nice tags...not

[edmicman]

You couldn't do something like, say, make a better product than the competition?

Re:nice tags...not

[ubrgeek]

> maybe replace all their employees with robots?

Yeah but in two months they'd replace those with slightly better models ;)

Re:nice tags...not

[stewbacca]

It would be hard to make a better product if they are reverse engineering our code and using their much bigger capital to push through our ideas faster than we can. Apple is in the same boat. Anytime Microsoft gets a whiff of what Apple is doing, they can get it to market faster than Apple. Thus the Apple secrecy. Fortunately, the past 15 years have shown that Apple keeps their stuff under pretty good wraps because it usually takes Microsoft about a year AFTER the Apple product has been for sale for Microsoft to start copying them.

Re:nice tags...not

[UncleTogie]

Yeah but in two months they'd replace those with slightly better models ;)

...that they'd have to send in to have the batteries replaced.

Re:nice tags...not

[DRAGONWEEZEL]

Do you know what the big dogs do to the little guys when things don't go their way?
I'll give you two words you might have learned
Hostile Takeover
It's pretty exciting to watch one, as I was an observer to one a long time ago.

In the end you have the same problem that ma and pa shops have against dell. I'll try and be brief here. You see dell buys large quantities of components. VERY LARGE QUANTITIES. So the vendor says Look if you by x we'll give you y% discount.

Ma and pa shops can't afford to keep inventory on the shelf, so they either buy drop shipped or small quantities of components. w/o a discount (but still at wholesale prices... to be fair)

Dell has the resources to streamline manufacturing. Ma and pa have to make lil jimmy come home from school and screw in standoffs and motherboards for 2 hours before he does homework, but after sports.

To pay the bills, ma and pa need to sell maybe 100 computers a month
Dell needs to sell a lot more, but they have a HUGE distribution chain, Advertising budget, and multiple locations.

Ma and Pa have a great history w/ clients and word of mouth advertising but that only takes you so far (usually within a small region think City) Worse, Dell has their market region firmly penetrated.

In my own expierience, I can't compete with dell until I build a machine whose component cost is > $2K, and even then I don't profit much /hr of work. On a 2K machine, I can make maybe $70... but that's on like 7 hours of work. Just not worth it. I only build for the most hardcore gamers who want to save money and get a better quality product. And I haven't built a machine for a non family / friend in over 3 years now. I just tell them to go to www.dell.com/outlet I sure as hell can't compete w/ that at almost any price level.

Re:nice tags...not

[sfguy808]

There is no constitutional protection for self or pirvate censorship, ONLY government censorship. You can write anything you want, but you may have to pay a price (you can still write it, but you'll have to pay up). Welcome to America

Re:nice tags...not

[geminidomino]

I'm not sure what else you expect Apple to do to prevent it, maybe replace all their employees with robots? No way, then they'll all be chronically depressed. Just look at the iRobot in the Hitchhiker's Guide movie.

Re:nice tags...not

[Anonymous Coward]

Luckily, the tags feature can be turned off from the preferences. I did it long time ago when I noticed the tags were really just someone's opinions mixed with silly tags like the "haha" tag, which is for some reason used for every other article.

Re:nice tags...not

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

If they really want to protect trade secrets, maybe they could try to make sure they don't get leaked in the first place?

Which you do by making sure your employees know you'll do what it takes to find them and sue them if they release such information. Apple sued for the names of the leaks, not to shut down the publication. In the end, Apple did not get those names, but the publication shut down, so everyone lost.

When did speculation and reporting on rumors get deemed as private information?

When you're profiting from information you solicited from people who you knew or had a reasonable expectation to know where violating their confidentiality clauses. There are trade secret laws to this affect in almost every state.

All I know is CNN is screwed.

CNN is probably very careful not to do this very thing, except in whistleblower cases, where there is government corruption, a danger to public health, or an overriding public interest for the information to be released. What new gadgets Apple is working on, does not qualify for whistleblower protection.

Re:nice tags...not

[stewbacca]

You are supporting my point. Apple keeping trade secrets from other companies is not censorship, which was my entire point.

Re:nice tags...not

[Mister Whirly]

No. When the government does it it is censorship. When a corporation does it, it is Business As Usual (TM).

Re:nice tags...not

[d34thm0nk3y]

Since when is "protecting trade secrets" the same as "censorship". I think it's time for /. to abandon the tag feature.

No kidding. It is not as if they used legal pressure to suppress speech they didn't approve of.

Re:nice tags...not

[vought]

Apple sued for the names of the leaks, not to shut down the publication. In the end, Apple did not get those names, but the publication shut down, so everyone lost. ThinkSecret made this choice, not Apple. Nick C. was suspected of paying Apple contractors and employees for information about upcoming products - trade secrets - and rather than give Apple the names, he decided to shut down his web site.

As companies in this valley are largely competitive based on what they know, I think Apple had every right to sue ThinkSecret for the names of people who broke an explicit contract with Apple NOT to divulge privileged information. This valley runs on secrets, and people with big mouths aren't lauded as they were in the 80s and 90s.

Re:nice tags...not

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

ThinkSecret made this choice, not Apple. Nick C. was suspected of paying Apple contractors and employees for information about upcoming products - trade secrets - and rather than give Apple the names, he decided to shut down his web site.

Do you have some information the rest of us don't? He may have decided to shut down his site, or maybe it was a condition of his settlement with Apple. Since it is confidential, how will we ever know? Note, shutting down his site does not, by itself, end the lawsuit or get him off the hook, unless it is a trade with Apple.

I think Apple had every right to sue ThinkSecret for the names of people who broke an explicit contract with Apple NOT to divulge privileged information.

Sure they do, but they don't seem to have gotten those names, probably because Apple was worried about PR backlash and did not want to force the issue any more.

Re:nice tags...not

[stewbacca]

I would expect my company to use every legal pressure available to safeguard our trade secrets. Furthermore, it isn't censorship, because it isn't the government. But I like your sarcasm none-the-less.

Re:nice tags...not

[Anonymous Coward]

And when Apple does it, its Protecting The Herd From Reality Distortion Field Failure

Re:nice tags...not

[d34thm0nk3y]

I would expect my company to use every legal pressure available to safeguard our trade secrets. Furthermore, it isn't censorship, because it isn't the government. But I like your sarcasm none-the-less.

Main Entry:
censor
Function:
transitive verb
Inflected Form(s):
censored; censoring Listen to the pronunciation of censoring \sen(t)-s-ri, sen(t)s-ri\ Date: 1882
: to examine in order to suppress or delete anything considered objectionable ; also : to suppress or delete as objectionable

Merriam Webster says you are wrong.

Re:nice tags...not

[Daengbo]

Anytime Microsoft gets a whiff of what Apple is doing, they can release vaporware announcements faster than Apple.
Fixed that for you.

Re:nice tags...not

[Daengbo]

By definition, a trade secret has no protection. If you want protection, you need to file a patent. Once a trade secret is out, you have no rights to squash it. Well ... except filing a DMCA take-down notice ....

Re:nice tags...not

[SoupIsGoodFood_42]

I think you have a bad understanding of what censorship really is. When you don't tell everyone aspects of your private life, is that also censorship?

Re:nice tags...not

[stewbacca]

You are missing the point. My company has exteremely strict rules about how we use our computers, such as our development machines are not hooked up to the net and we aren't allowed to introduce any media to it. They have no CD-burners, and USB thumbdrives can get you fired. This is to ensure that our source code doesn't leave the building. We do everything we can to protect our secrets, because the industry in general doesn't protect it for us. However, our software is in version 3 and in use by thousands of government offices, so we are afforded specific copyright protections. What isn't protected, though, is the new ideas we have and are beta testing for the next version. If that leaked, and Lockheed Martin got it, they could push it to market faster than us and take credit for it.

This is why Apple is so secretive...just like you said, "once a trade secret is out, you have no rights to squash it." That's why the squashin' must be done BEFORE the secret gets out. Contrary to popular Slashtdot GroupThink, this is good business, NOT censorship.

Re:nice tags...not

[Daengbo]

Hey, I'm not arguing with you about keeping trade secrets. I just think that Apple made a huge mistake closing down (what used to be) one of its major rumor/fan sites trying to find out who leaked this story. Yeah, whoever did leak it probably violated an NDA and should be terminated or whatever Apple's punishment for that offense is, but taking action against your fan base just seems really stupid to me. Once the cat's out of the bag, you can't put it back in. Apple seemed to be sending a message that rumor sites should discontinue printing rumors "or else ...."

Re:nice tags...not

[qurk]

Would someone explain this comment to me? What does Tourette's have to do with tagging at all. Hmm, I guess I'm asking why is this funny? I've done a lot of reading on Tourette's and I have no idea why the original poster would have thought it was funny at all, the thing he wrote. I really don't understand in any way. I'm sure that's why the original poster was anonymous, but I don't think he understood anything at all about "severe Tourette's". And you hear 12 year old doing the whole backlash "IT'S NOT FAIR" but I would consider this comment to be pretty much all the explanation you would need, unless someone wants to clue me in. There is a reason a lot of websites require you to be 13 at least to comment, kids.

Monkey off his back?

[InvisblePinkUnicorn]

It sounds like the creator of Think Secrets is pissed off but trying to act otherwise. He alludes to being "pleased" with the result, saying that he is now able to focus on his "college studies". Had college studies been important to him in the first place, he wouldn't have spent so much time on other projects like this. Most likely this statement is just a weak attempt to save face.

Re:Monkey off his back?

[Rob T Firefly]

I wonder if he's "pleased" in the sense that he has a "big fat Apple check" to "deposit."

Re:Monkey off his back?

[gnasher719]

I wonder if he's "pleased" in the sense that he has a "big fat Apple check" to "deposit." Maybe in an alternative universe, but not in the one where Steve Jobs runs Apple.

Re:Monkey off his back?

[Anonymous Coward]

lol. sounds like you don't know shit about jack. I don't even read think secret, I don't own a mac (I have run a hackintosh on my AMD)....but you sound like some jackhole armchair quarterback taking wild guesses about the psyche of a guy who had a long successful run.

Re:Monkey off his back?

[bondjamesbond]

So, he's been trying to finish college since 1998?? I guess he can pay for it now.

Re:Monkey off his back?

[Minupla]

I expect that what you see on the website was carefully vetted by the various legal teams involved.

MIn

Re:Monkey off his back?

[Vellmont]

Most likely this statement is just a weak attempt to save face.

No, most likely this is a statement as part of the legal agreement. It might contain something like "ThinkSecret will not make any deragatory or defamatory remarks regaring Apple Computer Inc."

I on the other hand am under no such legal obligation. What Apple fans need to remember is that Apple is a big corporation that'll do whatever they like to defend what they see as their interest. That includes silencing critics when they're able to. In many ways Microsoft has been a better player in terms of free speech. I don't recall them suing anyone over spoiling the CEO's "big surprise". (Which is really what this is all about, Steve Jobs personal vendetta). That doesn't mean Microsoft doesn't exert the same controls over their product.. they just tend to take the "keep your friends close, and your enemies closer" approach.

Re:Monkey off his back?

[cowscows]

It's probably more along the lines of all this extra scrutiny has scared his sources away from providing him insider information, so at that point he just becomes another speculative website, of which there are already a bazillion. Even if the lawsuit had just gone away, losing your exclusive sources probably would've taken some of the fun out of it.

Re:Monkey off his back?

[MrPerfekt]

Priorities certainly can change over 8 years, don't you think?

Re:Monkey off his back?

[Anonymous Coward]

Or maybe "pleased" in that he's "not" getting "sued to oblivion."

Re:Monkey off his back?

[catxk]

Or maybe in a "democracy", it's not illegal to publish stuff you hear about.

Re:Monkey off his back?

[Arcady13]

So, he's been trying to finish college since 1998?? I guess he can pay for it now.

I think he was in high school when he started the site...

Re:Monkey off his back?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hm, started by a college student in 1998, and shutting down at the end of 2007 so he can focus on his "college studies". Had college studies been important to him in the first place, he would have graduated in less than ten years...

Re:Monkey off his back?

[Anonymous Coward]

So that's why they've only posted something like one story every two months lately... They had to wait fro Apple Legal to actually approve something. Yup. Sounds about right.

Re:Monkey off his back?

[cmacb]

I think the day will come when Apple marketing people will BEG for publicity such as they got from ThinkSecret.

The company seems to have no common sense when it comes to a sense of proportionality. Microsoft my be an incompetent bully when it comes to its competition, but Apple is downright schizophrenic when it comes to dealing with its friends.

This will go down as a milestone in the company's history and whether they continue to be successful it will remain an unsightly incident.

Re:Monkey off his back?

[Anonymous Coward]

Alternative Universe??? Not hardly. Business as usual. Apple had no shot of actually winning this lawsuit... but they could keep Nick tied up in expensive litigation for a very long time. To Apple, it's chump change. To Nick, it's probably enough to keep him in college for another 8 years!

Re:Monkey off his back?

[Anonymous Coward]

Quick, which statements are "insightful"???

• What Apple fans need to remember is that Apple is a big corporation that'll do whatever they like to defend what they see as their interest. (small corporations don't try to protect their trade secrets?)
  
• That includes silencing critics when they're able to. (like bringing legal action against those who illegally leak their trade secrets - it seems that Apple has effectively won the legal argument) In many ways Microsoft has been a better player in terms of free speech. (um, how so? MS-NBC or something?)
  
• I don't recall them [Microsoft] suing anyone over spoiling the CEO's "big surprise". (Which is really what this is all about, Steve Jobs personal vendetta). (Future products are all about a CEO's marketing strategy? Most would agree that this product wasn't going to be any kind of CEO marketing exercise, because it wasn't a flashy product at all.)
  
• That doesn't mean Microsoft doesn't exert the same controls over their product.. they just tend to take the "keep your friends close, and your enemies closer" approach. (Does that mean Microsoft's enemies have a handle on their trade secrets, more so than Microsoft's friends? Or that Microsoft is like a communist country on the inside, with little free-flowing information about the direction of the company and its products? No wonder why Vista sucks so bad.)
  

Re:Monkey off his back?

[Rhys]

> That includes silencing critics when they're able to.

You win at the internet.

I've caught a lot of flack for talking about the failure-rate statistics of our apple supercomputer. Luckily my boss' opinion of that sort of crap from a vendor is rated on a scale of zero to negative infinity and is a pretty large value.

Re:Monkey off his back?

[heinousjay]

I don't think the word "illegal" means what you think it means.

Re:Monkey off his back?

[GaryPatterson]

I don't recall them suing anyone over spoiling the CEO's "big surprise". (Which is really what this is all about, Steve Jobs personal vendetta).

No, this is about trade secrets. The big surprise was a product that the never released (some iPod called Asteroid). It's not a personal vendetta, and I'm pretty sure you'd find the US legal system not so sympathetic to personal vendettas being carried out via the courts.

Re:Monkey off his back?

[SoupIsGoodFood_42]

Or perhaps you don't really have a clue about this person you probably don't know anything about, and he does see it as partly a good thing, or has decided to make the best of the situation? What makes you so sure you know his life situation so well that you can make judgments like that, and why on earth do you feel the need to post about it?

Re:Monkey off his back?

[bryan1945]

I don't recall them suing anyone over spoiling the CEO's "big surprise".

Ah, when has Microsoft ever had a "big surprise"? Wasn't Vista announced in 1976 or somesuch? Ok, I exaggerate, but I think you get my point- MS announces all kinds of things in advance while Apple tries to keep their announcements to 3 days after they actually release a product (yes, another exaggeration).

As for Stevie's ego- yup.

Re:Monkey off his back?

[Zhe Mappel]

Your premise:

What Apple fans need to remember is that Apple is a big corporation that'll do whatever they like to defend what they see as their interest.

Your sig:

Whenever I hear the word activist, I reach for my revolver.

Care to explain why you criticize corporate decisions, yet invoke a (falsely attributed) saying of a chief architect of Nazism in order to imply you would shoot those who criticize corporate decisions?

Re:Monkey off his back?

[aphor]

What a crock!

Apple's strategy hinges on hyped products. The hyperbole doesn't work without the control of information about new products. In many ways this is a counter to Microsoft's liberal use of vaporware to scare customers away from products released by faster and more innovative (better) competitors. If Apple provides the first glimpse of its new product before Microsoft can even cook up a fake future product to compare it to, then Microsoft is left trying to compete on actual technical merit. If the bulletin boards provide Micrsoft with free focus-group marketing research, then they can pitch vaporware at the same time Apple announces an actual product. Vaporware is a little more transparent (doesn't work) when it is announced after the product it intends to sink actually hits shelves. The Apple store is number one a guarantee to Apple that Microsoft can't make side deals with retailers to deny Apple access to product distribution.

He would have closed down either way.

[RandoX]

Don't give up your source and shut down, or give up your source and don't shut down. You won't be getting any more "insider tips" either way.

Re:He would have closed down either way.

[hsdpa]

You won't be getting any more "insider tips" either way. Why not start a new site like think secret, but with another staff? ThinkGeekSecrets.com maybe :)

Re:He would have closed down either way.

[Selfbain]

The site has been essentially dead for a while now anyways. I haven't seen a single interesting update there in months and what stories they did have were repeated from other sources. Now hopefully AppleInsider can hold out.

Re:He would have closed down either way.

[Anonymous Coward]

Lack of "insider tips" did not seem to stop macosrumors.com from posting their, er, stories!

Re:He would have closed down either way.

[srussia]

Don't give up your source and shut down, or give up your source and don't shut down. You won't be getting any more "insider tips" either way. Oh well, there's always Dave Schroeder.

Re:He would have closed down either way.

[Doctor-Optimal]

You won't be getting any more "insider tips" either way. Why not start a new site like think secret, but with another staff? ThinkGeekSecrets.com maybe :) Insiders predict a new (but still unfunny) command line shirt!

Re:He would have closed down either way.

[hsdpa]

Uncertain sources:

It will be a black shirt with the white text ":(){:|:&};:".

Re:He would have closed down either way.

[alx5000]

He can always join the Mr. X initiative...

Re:He would have closed down either way.

[daveywest]

Nick now has an established and proven reputation for keeping his sources confidential. Even with TS shut down, I have to imagine he will be a coveted corespondent for mainstream Apple press.

I can't think of a publisher that wouldn't want a staffer that has exclusive stories dropping in his lap.

Re:He would have closed down either way.

[Ilgaz]

The site has been essentially dead for a while now anyways. I haven't seen a single interesting update there in months and what stories they did have were repeated from other sources. Now hopefully AppleInsider can hold out. How can he post breaking news or anything he learned while being in court with a Fortune 500 giant with army of lawyers after him?

TAG PARENT censorship

[aussie_a]

Wouldn't that be censorship?

Re:TAG PARENT censorship

[stewbacca]

No. It would be eliminating a beta program that has proven to be ineffective.

Dangerous Slippery Path

[Bruha]

So now corporations will determine what independent press is able to say or shut them down? Our news is already skewed enough as it is by the various corporate news outlets who cater to this and that political party.

Re:Dangerous Slippery Path

[gnasher719]

So now corporations will determine what independent press is able to say or shut them down? Corporations are now and have always been able to take someone to court who publishes - like in this case - their trade secrets.

Re:Dangerous Slippery Path

[Professor_UNIX]

Most corporations aren't as secretive about their projects as Apple is for some reason. Intel publishes road maps of their upcoming technology years before it ever hits the consumer market, yet Apple keeps a lid on their "secrets" until the day the hardware is marketed in the Apple Stores or announced at a MacWorld event. Ridiculous.

Re:Dangerous Slippery Path

[falcon5768]

different fields. Apple is about hardware, in particular consumer and business products. Intel has to work with hundreds of companies to make products that are PART of their partners products (including Apple)

Intel has a vested interest in letting its partners know whats on the horizon. Apple has a lot to lose by doing so, since what makes them so popular, is how well they can design products for user simplicity.

Re:Dangerous Slippery Path

[Mr. Underbridge]

So now corporations will determine what independent press is able to say or shut them down? Our news is already skewed enough as it is by the various corporate news outlets who cater to this and that political party.

Journalists are no less obligated to respond to subpoenas than anyone else. In this case, TS was obligated to name the source who had illegally leaked trade secret information. He chose not to do that.

Note that he actually was not barred from printing the information. It was not giving the guy up that was the problem.

Re:Dangerous Slippery Path

[Chelloveck]

Corporations are now and have always been able to take someone to court who publishes - like in this case - their trade secrets.

I was under the impression that trade secrets, unlike patents, have no protection under the law. That's the trade-off a company makes when it decides whether something will be patented or be a trade secret -- If you patent, you get exclusive use of the invention for 20 years, but the patent becomes public knowledge and after it expires anyone can use it. A trade secret, on the other hand, is not published and no one else can use it, assuming you manage to keep the secret to yourself. Let the cat out of the bag, though, and it's game over.

The only protection for trade secrets is any non-disclosure agreements you've had people sign. If someone who is not under a non-disclosure agreement finds out the secret and publishes, there's pretty much nothing the company can do except whine at him. They can sue whoever broke the non-disclosure, but the guy who publishes is in the clear. Of course, the company can always threaten a long, drawn-out court case which they have no hope of winning, but which will break the guy financially trying to defend himself.

IANAL, but this is how corporate lawyers have explained it to me in the past.

Re:Dangerous Slippery Path

[samkass]

I was under the impression that trade secrets, unlike patents, have no protection under the law.

It varies widely by jurisdiction, but in the US this is not entirely true. The difference is that with a trade secret, if another company independently re-invents it, the other company can use it. However, a trade secret has legal standing in that employees cannot legally reveal them or take them to another company.

Although I don't recommend using Wikipedia to base legal decisions on, they have a description of the practical legal difference on the trade secrets page.

Re:Dangerous Slippery Path

[ubernostrum]

There are two issues people tend to go after here: the "I thought trade secrets weren't protected!" issue and the "OMG First Amendment!" issue. Both objections have serious problems.

Let's deal first with trade secrets. The revelant federal law is quite clear, and lays out some pretty stiff potential penalties for both Think Secret (who almost certainly knew they were receiving an inappropriately-disclosed trade secret, and thus would have triggered the statute) and the person who talked to them (who almost certainly misappropriated a trade secret or improperly transmitted one, and thus would have triggered the statute). 10 years' federal imprisonment or $5m fine is nothing to sneeze at, so we're talking about something that -- from the standpoint of the law -- is a pretty serious offense.

Now, as for journalism and the First Amendment: Think Secret originally attempted to claim the traditional right of journalists to protect anonymous sources, but there's serious doubt about whether they ought to receive it. The traditional protection afforded to journalists' sources exists to ensure that information which is important to, or which impacts the public good will be brought to light. But in this case the information does not serve any high and lofty public purpose: this isn't Watergate or the Pentagon Papers, it's some company's product lineup. And while we have freedom of the press, that's not the same as carte blanche to break the law: if you're going to wrap yourself in the Constitution, you need to go to the judge with something better than "Well, we really only did it because we can, and because we thought it'd be cool." Think Secret didn't have anything better to tell the judge than that, and so the judge (rightly) laid the smackdown on them.

The result is that they've been backed into a settlement which puts them out of business. Whether this means Apple is the next Google is the next Microsoft is the next IBM is the next Dark Lord Sauron, I don't know. But Think Secret basically screwed themselves, and have no-one to blame but themselves.

Re:Dangerous Slippery Path

[xero314]

If someone who is not under a non-disclosure agreement finds out the secret and publishes, there's pretty much nothing the company can do except whine at him. They can sue whoever broke the non-disclosure, but the guy who publishes is in the clear. This is not entirely true from my understanding of US law. NDAs and other contracts are protected by legal statute. Violation of a legal statute is illegal. Making an agreement with someone to break the law is called conspiracy and is also illegal. Finding out something is one thing, but asking, or enticing, someone to break the law is another.

Re:Dangerous Slippery Path

[sexconker]

Apple is about selling you that latest iPod up until the very hour of the event where they release their new iPod, making yours instantly outdated.

THAT'S what this is all about.

You release info on Apple's products / timing, it spoils their quarterly reports.

Apple is so secretive because it's the only way they can turn a profit.

If the average Mac fan / iPod user knew of all the problems with their products, they'd stop (or at least slow down) buying them.
If said user was also armed with the fact that a new version would be coming out soon, they'd hold off, and buy less frequently.
Unfortunately for Apple, the two go hand-in-hand.

Apple likes to release their new products in their light, on their timing. Everyone rushes to the Apple store to buy buy buy. No one gets to check out a review or learn about issues with the device.

"Apple is going to be unveiling their new iPod next month, despite the problems with the batteries and LCDs we reported on."
vs
"I'm Steve Jobs, and today, you'll meet, THE NEW IPOD!!! Available NOW at the Apple Store!"

But hey - you can always wait and get some good info from reviews and forum users. Unless Apple deletes their forum posts or sues the reviewer.

Re:Dangerous Slippery Path

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

IANAL, but this is how corporate lawyers have explained it to me in the past.

You'd better talk to the boss about hiring better lawyers, since they are completely wrong if you're talking about US law. This one falls under both Federal and California law and both have trade secret laws and California's Whistleblower statutes don't apply in this case. 60 seconds with Google will provide the relevant laws.

Re:Dangerous Slippery Path

[freemywrld]

Most corporations aren't as secretive about their projects as Apple is for some reason. Intel publishes road maps of their upcoming technology years before it ever hits the consumer market, yet Apple keeps a lid on their "secrets" until the day the hardware is marketed in the Apple Stores or announced at a MacWorld event. Ridiculous.

It is true that Intel does put out road maps of upcoming tech, but they generally provide this information only to partners. We had a road map presentation from Intel and HP where I work the other day, and both were covered by an NDA. Staying in the room for the presentation was akin to accepting the agreement. Should that information have been leaked and traced back to our company, I can guarantee there would be some suing going on.

Re:Dangerous Slippery Path

[Daengbo]

So would Intel have sued your company, the person who leaked, or the reporter?

Re:Dangerous Slippery Path

[Actually, I do RTFA]

The traditional protection afforded to journalists' sources exists to ensure that information which is important to, or which impacts the public good will be brought to light. But in this case the information does not serve any high and lofty public purpose: this isn't Watergate or the Pentagon Papers, it's some company's product lineup.

The quickest way to lose civil rights is to allow the government to decide who qualifies for them. Hence, the ACLU defending the scum of the earth. I mean, the KKK is not making any kind of point that we would recognize as being furthering intellectual discourse or whatever the justification you think is the reason for free speech.

if you're going to wrap yourself in the Constitution, you need to go to the judge with something better than "Well, we really only did it because we can, and because we thought it'd be cool."

Actually, I think you can.

IANAL

Re:Dangerous Slippery Path

[Anonymous Coward]

A law that prevents you from talking about something that someone is doing is not constitutional. It does not matter how bland or immaterial to the current political milieu the something someone is doing that is being talked about is. Congress cannot make that law. The relevant federal law is quite unconstitutional.

Re:Dangerous Slippery Path

[ubernostrum]

So, here's the thing you're missing: this isn't about free speech. This is about the press, and specifically about one aspect of the press. While we do have freedom of the press in this country, we have no clause in our Constitution which guarantees the anonymity of sources used by that free press. The protection of anonymous sources is largely meant to further the free spirit of the press, but the Constitution does not directly require or impose that protection; in fact, there's not a single federal law on the books which recognizes or protects anonymous sources. Various states have variations on "shield laws", but they are by no means universal.

So first of all, there's not one single "civil right" at issue here. What there is is a kid wrapping himself up in the Constitution without bothering to read it first: he got his ass handed to him in court as a result, and deservedly so. Again: freedom of the press if not carte blanche to violate laws left and right, and may God preserve us from people who think they know otherwise.

L

Re:Dangerous Slippery Path

[ubernostrum]

A law that prevents you from talking about something that someone is doing is not constitutional.

You've never been on the wrong end of an NDA before, have you? There are all sorts of ways you can end up legally forbidden to talk about something while not violating the US Constitution in any way.

At least Apple didn't really win

[__aaahtg7394]

It's sad that this came out the way it did, but kudos to Think Secret for taking the cyanide pill for us. At trial, this case could have resulted in a terrible outcome. If Apple had won in court, it would have set a harmful precedent: you must reveal sources. By agreeing to some (probably less-than-ideal) conditions, Think Secret and their legal team has saved us all from that precedent. Thank you!

Re:At least Apple didn't really win

[aussie_a]

A harmful precedent being that encouraging people to break their NDA and then publish what they is actionable? I'm guessing that precedent has already been set.

Re:At least Apple didn't really win

[kellyb9]

Giving in seems like a great way to piss all over the first amendment. If this were MS, everyone would be up in arms, but since its our beloved Apple, we should probably just give in.

Re:At least Apple didn't really win

[bxwatso]

Sources are actually not protected by any law I know of. Just ask Judith Miller.

I hear what finally nailed him....

[explosivejared]

was when he got a hold of anti-reality distortion field unit. I hear got a look at Jobs' real face. All I can say is... he's lucky he's not dead. Count your blessings and move on man.

And all over "Asteroid"...

[Anonymous Coward]

... a product they never released anyway.

I still can't figure out how Trade Secrets became legally protected. What a stupid legal system.

Re:And all over "Asteroid"...

[Farmer Tim]

... a product they never released anyway.

Only because Woz called up Jobs and pointed out Atari already .

Re:And all over "Asteroid"...

[Farmer Tim]

...did it.

Sorry to keep everyone in suspense, I need sleep.

Re:And all over "Asteroid"...

[Lars T.]

... a product they never released anyway.
What if they shut down to protect against the law-suits by companies selling audio break-out boxes that lost sales because ThinkSecret reported that Apple would bring out such a thing?

Good for the Source

[oahazmatt]

I work for a large Telecom corporation, and I had to sign quite a bit of paperwork regarding trade secrets. My training material, which did not include any usernames, passwords, server paths, etc., was not allowed to leave the building. We were granted access to quite a bit of information that was not intended for anyone outside of the company.

That being said, this is an excellent outcome for the Source. As the Source does not have to be revealed, something within Apple, perhaps at a significant level, will not be losing their job for divulging information that he had probably signed agreements to not disclose but felt the information should be shared anyway.

The person who wins this is the Source, as he most likely violated enforced company policy and came out of it free and clear.

Re:Good for the Source

[Anonymous Coward]

so really the only person that got anything good out of this is the person who was actually breaking a law. That's good old American justice for you

Re:Good for the Source

[oahazmatt]

so really the only person that got anything good out of this is the person who was actually breaking a law. That's good old American justice for you

Except company policy is not law, so this really has nothing to do with the American Justice System other than the fact the matter was settled out of court.

Re:Good for the Source

[noidentity]

Who is this Source you keep referring to? Is it the name of a group or person or something? I'm confused.

Re:Good for the Source

[oahazmatt]

Who is this Source you keep referring to? Is it the name of a group or person or something? I'm confused.

The Source. The leak. The rat, the stoolie, the mole, the snitch, the tattler, the tipster, the squealer. The source of the information provided to ThinkSecret.

Re:Good for the Source

[Anonymous Coward]

Company policy may not be law, but contract law is most definitely law.

Re:Good for the Source

[oahazmatt]

Company policy may not be law, but contract law is most definitely law.

Forgive me, I stand reminded of that.

Re:Good for the Source

[CODiNE]

As the Source does not have to be revealed, something within Apple, perhaps at a significant level, will not be losing their job for divulging information

You must be thinking the same thing I'm thinking... that Apple has an artificially intelligent cluster of Octo-core Macs working at the executive level! And it's not happy either...

He's been in college since 1998?

[radiotone]

Wow. That beats my record.

Re:He's been in college since 1998?

[warrior]

Tommy: You know a lot of people go to college for seven years.
Richard : I know, they're called doctors.

Re:He's been in college since 1998?

[CrackedButter]

10 years for me and still with at least 3 years to go sadly.

A year ago this would have been sad, contentwise

[ThatbookwritingWheel]

But since the "issues" he had with Apple, the content on thinksecret wasn't really much beyond what someone with an Apple Developer Connect membership could access. To many articles on the latest seed of this or that. Before that ThinkSecret sometimes had some real gems every now and then (and was plain wrong lots of times also)

My first anti-apple rant

[ahoehn]

Before I begin my first real anti-apple rant on Slashdot, I should note that I have and love an iBook, a 4th Gen iPod, a 2nd Gen iPod Shuffle, a Hackintosh, and an iPod Mini.

Now, to the rant. Perhaps I'm just paying more attention, but it feels to me that Apple is becoming more and more of an Evil Empire(tm). Suing a site that is completely devoted to Apple Fanboys out of existence seems pretty anti-customer. The "You installed bootcamp beta and now you must upgrade to Leopard if you ever want to boot your computer again" fiasco a few weeks ago reeked of the same.

My most recent bout of self-righteous indignation came when I went to Apple's online store to buy a new nano as a gift. I wanted to buy one of the 4gb nanos, and I wanted it in green. Sadly, this is impossible. The 4gb nano only comes in silver. To get a colored nano, you have to pay the extra $50 bucks for the 8gb model. It's a little thing, but it pushed me over the edge. Part of Apple's appeal has always been, "You pay a bit more to get something a bit cooler", but this is a bit too blatant for me. It's enough to kick me out of the fanboy camp. I'm sure Apple-product-lust will still rise in my greedy heart from time-to-time, but I'll do my self-righteous best to suppress those longings in favor of less restrictive fare.

In a related story, are there competitors to the nano that are as elegantly designed and easy to use?

Re:My first anti-apple rant

[Raineer]

Quality rant. Seriously. I have quite a few Apple-logoed devices around my home, and this is how I feel as well.

Re:My first anti-apple rant

[MrPerfekt]

I'm with you that the whole suing a fan-site thing leaves a bad taste in the mouth but really the site was more than that. If ThinkSecret got word of a product a few months away from launch and it seemed credible enough, that really does give the competition an opportunity to get an early start on a similar product. That could have an effect in the millions of dollars range. I'm not saying everything ever printed does that but then again Apple doesn't sue for every rumor every printed, in fact, they've done so only a handful of times. Presumably when a 'rumor' report hits far too close to home to have come from anywhere but inside of Apple.

Apple certainly isn't the only company to use the 'upgrade to a higher model and get X' tactic. It's grossly common in the Auto industry as well. Take Audi, for example, sales of the A4 with the 3.2 engine were suffering because everybody wants a 2.0T engine, which is not a terrible amount slower, much cheaper and more upgradeable. What's Audi to do? Well, cut out options from the 2.0T and make convenience features like 'memory seats' only available on the 2.0T. And the engine upgrade option is much more than $50.

The point is that if you really enjoy the product, you'll dish out the extra cash to get more of it. More memory, more engine. The concept is definitely not unique to Apple.

Re:My first anti-apple rant

[ducomputergeek]

And how long have you been using Apple products again? This isn't new. They did the same with Xgrid. The Technology Preview of Xgrid back on OS 10.3 had a couple slick GUI's that made it easy for joe user to create a render farm. (It was a better looking Qmaster interface but...). When OS 10.4 shipped, gone was the GUI and the controller features (needed OSX-server for that). [Caveat, the features were there, but turned off. If you knew the least bit of how to navigate and use Unix, you could enable the Controller feture. Or download Xgridlite to enable it. Couple it with the Xgrid control from the Xserver remote tools (free download) and you had all the functionality. I was working in Video production and we were all salavating over this. Finally an easy to use system for distributed rendering of video, animation, etc..

However, for the slick, easy to use GUI to Xgrid....gone. While it wasn't too bad for people like me who was a *iux systems admin before hopping over to the Animation side of things, it was no big deal. But to the true artists who worked in Maya or Lightwave all day and used to using a GUI interface to Screamernet or other renderfarm engine, Xgrid in it's final form wasn't that impressive. Hell, even the guys over in editing continued to use Qmaster. The only application I've really used on Xgrid has been Terragen. And that's mainly because it's not a multi-threaded application. So in order to use all 4 processors on my quadcore to render Terragen output, it has to be run through Xgrid.

Apple has defended their trade secrets for years. And vigerously. So much so that the Microsoft Mac Business Unit across the street didn't have an inkling to the switch from PPC to Intel until it was announced. Company I worked for had some in house graphics apps (Ported from IRIX to OSX) and we had to sign a huge number of NDA's for some of the developer documentation.

Anyone who's worked around Apple for any length of time should know two things by now: Never by a 1st Gen product and don't get overly impressed with any previews.

So long as I remain in video & post at some level, I'll continue to run Mac. For the money, Final Cut Pro and Shake are slick apps.

Re:My first anti-apple rant

[zigziggityzoo]

The "You installed bootcamp beta and now you must upgrade to Leopard if you ever want to boot your computer again" fiasco a few weeks ago reeked of the same.

This statement may work well for your argument, but it's completely false. When Leopard was released, the Boot Camp Beta software would cease to modify your current boot camp volume. Your current Boot camp volumes would continue to work flawlessly, as if nothing had happened. You just lose support, and the Boot Camp software on the Mac partition. And that doesn't even go into effect until the end of the year.

Re:My first anti-apple rant

[mihalis]

Dell also uses similar bundling tactics, or did last time I checked.

I have no objection to them doing this, by the way, it's up to them, but it dissuaded me from buying from them a couple of times.

The issue seems to be Dell's desire (or perhaps Intel's desire) to hide the cost of top-of-the-line CPUs, so any PC that has one fitted tends to be bundled with a lot of other high-grade options which (presumably) are intended to enhance the purchasers perception of the value they are getting.

what this means in practice is it's very difficult to get a Dell with their nicest case and motherboard, great speakers, all the frills, but put a Celeron class cheapie processor in the machine. Their website wont allow cetain combinations that should be valid in the sense that the motherboard in the model selected could accept certain cheaper and slower processors.

Understandable but sucky. They may say they only validate a limited range of combinations and "everything nice but the CPU" is not one of them, but one could say "but did you ever TRY?"

Re:My first anti-apple rant

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't understand. Apple (in this instance) is the manufacturer. They get to decide what to offer and at what price. You are the consumer. You get to decide whether to buy anything offered by any manufacturer.

This is the same choice offered to every consumer by every manufacturer. If you don't like the choices offered by a given manufacturer, don't buy their product - what's so hard about that ? Just don't bitch and moan "waah waah waah, they don't do exactly what *I* want them to. Waah waah waah". Enough already. The self-focus of people today is unbelievable. Me! Me! Me! Perhaps it's an American thing.

If Apple (or any manufacturer) don't do what enough customers want, their products will become unpopular, and their competitors will gain on, and surpass them. End of story.

Re:My first anti-apple rant

[onefriedrice]

> Perhaps I'm just paying more attention, but it feels to me that Apple is becoming more and more of an Evil Empire(tm).

I think you chose a bad time to start ranting. Apple's source shared private corporate information to Think Secret. (That's illegal.) Apple tries to find out the identity of the source so that the law can be enforced. Think Secret refuses to cooperate, thus preventing the enforcement of the law. What do you think the outcome should be?

Should Apple ignore the situation (instead of pursuing the company's interests), their problem with leaked information would escalate. Should they do they right thing (which they have done) in trying to make sure the LAW is enforced, a few twits on Slashdot will try to make a big deal about it, but Apple owes it to their stock holders (i.e. the public) to not behave like a doormat.

As for the iPod nano, if it's such a big deal for you to have a _green_ iPod rather than a silver one, apparently you have proved that there is increased value in colored iPods. Therefore, the solution is simple: Assuming the iPods are otherwise identical, if the value of having a green iPod is $50 or greater than having a silver one, then get the green one. That's all you have to consider in order to be a rational consumer. These marketing techniques are not unique to Apple by any means. So if you ever get pissed about any product that costs more due to seemingly artifical factors, just remember that products (especially luxury items) are priced on perceived value.

Anyway, there is a lot of other topics more deserving of an "anti-Apple" rant. I don't know why you chose this one...

Re:My first anti-apple rant

[McDutchie]

In a related story, are there competitors to the nano that are as elegantly designed and easy to use?

No.

Re:My first anti-apple rant

[IdeaMan]

The only reason Apple was smelling so good in the recent past is because Microsoft stank up the place so badly.
Back in the bad old days buying clones (Non-IBM) machines running Windows was "stickin it to the man", well both men, because of the terrible monopolistic anti-competitive business practices Apple used. Apple was the one that established the standard of Sue first, ask questions later, and Microsoft learned from the best. You young whippershnappers of today seem to forget these things. Now get off my lawn so I can trim the weeds around my Linux powered Natalie Portman shrine.

Re:My first anti-apple rant

[djfake]

Someone at work emailed me with a question: "we need to send an entire mailbox of emails to Dr So'n'so. He says Macs have the ability [to do this]". In academia, where I work, the majority of Mac "wack jobs" are in the 50 year old plus crowd. They make comments like the above, bestowing God-like power to their overpriced machines. I only use Mac because of work (as an OS X Server sysadmin). Here's the point - it's really easy to rant about Apple. It's just unfortunate that all the Apple Fan-Boys on /. continue to buy the hype. You'd think they were a little better versed in computing than the crowd I work with. c

Re:My first anti-apple rant

[SoupIsGoodFood_42]

So just by the silver one? I can see your point, but I think it's a good sign that perhaps you need to stand back a bit and take a few, calm breaths. Because at the end of the day, it's just a color -- no need to get too caught up in materialism, as easy as it may be sometimes.

Re:My first anti-apple rant

[Scudsucker]

Before I begin my first real anti-apple rant on Slashdot, I should note that I have and love an iBook, a 4th Gen iPod, a 2nd Gen iPod Shuffle, a Hackintosh, and an iPod Mini.

A lot of trolls say much the same thing now, so your statement doesn't help you any even if it's true.

Now, to the rant. Perhaps I'm just paying more attention, but it feels to me that Apple is becoming more and more of an Evil Empire(tm).

Well, you get points for not using the cliches of "Apple is turning into Microsoft" or "if this were Microsoft, you'd all be up in arms..."

It's a little thing, but it pushed me over the edge

Did they offer you some cheese at that point?

In a related story, are there competitors to the nano that are as elegantly designed and easy to use?

Nope.

Re:My first anti-apple rant

[ChrisCampbell47]

And of course you realize now that you blew it at the end there when you typo'd "2.0T" where you meant to say 3.2 :) Anyway, 4 cyl turbos are for rice boys (and mechanics). Gimme the torque curve and responsive throttle of a V6 any day ... - An Audi V6 owner

option 3: Think Secreter

[JonTurner]

option 3: open a new site called "Think Secreter"

4. PROFIT!

Re:option 3: Think Secreter

[dgatwood]

No, no. It's Think Secretly.

The New Apple...

[TheNetAvenger]

The New Apple, making Microsoft look less evil everyday...

Only Apple.

[Anonymous Coward]

Because heaven knows if this were Microsoft we would already have a thousand comments against them

issues

[Anonymous Coward]

Well I have serious issues with this coming from both sides. I frankly am enamoured with Apple, OK? But part of that means I checked thinksecret.com daily for new insights. So I'm very sad to see it go and I don't think appleinsider is an adequate substitute. Hell, whole legions of the mainstream and online press have used thinksecret as a source countless times. It's been a leader in the community as a source of Apple news. So I think this is a sad development and not the best outcome for anyone, including Apple. But what were the issues?
1. Trademarked or copyrighted knowledge was released by thinksecret. From what we know, it was information provided by a source outside of thinksecret itself, and we presume the source was inside apple. The actual information apparently concerned a firewire musical instrument, from before 2005, that never was released. So should thinksecret be held liable for releasing a trademark secret? Legally, I don't know the answer. I would bet any hard-copy publication, such as the New York Times, would balk before publishing trade secrets. The times and other major newspapers have admitted to halting publication of government secrets on those occasions when the government has convinced them of the security risk. And publishing trade secrets probably is illegal. Thinksecret was always skating on thin ice, that's why we liked it, after all. So, let's agree that it was a legal blunder and thinksecret had to admit this.
2. Lawsuits in themselves are stressful. A college student involved in a suit against a major corporation must be overwhelming. Even if there was a legitimate way to thwart Apple, would any college student have the resources to undertake such a fight? And from the beginning, wouldn't Apple be aware of its strength in that regard? I'd like to think that if I were faced by a lawsuit from a major corporation I'd have the money to afford a single lawyer for at least a few hours of work. But the truth is, I don't.
3. Apple allowed thinksecret to publish many secrets. Did it finally get mad, or was there some other precipitating event? I don't think Apple would sue thinksecret over a product that was never released. At least it would have no reason to continue that suit. I think that Apple was concerned over a related product, whose secrecy was more important, and whose developing team may have had some overlap with the firewire guitar, or whatever it was. So they wanted to protect some other development. A company with a number of great engineers can't just fire a development team because they're worried about trademarks leaking from one disgruntled employee.
4. Nick may have acted illegally. His settlement makes him happy because he doesn't have to go to jail or even be arrested. That would make me happy too. Furthermore, as far as we know, nothing is to keep him from working on a similar site in the future, perhaps with lessons learned and a tempered attitude. Of course, if he checks with Apple each time he wants to publish a new secret, well, we won't really be reading him any more than we read MacWorld, now, will we?

Re:issues

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Trademarked or copyrighted knowledge was released by thinksecret.

This is incorrect. The violations were trade secret violation, not copyright or trademark. In almost every state it is illegal to intentionally reveal trade secrets or to solicit others to reveal them for financial gain. Even in states without trade secret laws, the employees would still have violated their civil contracts with Apple (NDAs).

The actual information apparently concerned a firewire musical instrument, from before 2005, that never was released. So should thinksecret be held liable for releasing a trademark secret? Legally, I don't know the answer.

Legally, ThinkSecret was clearly going to lose the lawsuit.

Even if there was a legitimate way to thwart Apple, would any college student have the resources to undertake such a fight? And from the beginning, wouldn't Apple be aware of its strength in that regard? I'd like to think that if I were faced by a lawsuit from a major corporation I'd have the money to afford a single lawyer for at least a few hours of work. But the truth is, I don't.

Civil suits are clearly weighted in the favor of the party with more money. In this case, however, ThinkSecret didn't really have a leg to stand on. ThinkSecret's leverage was the threat of bad press for Apple. I would note, however, Apple reportedly did not seek any damages or even court costs from ThinkSecret, just the names of the sources (which they were entitled to under the law).

I think that Apple was concerned over a related product, whose secrecy was more important, and whose developing team may have had some overlap with the firewire guitar, or whatever it was. So they wanted to protect some other development.

Actually, if this product was ever going to market, it probably was not important and that is why Apple pressed this case. Apple thrives on secrecy. They make huge profits from the press they get from surprise releases of new products. Journalists actually want to attend their press releases because it is occasionally more than filler material and PR about things everyone with an interest already knows.

Apple pushes this culture really hard and tries to make sure all the employees know they are serious about it, because real money is on the line. So when you were in highschool and the football team was all boozing it up every night and causing trouble, did the coach go after the Quarterback and suspend him from the team, or did he pick a fairly unimportant team member to kick off the team so the others knew he was serious? This is probably the same thing... going after leakers from less important projects to make an example for the rest of the company.

Nick may have acted illegally. His settlement makes him happy because he doesn't have to go to jail or even be arrested.

This was a civil suit. There was no danger of anyone going to jail or being arrested. There was no threat of the publication being shut down. There was no claim to financial damages, although there clearly could have been. Apple filed for one thing only, the identities of the leakers... and they did not get them in the end. Apple lost. Sadly, instead of what they wanted, the publication shut down, which isn't good for the readers or Apple or Nick. He lost too. Pretty much everyone here lost except the leakers, who Nick took all the heat for. It was admirable of him, but not really a good thing for people in general. And who knows, maybe Apple found out the leaker's identities from other sources, and it was a moot point for them. We don't know because all this happened behind closed doors. Basically, a tragedy all around.

I can see it now...

[slapout]

...Coming soon.... Secret Think! Get all your rumors here!

Re:A year ago this would have been sad, contentwis

[Midnight Thunder]

But since the "issues" he had with Apple, the content on thinksecret wasn't really much beyond what someone with an Apple Developer Connect membership could access. To many articles on the latest seed of this or that. Before that ThinkSecret sometimes had some real gems every now and then (and was plain wrong lots of times also)

In addition to this there are still plenty of other sites providing this sort of information, including appleinsider.com

Hoo-ha

[Anonymous Coward]

... but he's not a SNIIIIIITCH!

re: not a win for Apple

[King_TJ]

I absolutely agree, although the truth is, taking these types of sites down is equivalent to playing "whack-a-mole". Another will just pop right back up. If it had good readership/popularity before, there's no way that void will remain unfilled when it disappears. Someone out there is *always* looking for a popular topic to build a new web site around and get visitors.

Already, this new "9to5mac" web site seems to be coming up with an awful lot of fairly accurate rumors and informative facts. I imagine a lot of the "rumor info" they used to leak to thinksecret is simply getting redirected to them now.

Does anyone really care?

[Enrique1218]

I know I certainly don't care one way or the other. I know the Macbook was upgraded recently without so much a whisper from Apple or the enthusiast community. Leopard seems at best to get a lukewarm welcome. I have lost my enthusiasm for new tech toys especially since they are longer designed for quality but rather planned obsolescense and limitation. I getting the feeling that the novelty of Apple is wearing off.

Re:Does anyone really care?

[Anonymous Coward]

I know the Macbook was upgraded recently without so much a whisper from Apple or the enthusiast community. Leopard seems at best to get a lukewarm welcome.

I think you're confusing "the ehtusiast community" with "the Slashbots." For one, incremental upgrades usually don't get a whole lot of press, and Leopard got a very warm welcome -- yes, it has bugs, and since when has a .0 release not? Meanwhile, everybody loves Time Machine, the unified graphical theme, IDLE support in Mail.app, a Terminal.app with lots of new features, and so forth.

I getting the feeling that the novelty of Apple is wearing off.

Right, that's why the iPhone has been such a flop.

Less hype == less business for Apple

[Tibor the Hun]

As a huge OS X fan I must say that I think this is a bad move on Apple's part.
For me, part of the excitement about Apple is all the hype and "can they really manufacture that?" attitude that comes in the months preceding a product launch.

Thinksecret was a major part of the hype machine, for better or worse, and I'm sure Steve realizes that all of us fanatics enjoy the hype and wonder.
I understand they need to protect their trade secrets and should do so, but it would be nice if the site could have stayed in business.

Of course, I didn't RTFA, so maybe I'm way off base... (+5 informative then)

Re:Less hype == less business for Apple

[catxk]

I guess they have to hunt down people exposing their secrets, even though they really profit from it. There are many reasons for this, one is obviously PR: If info about a future Apple product "leaks out", the leaking is fundamental to the hype! If Apple didn't try to stop the leak, the leak-hype would vanish, Apple's leak-PR model would lose credibility.

Another reason is the similar, but is more of a legal concern: Apple must hunt down trade-secrets in order to honor the NDA:s their employees has signed. If they don't hunt down rumor sites, what's to stop employees from leaking _real_ trade secrets?

A bit conspiratory, but still...

Typical slashdot comments

[Anonymous Coward]

Slashdot: Apple is closing a website! Apple are against freedom of speech! The horror!
Truth: That website was leaking company information, that's illegal.

Slashdot: Apple aren't supporting BootCamp for Tiger users in 2008! The bastards!
Truth: Apple said that BootCamp on Tiger was a Beta,since the beginning. Also, it won't stop working in 2008, you just won't be able to re-install it.

Slashdot: Apple is forcing me to pay $50 for a green iPod nano! How greedy!
Truth: Nobody is forcing you to get a green iPod nano, and that $50 also gets you twice the storage capacity.

Etc, etc.

Slashdot. News for nerds, nonsense comments.

Re:Typical slashdot comments

[nqz]

Truth: Nobody is forcing you to get a green iPod nano, and that $50 also gets you twice the storage capacity.

Consumer truth: He *wanted* a green, 4GB iPod nano. Not a silver one, not an 8GB one. This is a case of Apple forcing the customer to the extra $50 just for a different color. In the manufacturing process, it doesn't cost Apple a single penny more to slap on a green case versus a silver case. It'd be one thing if the faceplate was interchangeable, but I don't own an iPod nano so I wouldn't know.

Re:Typical slashdot comments

[Phylarr]

Truth: That website was leaking company information, that's illegal.

Could someone who knows fill me in on whether this statement is true? If so, that is the portion of this whole thing that offends me the most.

Why would I or anyone else have any obligation to keep secret any information related to a corporation with which I had signed no agreements or contracts? Does some random company's desire to make money trump my freedom of speech?

Re:Typical slashdot comments

[Anonymous Coward]

Typical fanboy comment

Re:Typical slashdot comments

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple "Truth": That website was leaking company information, that's illegal.
The Real Truth: No .. where has that been established.

Apple "Truth": Apple said that BootCamp on Tiger was a Beta,since the beginning. Also, it won't stop working in 2008, you just won't be able to re-install it.

The Real Truth: " you just won't be able to re-install it." That is the defination of crippled software . If you cant install it aint working.

Apple "Truth": Its just a regular update we aint trying to brick iPhones ...
The Real "Truth: Lets shaft all our users who just tried to screw us over by trying to open their phones to other carriers.

Etc, etc.

Slashdot. News for nerds, stuff that matters.

yeah and i dont think its worth my while, to even log in to post on this topic ..

Re:Typical slashdot comments

[Phroggy]

One or more Apple employees apparently violated their non-disclosure agreements with Apple by disclosing confidential information to third parties. Apple can sue them for violating the agreement... except that Apple doesn't know who they are. So Apple's only recourse is to sue ThinkSecret, not for damages to the company, but only to reveal the identity of the leak, so Apple can take action against the leak, which would have left ThinkSecret in the clear.

ThinkSecret refused, thus bringing Apple's wrath down upon them instead.

Re:Typical slashdot comments

[Anonymous Coward]

Care for some more kool-aid to wash that taste of cock out of your mouth?

Re:Typical slashdot comments

[Myopic]

The idea with torts is that if you harm someone financially, they can pursue a tort against you and recover damages. That's the basic idea, and of course we have several centuries of law defining how that can happen. IANAL so I don't know the specifics of trade secret law, but yes basically the law extends obligations of secrecy to a person who receives the secret knowing that it is a secret, and publishes it knowing that it will do damage to the company (or person). There are lots of exceptions and lots of qualifications.

I don' think it's unreasonable for you to think it's dumb that the information recipient would be held liable instead of the person who transmits the secret.

I just read the Wiki on trade secrets but it wasn't very informative. I bet other sources could answer your questions better than I did, though.

Re:Typical slashdot comments

[DaveCBio]

Are you kidding? Apple gets the kid glove treatment around here. If Microsoft did anything like this there would be calls for blood. If you think Slashdot is anything near anti-Apple you aren't really paying attention.

Re:Typical slashdot comments

[shellbeach]

Actually, it's more like this ...

Slashdot: Apple never, ever, do anything wrong. Ever. They're just poor, misunderstood geeks working hard to make this world a better place for you and me.

Truth: Apple are just another company, with the same evil practices as everyone else. Deal with it.

Re:Typical slashdot comments

[Daengbo]

I had to use that in my sig. Thanks.

i Don't get it

[blhack]

How is what thinksecret was doing in any way damaging to apple? I work in the marketing field. ALl of my peers and I agree that while we don't exactly buy into the apple lemming philosophy, they are absolutely GODS of marketing. Take a product like the iPhone....which is NOT revolutionary in any way, shape, or form...let apple's marketing department put their spin on it and before you know it, you've got people camping outside of stores to buy A CELLPHONE!

Most of us honestly thought that thinksecret was secretly owned and operated by apple...that would make sense. Thinksecret, really, was doing a service to their marketing goons. They were creating hype about products without giving TOO much information, and they were doing it for free.

R.I.P. thinksecret.

Re:i Don't get it

[RetiredMidn]

As somebody said way back at the beginning, you can be pro-Apple, even have the 6-color Kool-Aid running through your veins, and still do things that are harmful to their efforts.

Apple could have been harmed by the premature release of product information in at least three ways:

- It gave potential competitors time to position or re-position their own products against Apple before the product was released.

- It could alter consumer buying plans, causing some to defer a planned purchase and impacting Apple's near-term bottom line.

- It diminishes their ability to spin the product release their own way, which you cite as one of their great strengths.

Re:i Don't get it

[Anonymous Coward]

Indeed. It'd be a disasterous precident though if they did *not* try to protect their trade secrets, though: Unlike patents, trade secrets run on shaky grounds, and have to be closely protected to be maintained; but you don't have to disclose them for the protection and you don't have to worry about them expiring (admittedly, lesser a concern daily)

Re:i Don't get it

[Anonymous Coward]

sorry .. MS are the marketing GODS. How else do they get people to use the BROKEN software.

Think Secret shutting down...or are they?

[kannibul]

Maybe that's just what they want us to think...

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

goose and gander is not apples and oranges or something

Will Success Spoil Apple?

[axafg00b]

I have to be a ditto-head with the earlier post about Apple finally pissing someone off. They are no longer the lovable underdog (nor have they really been except during the lost years under Gil Amelio), valiantly battling M$oft for world dominance. They are also a business that has to protect their intellectual property. A nuisance lawsuit by a patent troll or a blogger with great, if confidential, resources are both fair game for any firm - not just Apple - to go after if they feel their property has been improperly used. Sure, it's great for us fanbois (and grrls) to get the really advance word on OS or hardware decisions, but for Apple (or any business) it can mean their business would be adversely affected.

I will continue to look at Apple products first in certain areas because I like the fact they work with relatively minimal fuss. I like not having to support my daughters' laptops over the phone and late at night before one of their papers/tests/etc are due. I like the whole iPod ecosystem - with DRM and without - because it works. However, I would expect that, as a business, they will be just as evil as others /.'ers have dumped on in these pages.

Re:Will Success Spoil Apple?

[DaveCBio]

I've always thought that if Apple had a dominant market share there would be a lot of hate for the things they did. As an underdog people tend to look the other way and ignore some sleazy practices they have had over the years. Does anyone really think Jobs wouldn't be a techno-tyrant if he had the number one OS?

Think Secret 2.0?

[davidwr]

Someone should mirror this site and start a Think Secret 2.0.

Attn: Mac Fanbois & Fangrrlz

[seandiggity]

There are free operating systems that will run well on your Mac hardware and do not shut down websites for revealing "trade secrets". In fact, there are no trade secrets and you are invited to join in on the development process. Begin here.

Re:Attn: Mac Fanbois & Fangrrlz

[seandiggity]

Before someone points it out, yes I know that OS's don't do anything by themselves. But you know what I meant :)

Re:Attn: Mac Fanbois & Fangrrlz

[Anonymous Coward]

Call me again when you kids have stopped fighting over GUIs and installation methods. Too many choices is bad, real-world users need standards.

Re:Attn: Mac Fanbois & Fangrrlz

[Anonymous Coward]

yay thanks for the info

Re:Attn: Mac Fanbois & Fangrrlz

[seandiggity]

Reply to me again when you kids stop posting anonymous flamebait.

Re:!News: Apple fanboys brook no criticism

[reidconti]

Try reading the comments before posting, Gomer.

That's fairly normal "agreement" wording

[mrbill]

Back in 2000, I got a letter from a Sun attorney threatening me with a lawsuit over some material on the "Rumors" section of my web site. They didn't like the fact that I'd copied documents (blueprints/engineering drawings) from their web server to mine and those documents were marked "Proprietary and Confidential". They also disliked the fact that I used the color purple on my web site and had a logo that was vaguely reminiscent of theirs.

I countered with the fact that I got the documents from a search on their publicly-accessible web server, and that after AOL, the next six top visitors of the site were Sun employees themselves hitting it from internal Sun proxy servers, and that no one had ever expressed concern over the logo or the purple color since the site was created in '97.

After a couple of weeks of negotiations, we came to an agreement and I made this public statement:

"I'm happy to announce that I have amicably resolved my situation with Sun regarding SunHELP.org. The site will function much like it has in the past, but in a manner that protects Sun's trademarks. In fact, although I will continue to operate independently of Sun, Sun has offered to help me provide you with better information about Sun and its products. I am pleased with the outcome and the manner in which this situation was resolved. I now consider this matter closed."

A couple of weeks later, I got a FedEx delivery of a brand-new Ultra 10 workstation as a "thank you" for "resolving the dispute in a friendly and speedy manner that avoided litigation". Since then, I've had good relations with the company. I was a member of the Opensolaris Pilot Program and have talked in email with both Scott McNealy and Jonathan Schwartz. Sun has greatly improved their relationship with third-party supporters since 2000; in fact, in 2006 they donated a fully-loaded T1000 system to SunHELP.

Nick at ThinkSecret probably ended up with some free Apple gear in exchange for shutting his site down - after all for Apple, "no publicity is bad publicity".

Or how about...

[Traegorn]

...the grammatically correct Think Secretly? :-p

student for life

[Quiet_Desperation]

the blog, published since 1998 by college student Nick Ciarelli,

Well, maybe now he'll have time to finally graduate.

Apple == Evil

[Nom du Keyboard]

Google may not be evil,
But Apple surely is - especially this year!

Or Maybe Not So Slippery...

[EXTomar]

Or maybe "Think Secret" was really more tabloid than journalism. I'm not a big fan of the big money machine, I'm rather neutral about Apple Inc. itself, and I'm also a big believer in free flow of information but I'm not sure "Think Secret" was acting in the public interest as much as their self interest to see sensational information generate clicks. I'm all for journalists protecting sources from reprisals to continue to reveal new information but it must have some intrinsic value and it must be backed up by collaborating evidence if they can't cite the source.

I want corporations to be responsible and journalists help to make that happen. I also want the journalists to be responsible where in many cases just one hidden source isn't enough to publish a story on. Without more its just rumor which is the level of stuff you see at the supermarket checkout. It isn't so much that a company gets to determine what the press says any more than any other person gets to determin what the press says about them.

If it was simply that "Think Secret" was saying "Apple products suck" that wouldn't be an issue. It was that "Think Secret" was using information and data that belonged to Apple which without a good reason is not permissible. Sorry but "the fans demand to know" is not a good reason.

Re:Or Maybe Not So Slippery...

[DinobotPrime]

Best comment I have seen for a while .

Re:Or Maybe Not So Slippery...

[Anarchitect_in_oz]

Yep, great post Indeed the Public Interest is not merely what is of interest to the public.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money-INFORMED==BAD!!

[Nom du Keyboard]

Anytime you expose secret projects that the company does not feel is ready for prime-time, you risk losing any forward momentum that you would have had over opposing companies in development.

Yeah, it makes it ever so much easier to keep selling the old stuff to the cluele<<<<<< faithful, instead of the much improved, better performing, cheaper gear coming out in only 2 months - which you can then sell them as well. An Informed consumer is a Bad consumer.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money-INFORMED==BAD!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes...I'm sure the early iphone buyers were not upset at all when it was significantly cheaper only a month later.

Nano alternative

[muellerr1]

I really like the Sansa e280 running Rockbox. The stock Sansa firmware is gimpy and Rockbox is so easy to install and customizable. The 4GB version is the e260 which you should be able to find easily for under $100. Pros: the best sound quality I've ever heard from a portable (though you need Rockbox to get the best sound); about the same dimensions as the Nano but thicker (it feels very comfortable) and is significantly cheaper. Cons: not an iPod; scrollwheel is not touch-sensitive, but rather a piece of moving plastic (which doesn't bother me, but bothers some people); you have to use Rockbox to get better sound quality than the stock firmware.

Tagline comment

[krack]

Regarding your tagline, We are all packets in the Internet of life!

If we are all packets in the Internet of life, I have a malformed header.

Backroom Deal = Backwards Solution

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

I probably have a different take on this development, having done a lot of research at one time into trade secret laws and whistleblower statutes in the U.S., as well as this case in particular. What I find really interesting about this agreement we know so little about, is the only two things we do know are exactly backwards from justice. It seems to me that both Apple and ThinkSecret lost here, since neither was given what they wanted. Let me explain.

First, ThinkSecret had no right to protect the confidentiality of their sources. Apple sued ThinkSecret asking for the identities of those people who had committed a criminal act against them. (Note, whether revealing trade secrets should be a crime, is another discussion). According to the filing, that is all they wanted and it is the one thing they did not get. Despite having no legal right to keep these sources secret, ThinkSecret managed to make a deal to do that, probably out of personal loyalty or a perceived ethical obligation on the part of Nick Ciarelli. He seems to have walked away from this with his reputation as a journalist intact, which is a valuable asset if he's planning on asking sources to trust him in the future. It also speaks quite well of his character.

Second, Apple had no right to shut down this publication, and it was probably in their best interests to avoid doing so. And yet, in a deal to protect those sources, that is exactly what happened. Why and how did such a thing happen? We can only speculate. My best guess is that after dealing with the public relations aspect of this for a while and with mounting court costs that were unlikely to ever be repaid, someone at Apple made the decision that this should "go away" and ham-fistedly ordered the legal team to settle it one way or another and make sure it didn't happen again. As a result, Apple failed to get what they were out for, and stupidly got an agreement to shut the site down instead.

I think my perspective on this is probably a little less reactionary and a little more realistic than what I've seen in other posts here. ThinkSecret was aiding others to break the law and clearly in the wrong on this lawsuit, but having done something wrong, Nick Ciarelli took all the responsibility for other's criminal acts (which he helped incite) upon himself and shielded them. Apple, fumbled the ball, failed to get the leaks identified, and made a typically corporate and shortsighted decision. Everyone lost.

Re:Backroom Deal = Backwards Solution

[bar-agent]

ThinkSecret was aiding others to break the law and clearly in the wrong on this lawsuit, but having done something wrong, Nick Ciarelli took all the responsibility for other's criminal acts (which he helped incite) upon himself and shielded them. Apple, fumbled the ball, failed to get the leaks identified, and made a typically corporate and shortsighted decision. Everyone lost.

A good compromise leaves no one satisfied.

Re:Backroom Deal = Backwards Solution

[the pickle]

He seems to have walked away from this with his reputation as a journalist intact, which is a valuable asset if he's planning on asking sources to trust him in the future. It also speaks quite well of his character.

Yeah, so well that it almost makes up for the fact that Nick is a guy willing to knowingly release a company's trade secrets for personal profit (i.e., the buckets of cash he was raking in from advertising on his site) and some dubious level of "entertainment" value.

Almost.

p

apple computers

[icepick72]

*yawn* I don't use a Mac. Mark me as a troll. I'm moving on the next article...

Re:apple computers

[Anonymous Coward]

But not before you take the time to click on the link, scroll down, click the "Reply" button, and make a post whining about it, apparently. You're basically the definition of a troll.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money-INFORMED==BAD!!

[Anonymous Coward]

I wasn't. I don't really understand why anyone was. I thought it was worth the price when I paid it, or I wouldn't have paid it. As the GP said, things get cheaper - personally I think the whole outcry was down to greed - "if we bitch and moan enough, they might give us something"...

i guess i dont understand

[justaj]

This wasn't an apple fan site. They were profiting from corporate espionage. As it is, everything apple does is watched/imitated by companies like Microsoft and Dell. If say something like the iPhone was leaked a year earlier, someone could have beaten them to the market. The point is Apple has a right to not have its company secrets told to everyone. It is not your right to know that information. It will never be your right to know that information. It's just plain arrogance (and stupidity) to think that it is.

Re:i guess i dont understand

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

This wasn't an apple fan site. They were profiting from corporate espionage.

Actually, it was an Apple fan site and it was profiting from corporate espionage.

The point is Apple has a right to not have its company secrets told to everyone. It will never be your right to know that information. It's just plain arrogance (and stupidity) to think that it is.

Well, sort of. The law supports Apple in that anyone releasing these secrets, enticing others to release them, or knowingly publishing them for profit is breaking the law. As to a fundamental right of Apple, well they are a corporate entity and don't have "rights" just granted privileges. It is debatable whether corporations should have this particular privilege.

This is pretty touchy ground with a lot of complications. In general the first amendment trumps an individual's right to keep facts secret. It has, however, been altered to go the other way for businesses... with exceptions granted by whistleblower statutes for government corruption, public health, and other overriding public interests. It may well be that the laws will change and these corporate privileges will be revoked. It is interesting and reflective of the culture in the US that while most of the world recognizes an inherent, individual right to privacy, the US does not... but the US does grant that privilege to corporations.

In other news...

[Anonymous Coward]

He's very pleased to announce the launch of his new blog: "Think Vista"

But information *WANTS* to be free!

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought Slashdot said all information should be free anyway!

Too Early To Say

[hotsauce]

Yeah. And most comments are relieved the source hasn't been revealed. But it's too soon to say. The terms were secret.

If in a month we haven't heard about an Apple lawsuit against an ex-employee, then we'll be able to say.

Slashdot burp

[Bruce Perens]

Look at the front page. As I write this, Slashdot seems to have lost its stories from Wednesday and Thursday.

Re:Slashdot burp

[Bruce Perens]

Never mind, stupid pilot error here. Sometimes poor color-blind Bruce can't tell what page he's on.

coming soon: thinksecret2

[UESMark]

So what? I didn't see anything stating or implying that he couldn't start up another web site with another name. The thinksecret2.com domain name is available. All he has to do is copy over is web content and s/thinksecret/thinksecret2/. Even if in the terms of the agreement he personally is precluded from operating such a website I'd be very surprised if he is not allowed to forward his contact information to someone else who wants to run it, and possibly use him as a source.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money-INFORMED==BAD!!

[soft_guy]

What reporter is going to cover the launch of a new Apple product that everyone knew about before hand?

Answer: they don't. Right before Jobs came back, Apple seriously had this problem with websites like MacOS Rumors (which isn't what it once was) leaking VERY ACCURATE info about 2-3 weeks ahead of the new cycle. When the products actually shipped, the tech press didn't care because if they reported anything, it was the rumor beforehand.

Advertising costs Apple a lot of money and the free advertising they get from reporters is very important.

Of course

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the day will come when Apple marketing people will BEG for publicity such as they got from ThinkSecret.

[sarcasm]Yeah, 'cause that's Apple's biggest problem, is the complete and utter lack of publicity they've historically had.[/sarcasm]

Even in the "beleaguered" days, Apple had a lot of publicity. And even more now, of course. Do you really think that's likely to change any time soon?

Apple == business != religion

[Anonymous Coward]

Just take the 3G iPhone e.g. Jobs always vaguely referred to it as "possibly towards the end of 2008". Obviously it's gonna hit the stores faster than that (Japan's not gonna get the current model). What Steve doesn't want is the crowd knowing that it's coming by let's say April 1st (no pun intended). Then as of new year, noboby will be buying that old iPhone anymore, which would basically halt its sales temporarily. Instead, they want you to think it's still far off so you can feel comfortable buying that iPhone now. And then, kaboom! 3G iPhone announced by suprise on April 1st during a special gathering at Infinite Loop. That's how it works and I can't blame them. As a Apple fan I regret sites can't leak those things anymore. But as an Apple shareholder, I understand and applaud their policy. They're a business in the 1st place, religion only comes 2nd ;-)

Well, maybe not, but at least...

[Gary W. Longsine]

Information *wants* to be anthropomorphized!

Good times... Good times

[Bones3D_mac]

Having ran Think Secret's previous forums for a few years, I can definitely say it's sad to see such a reliable rumor site fade away like this.

That said, even though we were never directly owned/operated by Think Secret, we did get our own share of the underlying nastiness on the legal front. Luckily the few issues we did have with Apple Legal were surprisingly easy to resolve, all things considering. Usually they were reasonably patient and flexible on most things and would avoid pursuing action as long as you appeared willing to comply with their requests.

On the other hand, we did have a frighteningly close encounter with Adobe that could have been extremely ugly had we not been careful. (Trust me... you really do not want to be on Adobe's bad side... ever.)

The rumor industry is definitely a tricky road to travel. You have to be ready to "thread the needle" at any moment if you expect to survive very long. It doesn't get any more grey area than that.

I think Not! (was Re:Hope He Got Some Money)

[Archeopteryx]

He's lucky Apple didn't ruin him.

What he did was wrong. The reason there are so many iPhone-like phones now rather than them appearing late next summer is because of the head's-up sites like provided. That represents millions in lost revenue for Apple.

I know, I know, I'm going to be modded to Troll again for not siding with "the little guy" - but what virtue would that be if "the little guy" is obviously in the wrong?

so who'll tell us the inside deal now?

[marxzed]

I'm borderline Apple fanboy but I do not like this... sites like think secret were always my first port of call when looking at my next few months of budgeting for possible new toys... err gadget... um I mean computers and peripherals. If we had to rely on Apple's official PR we wouldn't know about what was coming up until it was already shipping.

Corporate Personhood

[argent]

As to a fundamental right of Apple, well they are a corporate entity and don't have "rights" just granted privileges.

Back before the 1880s that was true. But thanks to some tricky work by a bunch of clever lawyers and a creative bit of editing by a Supreme Court reporter they managed to get the 14th amendment (equal protection) interpreted as granting rights to legal entities like corporations. So, yes, Apple does, according to US case law, have "rights".

Funny stuff, wot?

Sounds like a domain is up for grabs

[daveywest]

Mark

Set

Squat!

Re:I think Not! (was Re:Hope He Got Some Money)

[Daengbo]

Bad news for you. If you lived in Asia, there were quite a few "iPhone-like phones" a couple of years ago. And they were 3G. Visit Japan, Taiwan, or even Korea sometime. Apple didn't make some kind of leap with the iPhone -- It's just evolution and marketing.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money-INFORMED==BAD!!

[pushing-robot]

What reporter is going to cover the launch of a new Apple product that everyone knew about before hand?

Yeah, Apple really shot themselves in the foot over the whole iPhone thing. If they'd kept it a secret till launch it might have at least received some news coverage.

Yup this is one reason I don't buy Apples...

[Anonymous Coward]

This has been one big reason I don't buy Apples... This isn't really anything new, Apple has always been fairly unique out of any computer company for throwing out all sorts of cease and desist notes to various apple fansites... trimming unflattering posts from their support forums... trying in general to cover up any hardware or software bugs (making it harder to figure out what's wrong with your system if something goes wrong) and so on.

          The short of it, Apple has never been particularly open.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money-INFORMED==BAD!!

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't need to be informed about new apple products to be a smart purchaser.

Do not buy an apple product prior to WWDC, MacWorld or Christmas. This has been the law since the 80's. Once said event has occurred, you can safely make a decision about how to purchase. Either (a) wait for new product and purchase, or (b) wait for new product and get product you would have bought cheaper as ex-demo, surplus, second hand etc.

There are of course the inevitable mid-stream speed bumps that are unannounced (though usually fit neatly on a moore's law plot), but usually you get a pretty clear idea of what's going on after a large event.

Re:Hope He Got Some Money-INFORMED==BAD!!

[mstone]

The Osborne Effect: what happens when consumers are so 'well informed' about upcoming products that it puts the company out of business.

Let's also consider Microsoft's long-standing "Real Soon Now" policy for killing competing products. 'Inform the consumers' that MS will release something "just as good" in the near future, and that it's silly to go with another vendor when all your business software is currently from MS, and you can pretty much wipe out a company with a good product.

Beyond that, consumer markets have this thing called 'first mover advantage'. There's some serious dollar value to opening up a new market so fast that the competition has to run like hell just to get a shoe in the door. Leak the specs for an upcoming project far enough in advance, and any company in an even vaguely similar line of business can have a me-too product ready to go on the shelves about the same time as your debut. The end result is that nobody makes enough money to make the new market seem worthwhile, and the whole thing lapses back into nothingness in about six months.

There are lots of cases where a large number of people who make 'well informed' decisions in their best interest end up making things worse for themselves and everyone else. See: The Tragedy of the Commons.

Besides, the whole idea of 'informed, rational consumers' is pretty much fantasy anyway. If such creatures existed, most people wouldn't have some gadget in their kitchen that they haven't used even once since they bought it. We also wouldn't see billions of dollars every year rewarding the software industry's de facto policy of 'whoever has the longest list of bullet points wins'.

Van Wilder Much?

[egyptiankarim]

published since 1998 by college student Nick Ciarelli

Come on, dude. Get on the ball and get that Underwaterbasketweaving degree finished!

Not a surprise

[Stu Charlton]

ThinkSecret seems to have lost a lot of the "zest" they used to have before the lawsuit. I don't think his heart was in it anymore: the object of his affection was suing him. I remember the days when TS was bizarrely accurate with the frequency and detail of its predictions. AppleInsider / MacRumors seems to be the best we have now.

So, Kudos TS.

tabloid journalism vs whistleblowing

[Scudsucker]

Not all sources and stories are created equal. Is the public served by protecting whistleblowers like Daniel Ellsberg (Pentagon Papers) or Sherron Watkins (Enron) if they wish to remain anonymous? Certainly. Is the public served by protecting the identity of the maid that takes pictures of Britney Spears in the shower and sells them to a tabloid? Not really.

If Think Secret were covering stories of corruption or lawbreaking at Apple, that would be one thing. But they aren't, they're engaging in tabloid journalism on Apple.

uh, no

[Scudsucker]

Two words: Osborne Effect.

straw man

[Scudsucker]

What Apple fans need to remember

What Apple fans? Those crickets over in the corner?

Microsoft "Big Surprises"?

[olafva]

Except for M$ original Basic on the PC, I can't recall any significant Microsoft
Big Surprises that rank anywhere in the league with:

1. Job's 1st Apple
2. Job's 1st Mac
3. Job's Superior virus-free O/S
4. Job's Superior & fastest browser, Safari
5. Apple-based System X Supercomuter at Virginia Tech
6. Job;s 1st iPod
7. Job's 1st iPhone

all which revolutionized the industry.

M$ Zune, table tablet, Vista and phone attempts are all are "duds"
and don't hold a candle by comparison. Look for innovation at
Apple and Google. Most of M$ "innovation" is based on buying
technology developed elsewhere as was documented in a WSJ
article which enumerated wher most mjor M$ products we
associate with M$ originated.

Don't hold your breath for any "Big Surprises" from M$.

I even prefer the latest iWork to Office (especially Keynote & Numbers
compared to Powerpoint & Excel) which they are compatible with.

"Now able to move forward with my college studies"

[Zhe Mappel]

You will always be our generation's Edward R. Murrow.

OK, that's going a bit far.

You will always be our generation's Walter Cronkite!

No. Not that either.

Wait.

You will always be our generation's Mr. Sam-The-New-Product-Man, appearing Saturday mornings on KXFK 104.1 before the farm report!

And in some distant Think Secretless future, when we hear a new Apple product has come out, and we have to make do with that instead of receiving amorphous half-detailed maybe-what-ifs a few hours earlier, we'll pause, and think of you. A tear in our eyes, for Mr. Sam.