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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.
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.
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.
Wouldn't that be censorship?
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.
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!
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.
Those who believe the Internet is private,
find their privates are on the Internet.
Wow. That beats my record.
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)
We are all packets in the Internet of life!
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.
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.
I just wasted your mod points! HA!
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.
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.
Geeks like to think that they can ignore politics, you can leave politics alone, but politics won't leave you alone.-rms
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.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
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.
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.