Apple To Release List of Companies That Build Its Products Around the World

mathfeel writes "Indulge me in some post hoc reasoning here: After last week's episode of This American Life 'Mr. Daisey and the Apple Factory,' a very interesting show, Apple announced that 'For the first time, Apple has released a list of companies that build its products around the world. In another first, the company also announced that it will allow an independent third party to check on working conditions at those factories, and to make its findings public.' But before you celebrate Apple's gesture (or complain about the potential increase in electronic price): 'It doesn't appear that Apple's partnership with the FLA will increase transparency in this regard either. The FLA will audit 5% of the factories that make Apple products, but like Apple, it will not name which ones it checks or where it finds violations.'"

Comments

Then what?

[betterunixthanunix]

They will check working conditions and...then do what when they find violations? Is there any reason to think that Apple will stop doing business with factories that mistreat workers? Is this going to be another sham like Apple's treatment of the conflict minerals situation (where Steve Jobs basically threw his hands up and said that Apple could do nothing about it)?

Re:Then what?

[jhoegl]

Look, we live in a world now of Capitalism.
There is no give and take where Capitalism and socialism melded together to form a better world for us all.
Instead, it is all about the money and not about those that get trampled on in that endeavor.
So, if you want to placate the masses, you offer empty gestures and convoluted solutions to problems that will never go away in a Capitalistic society.
Dont even think about "voting with your wallet", as there is no competition anymore. Patenting everything from taking a shit to clicking a button took care of that.

Re:Then what?

[UnknowingFool]

You mean this statement:

Yes. We require all of our suppliers to certify in writing that they use conflict few materials. But honestly there is no way for them to be sure. Until someone invents a way to chemically trace minerals from the source mine, it’s a very difficult problem.

Apple can ask their suppliers to use conflict free minerals (which they do). But technically Steve is correct; To guarantee that the minerals were 100% conflict free (indirectly through suppliers' suppliers) is an impossible task that even Dell acknowledged.

The mining of these minerals takes place long before a final product is assembled, making it difficult, if not impossible, to trace the minerals' origins. In addition, many of the minerals are smelted together with recycled metals, and at that point it is virtually impossible to trace the minerals to their source.

The problem is hard enough for conflict free diamonds and each of those gems can be uniquely identified and separated. How do you identify the source of every single particle in a product that is smelted with other materials?

Re:Then what?

[forkfail]

Doesn't mean we shouldn't try.

The world may be royally screwed up; as individuals, we may not have a whole lot of power to do anything about the Way Things Are (tm), but that shouldn't stop us from striving. If nothing else, there is intrinsic value in the attempt. And who knows - enough individuals exerting pressure may, if not radically change the nature of man and the world, at least mitigate the damage of some of the worst that we do.

Re:Then what?

[betterunixthanunix]

How about not using tantalum?

http://www.digikey.com/us/en/ph/Panasonic/tantalum.html

I suppose Apple's R&D team might not have been up to the task of finding alternatives to tantalum, but with all the billions of dollars Apple has at their disposal (and all the profit they made on iProducts, which were all made using conflict minerals) they could have set up some research teams and labs. Assuming that they actually cared about the issue, which I would not be so quick to assume (to be fair, Apple's investors and customers never cared, they just wanted to see profits and have sleek looking toys).

As for Steve Jobs' statement, why not apply it to working conditions as well? After all, Apple must have its factories in other countries, just like they must use conflict metals, so how are they supposed to ensure that the factories are not mistreating workers? Dell does it too, right?

Re:Then what?

[Kenja]

Then what? Then they will see if people actually care enough to stop using Apple products. They will find that they dont, and life will go on.

Re:Then what?

[jhoegl]

I am not saying dont try, I was responding to the current state of affairs that brought us to this point.
Perhaps public pressure will do it, but then again public pressure over 2 years evolved into this retort by Apple.
Perhaps "voting with your wallet" will do it, but then again it will take a long time, an expensive effort, and people caring to make it happen.
Perhaps voting in people that will take these issues seriously will be the ticket, but then again... read above.
So yes, change can happen, but in our ADHD, 30 second outrage world, how long will it take? What will be the key? Perhaps a vendor setting themselves on fire?

Re:Then what?

[gnasher719]

They will check working conditions and...then do what when they find violations? Is there any reason to think that Apple will stop doing business with factories that mistreat workers? Is this going to be another sham like Apple's treatment of the conflict minerals situation (where Steve Jobs basically threw his hands up and said that Apple could do nothing about it)?

1. Apple actually _has_ stopped doing business with companies in the past due to mistreating workers and other reasons. Apple has also in the last year made companies repay $3.3 million in fees that workers paid to agencies to find jobs.

2. The situation with "conflict minerals" is actually a lot more difficult than you think. There are plenty of honest and hard-working communities losing out at the moment because nobody knows what paperwork would have to be filled out to be allowed to buy their products.

Re:Then what?

[betterunixthanunix]

Perhaps "voting with your wallet" will do it, but then again it will take a long time, an expensive effort, and people caring to make it happen.

Unfortunately, nobody cares enough. Did people even reduce their purchases of new electronics when they learned about the conflict minerals situation, or did they forget about the war the minute they saw a new cell phone on the market? Did people stop buying sneakers when they found out that children were being forced to work to produce the shoes? People in America simply do not care about the troubles of other countries, as long as they can continue to live comfortable high-tech lives.

If people were willing to do something like this, we could affect change:

http://library.thinkquest.org/26504/

Re:Then what?

[UnknowingFool]

How about not using tantalum?

That isn't what was asked. Jobs was asked whether they use conflict minerals and he answered truthfully that is impossible to guarantee 100% that they don't as they can only really control a few levels of manufacturing. Your solution to replace tantalum which only addresses one of the many minerals that are in question. That doesn't really solve the whole problem. Also, since the main source of tantalum is Australia which isn't a conflict region, all that really does is take away a legitimate source.

As for Steve Jobs' statement, why not apply it to working conditions as well? After all, Apple must have its factories in other countries, just like they must use conflict metals, so how are they supposed to ensure that the factories are not mistreating workers? Dell does it too, right?

Well, Apple asks that their suppliers follow humane working conditions but can they control every aspect of the supply chain? Can they guarantee that their suppliers' suppliers do the same? No company can and for the record, Dell (and many other companies) uses the same manufacturers as Apple. For instance Foxconn.

Re:Then what?

[gnasher719]

How about not using tantalum?

So what about communities who mine the stuff, doing everything completely by the book. Do you think they should end up in poverty because bad things happened in a completely different place in the world? This problem is destroying honest people's livelihood right now, you want to make it worse?

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

And what made-in-the-USA alternative computers and cell phones are they going to buy instead?

This isn't just an Apple issue - it is a tech manufacturing issue. I haven't heard about Dell, HP, HTC, Motorola, Samsung, or LG auditing their manufacturers.

Re:Then what?

[betterunixthanunix]

The situation with "conflict minerals" is actually a lot more difficult than you think. There are plenty of honest and hard-working communities losing out at the moment because nobody knows what paperwork would have to be filled out to be allowed to buy their products.

1. We do not have to use tantalum. There have always been alternatives, and now there are alternatives that meet or exceed tantalum's characteristics.
2. How much did Apple invest in research on tantalum alternatives, while they were busy "wowing" people with devices built using tantalum (and by extension, financing the war)?
3. The problem with conflict minerals is simple: people are committing war crimes in Africa while fighting over mineral deposits. That is not an acceptable situation and mineral suppliers should be refusing to ship minerals that were obtained in that region; if the mineral suppliers cannot be trusted not to ship central African tantalum, then all the tantalum producers will have to suffer until the conflict in Africa is over.

Really, all of these arguments apply to working conditions. Why does Apply have to make use of factories in countries with poor labor laws? Why not hire some American, Canadian, or European workers to produce electronics? It would eat into profits and drive up prices? So would switching away from tantalum and other conflict minerals.

Re:Then what?

[betterunixthanunix]

So all those people producing tantalum alternatives should be in poverty, because we chose to use tantalum? This is a non-argument. You might as well complain about how stage coach drivers all lost their jobs.

Re:Then what?

[viperidaenz]

Did you notice how they said "Conflict few" not "Conflict free"?
Few and Free have different meanings

Re:Then what?

[Guy Harris]

(and all the profit they made on iProducts, which were all made using conflict minerals)

Presumably you're saying that for some reason more than just "they contain tantalum capacitors", as tantalum isn't ipso facto a conflict mineral, unless you're counting Australian rules football and capoeira matches as "conflicts". E.g., perhaps most or all of the tantalum used in capacitors comes from those countries, or perhaps most or all of the tantalum used in capacitors used in Chinese factories comes from those countries, etc..

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

As a response to no.1

Considering the high asking prices and immense profit margins Apple has on their products they should have kept labour in the USA where it belongs. And hence divide earnings amongst US-workers (whom are their primary market in the first place). Whether apple take actions against one or another chinese factory doesn't mean shit when yet another American factory-worker is standing in the unemployement line.

Fuck them all.

Re:Then what?

[betterunixthanunix]

This is fair, but in reality the only way to ensure that none of the money spent making electronics finds its way to Congo would be for electronics makers to buy the tantalum (and other minerals) directly from countries like Australia or buy old electronics for recycling and ship the raw supplies to the appropriate places. I am not so sure that would be an infeasible thing for a company like Dell or Apple to do, although it might be more expensive (which is all that really matters, and which is why these sorts of things won't happen).

Really, tech companies could do a lot of things. They could stop using conflict minerals and rely on alternatives. They could hire workers in countries with labor protections instead of China. They are not doing these things, because they do not really care about being socially responsible, only about appearing to be socially responsible (or not even that -- Apple is one of the few that even bothers to put on a show of auditing its suppliers).

Re:Then what?

[jaymz666]

do the sheeple in line at the apple store on release day of the next igadget even give a crap, as long as they can be cool by association and get the new shiny object on release day?

Re:Then what?

[forkfail]

Well, while it's quite probable that very, very few people actually took conscious action based on their knowledge, that knowledge is the sort of thing that impacts sales.

Advertisers and marketing firms are very aware of the importance of perception and image. People are rarely completely consciously aware of all the factors that play into a buying decision, but if it's in their mind that oil company X spilled oil and never cleaned it up, they're reasonably likely to drive on by that company's gas station to company one belonging to company Y. Same goes for this scenario; we've seen it with various other products (in particular, clothing and shoes come to mind), but given the ubiquitous of personal electronics, I'm thinking that it'll have a perceptible impact here.

So - at some levels, you're correct. There is a level of apathy out there that at some levels seems impossible to overcome. At other levels, though, awareness does have an impact.

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

Using words like "sheeple" make your argument lose all credibility. Maybe if you could form a sentence, using real words, you might have have an effect on someone.

Re:Then what?

[betterunixthanunix]

And what made-in-the-USA alternative computers and cell phones are they going to buy instead?

If we begin with the premise that we need computers and cell phones -- and I think living in modern American society does necessitate that -- then we should talk about not replacing electronics until they are broken beyond repair. How many times have you seen people upgrade a perfectly functional computer, for no reason other than that something a little faster is on the market? How many times have you seen someone throw out a cell phone that works just fine, because a new model came out? How many times have you seen a computer get thrown out because it has too many viruses?

I am using a computer that is more than 6 years old to write this post. Is there some pressing need for me to replace it? The keyboard is starting to show some age, but even that is not very urgent and it certainly doesn't justify buying a brand new laptop. An outright boycott is not necessary here; just cut the amount of buying you do in half and you'll send a message.

Re:Then what?

[Dupple]

Considering the on-going history of the Foxconn operations in China, I think it's pretty clear that Microsoft has absolutely no problem with companies that mistreat workers.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/01/11/foxconn_mass_suicide/

Fixed that for you

Re:Then what?

[Hognoxious]

Look, we live in a world now of Capitalism.
There is no give and take where Capitalism and socialism melded together to form a better world for us all.

Yes there is, thankfully. As a rule of thumb it can be found in anything that extreme libertarians grumble about. If you look around this site you may find one or two. Try here for starters.

Re:Then what?

[UnknowingFool]

This is fair, but in reality the only way to ensure that none of the money spent making electronics finds its way to Congo would be for electronics makers to buy the tantalum (and other minerals) directly from countries like Australia or buy old electronics for recycling and ship the raw supplies to the appropriate places.

Only if the source of the material is pure. In your example if a capacitor company buys pure, raw tantalum from Australia directly yes; however, if they buy recycled material, how can you tell where it came from? The recycler may not know as it they get their material from a variety of sources. If you can identify with isotope dating or some other means it might be technically possible however I know of no means to separate every single material by origin in this manner. Then when these materials get mixed in a smelt the origin gets muddled even further. The only way to do so is to never use recycled material. But then people can accuse them of being not ecologically responsible.

I am not so sure that would be an infeasible thing for a company like Dell or Apple to do, although it might be more expensive (which is all that really matters, and which is why these sorts of things won't happen).

Since Dell or Apple do not manufacture every single component in their products, yes, this is an infeasible thing to do.

Really, tech companies could do a lot of things. They could stop using conflict minerals and rely on alternatives.

If you can provide these companies with technologies that allow them to do so, I think they would love to hear from you. All you need to do is provide electronic materials that don't use gold, iron, tin, manganese, niobium, and tungsten.

Re:Then what?

[Guy Harris]

(and all the profit they made on iProducts, which were all made using conflict minerals)

Presumably you're saying that for some reason more than just "they contain tantalum capacitors", as tantalum isn't ipso facto a conflict mineral, unless you're counting Australian rules football and capoeira matches as "conflicts". E.g., perhaps most or all of the tantalum used in capacitors comes from those countries, or perhaps most or all of the tantalum used in capacitors used in Chinese factories comes from those countries, etc..

Actually, in 2009, Australian production dropped significantly ("The Government of Western Australia reported that tantalite production was 105 t of contained tantalum pentoxide (Ta2O5) in 2009 compared with 680 t of contained Ta2O5 in 2008 (Government of Western Australia, Department of Mines and Petroleum, 2010, p. 23)."), due to a mine suspending operation due to market conditions ("Talison Minerals Pty. Ltd. suspended production at the Wodgina Mine, the world’s leading producing operation of tantalum ore, owing to the global financial downturn and greater market share going to central Africa, where tantalum minerals were mined under conditions of armed conflict and human rights abuses [northeastern regions of Congo (Kinshasa)]."). So the chances that the tantalum in a capacitor was conflict tantalum went up substantially in 2009. Dunno what's happened since then. (See the Wikipedia article on coltan for summary tables.)

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

Dont even think about "voting with your wallet", as there is no competition anymore. Patenting everything from taking a shit to clicking a button took care of that.

*me scuttles off to patent clicking a button to take a shit*

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

The children sweatshop situation with Nike, you unfortunately have to admit was better than the family the kid supports starving. Terrible, but there's not much yanks can do about foreign conditions short of a complete boycott of the brand. With globalization, just Americans boycotting one company does little when all the other countries do not.

Behold the power of social networking. Getting the word out when a big company does evil, is now a lot more easy to do, but getting people to care is hard. Just look at SOPA. All the smart nerds and pirates are up in arms over it, but the average person doesn't give a damn unless you frame the question right. "Do you care that Apple buys from companies who purchase materials that people were murdered for?" versus "Apple products contain conflict minerals. Do you care?"

As it is, Apple is probably doing this because of Dodd-Frank, not out of the goodness of their heart.

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

"If people were willing to do something like this, we could affect change:"

That's "effect", you moron.

Re:Then what?

[jo_ham]

Actually yes, in Apple's most recent audit report they mention that they have actually stopped using some suppliers after finding continued violations of their working practices.

Joining the FLA just adds a further layer of third party oversight.

They've been releasing these audits publicly since 2007, but this time (presumably after Steve was out of the picture) they have decided more PR is required in response to all the "suicide iPad factory zomg!" stories.

Like any large company that outsources labour, they are not going to have a spotless record.

The summary, in obvious slashdot fashion, is doing the best it can to make this announcement as negative as possible, but the fact of the matter is the audits themselves being public is not new (although the supplier list is), and that the FLA's role is one of third party auditing and they have access to the whole of Apple's supply chain - that they'll only audit a small percentage each time (of their choosing) is more an indication of their manpower and the vast size of Apple's operations than anything else.

Re:Then what?

[jo_ham]

do the sheeple...

Stopped reading here.

Maturity is an important part of debate.

Re:Then what?

[jaymz666]

It conveys the sentiment. Unthinking masses of people who only want to be trendy and follow the herd. Sheeple.

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

They will check working conditions and...then do what when they find violations? Is there any reason to think that Apple will stop doing business with factories that mistreat workers? Is this going to be another sham like Apple's treatment of the conflict minerals situation (where Steve Jobs basically threw his hands up and said that Apple could do nothing about it)?

1. Apple actually _has_ stopped doing business with companies in the past due to mistreating workers and other reasons. Apple has also in the last year made companies repay $3.3 million in fees that workers paid to agencies to find jobs.

2. The situation with "conflict minerals" is actually a lot more difficult than you think. There are plenty of honest and hard-working communities losing out at the moment because nobody knows what paperwork would have to be filled out to be allowed to buy their products.

They also do not employ that douchebag Steve Jobs any more.

Re:Then what?

[PopeRatzo]

.Considering the on-going history of the Foxconn operations in China, I think it's pretty clear that Microsoft has absolutely no problem with companies that mistreat workers.

No question about it. But this article was about Apple, so I pointed out Apple's part in the mistreatment of workers.

It's good that you bring up Microsoft. It underlines the point that the notion of Apple being a more enlightened and progressive company is simply myth. When it comes to destroying lives in pursuit of profits, there is not much difference.

Re:Then what?

[gutnor]

Why not hire some American, Canadian, or European workers to produce electronics? It would eat into profits and drive up prices?

You know, in a free(-ish) market, this is not a choice. You must use the cheapest, most profitable method that is available. The reason is that if you don't, somebody else will, and they will eventually drive you out of business.

The real question is not why Apple do not hire American, it why people do not want to buy american. If the consumer does not care about what/who made his gadget, the condition, moral, social impact, ... then they will get the cheapest possible standard for all those criteria. Consumers drive the show.

Actually, the fact that Apple is even looking at the problem, means that there is pressure coming from the consumer. This is a good thing. Save your energy bashing Apple and use it instead to inform the consumer.

Re:Then what?

[93 Escort Wagon]

It conveys the sentiment. Unthinking masses of people who only want to be trendy and follow the herd. Sheeple.

Problem is, "unthinking" also applies to the one using the Apple/sheeple meme. It's just a knee-jerk response that doesn't add anything to the conversation. It's basically a smug way of stating one's own (perceived) superiority while conveniently ignoring the wider problem - the fact that this is a wider issue that touches most all tech-related companies we do business with, not just Apple.

Re:Then what?

[jo_ham]

It's immature and a sweeping generalisation, but you know that.

In the same way that not all Linux users are unwashed, friendless nerds living off hot pockets, rent-free in their parents' basements, not all Apple users are "sheeple".

To use it as your primary argument just smacks of immaturity and a lack of a real argument.

I really don't mind debating the pros and cons of Apple, and wider technology stories as a whole, but I've got to have something to go on. If you're just going to stand there and tell me I have silly hair then I'm just going to find an adult to talk to instead.

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

Considering the high asking prices and immense profit margins Apple has on their products they should have kept labour in the USA where it belongs.

Jobs tried that. How many Next cubes did you buy? Yeah, I thought so. You and all of the US had that opportunity, you didn't actually care and bought slightly cheaper, lower quality computers made overseas. Jobs learned his lesson and kept Apple manufacturing overseas when he took over the company again. Why would Apple retry this failed experiment?

Re:Then what?

[jaymz666]

I didn't say all apple users were sheeple now, did I? I'd argue that most everyone in line at the store on release day are in fact nothing more than sheep.

Re:Then what?

[Kenshin]

And they're not really all that different than all the fandroids who click "buy" the very minute the latest (for that week) Android phone goes on sale online. The only real difference is one group leaves their house to buy it, and thereby gets noticed, and the other group doesn't.

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

Nobelium caps anyone?

Not like they use a lot of tantalum caps these days as the newer smaller and higher capacity ceramic caps are available. That's what happened when there was a shortage of tantalum and enough economic push for an alternative.

Re:Then what?

[jaymz666]

No argument here.

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

noone is arguing that everyone should 'not use tantalum alternatives' if they have a use for those minerals, go right ahead.

Re:Then what?

[AgNO3]

Stage coach drives lived in an economic environment where they had other alternatives for income. Places that mine Taltalum usually don't and the tantalum mining is the only thing that brought the out of extreme poverty to begin with. While is is not true of say Brazil or Australia is very true of the central African mines.

Re:Then what?

[AK Marc]

It doesn't convey the meaning of "unthinking masses" but "thinking masses who choose differently than me". Sheeple isn't a description, it's an emotionally charged word designed to insult, not describe. It's the "unthinking" people who buy Android, because for the same price as my HTC, you can get a 4S with similar specs and "better" user experience. Thinking people buy Apple. It's the knee jerk anti-Apple people who are unthinking. But they are few enough (aside from the hoards on Slashdot) that nobody bothers to try to insult them. Just because you don't like a popular trend doesn't make you better than everyone else. Laptops over desktops are a trend as well, so if you own a laptop, you are a sheeple as well. So, any laptops in your stable of computers?

Re:Then what?

[AK Marc]

And you'd be as wrong as asserting "everyone who owns an Apple product or has ever installed iTunes is a sheeple."

Re:Then what?

[AK Marc]

Stage coach drivers didn't lose their jobs because a government outlawed horses, which is much closer to the reality here.

Re:Then what?

[ediron2]

Well put: a pure capitalism mechanism seems hell-bent on lowest cost at any cost (letting others pay for labor abuses, environmental damage, and gaming national workforces against each other in a race for the bottom). Which is precisely where unions and governmental protections (including international trade regulations) come into play.

Re:Then what?

[ediron2]

And our response needs to be a loud shout: "SEE! Capitalism is incapable of selfregulating." We've lost pensions and the old social contract with our employers that if we worked hard, we'd always have a decent job. The corporate response to environmental protections is a roving exportation target for where to dump the dirty stuff and dirty work. The foxconn conditions are deplorable, as are conditions in southwest Afghanistan, coastal India, Niger, and anywhere else that both lacks economic protections and openness. But I hardly think that the US's hellbent rush toward this is the end state.

Re:Then what?

[glitch0]

I'm aware of their use of Foxconn from past articles, but how come I don't see Foxconn on the list linked in this article?
http://images.apple.com/supplierresponsibility/pdf/Apple_Supplier_List_2011.pdf

Re:Then what?

[BayaWeaver]

I'm aware of their use of Foxconn from past articles, but how come I don't see Foxconn on the list linked in this article?

Yes, it is. See Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd. (Foxconn)

Re:Then what?

[glitch0]

Aha! I was looking under F. Thanks!

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

If Apple stopped doing business with one of the worst offenders, you guys would be screaming bloody murder that Apple should leave poor old Samsung alone. http://stopsamsung.wordpress.com/ http://www.publiceye.ch/en/vote/samsung/

Re:Then what?

[JohnnyMindcrime]

Stopped reading here.

I am a rabid Apple fanboi.

There, corrected that for you.

Re:Then what?

[JohnnyMindcrime]

Erm, how about those that queue on a day when nothing new is released but just because it's a new Apple store that's opening?

Sheep queue or cluster together because they are about to get something, like food, for example. The above behaviour is more akin to deranged magpies attracted by something shiny and somewhat insulting to sheep.

Re:Then what?

[AK Marc]

I've seen no evidence that Foxconn mistreats their workers (other than conditions outside the US not matching US expectations, no other "facts" have come out that I've seen). Perhaps you could provide some evidence. Suicides hit in groups in high schools as well and isn't an indication of administrator misconduct, usually linked to peer mistreatment, but at a factory, then suddenly it's the factory management that murdered everyone. Doesn't "freedom" include the freedom to make stupid personal mistakes, like suicide? Or are you anti-freedom?

Re:Then what?

[JohnnyMindcrime]

No, it does not.

But not recognising that Apple users are pretty much unique in the tech gadget world for queuing outside stores for a new piece of electronic jewelry, and that therefore the OP was making a valid point, does make you a fanboi.

And let me correct you on one thing - the term "credibility" is not a fixed attribute, it is based solely on opinion - therefore something that may seem credible to me may not seem credible to you. And whilst we could argue our difference of opinions ad infinitum, it is unlikely that either of us would change our viewpoint as a result of the other's reasoned argument. Therefore let's not waste time discussing differences in opinion any further.

However, not recognising that level of credibility is based purely on opinion has in itself allowed you to make a sweeping generalisation in assuming everyone else shares your opinion. Thus you paint yourself as a hypocrite also.

Finally, you also suffer from two dimensional blinkered thinking if you believe that someone with whom you do not share the same opinion automatically becomes your enemy. Who was it who said "I may not agree with what you say but I defend your right to say it"?

Clearly, since this is a discussion web site, I defend your right to say what you like on here, but that doesn't mean I necessarily agree with it - and definitely doesn't mean that when I sign off shortly to go to bed that as I fall into slumber I will be plotting the demise of jo_harn. If anything, you also suffer from an inflated ego if you seriously believe I care that much about your opinion in the first place.

So, no, you are not a rabid fanboi. You are a hypocritical rabid fanboi with an over-inflated ego.

Re:Then what?

[Rockoon]

How many times have you seen people upgrade a perfectly functional computer, for no reason other than that something a little faster is on the market?

Outside of my PC gaming geek circle.. never.

Maybe you should get out and meet people.

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

And what made-in-the-USA alternative computers and cell phones are they going to buy instead?

If we begin with the premise that we need computers and cell phones

Gee, then stop fucking posting here, you hypocrite.

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

I am not saying dont try, I was responding to the current state of affairs that brought us to this point. Perhaps public pressure will do it, but then again public pressure over 2 years evolved into this retort by Apple.

You know Apple has been openly publishing these audits since 2007 right?

Re:Then what?

[jo_ham]

You say:

Finally, you also suffer from two dimensional blinkered thinking if you believe that someone with whom you do not share the same opinion automatically becomes your enemy. Who was it who said "I may not agree with what you say but I defend your right to say it"?

and your sig says:

My right to Free Silence countermands your right to Free Speech when I don't care about your fucking opinion.

Which is somewhat contradictory. Your entire comment flies in the face of the former statement at any rate.

Either way, you're accusing me of being hypocritical for pointing out that his lack of maturity and generalisation hurts his argument's credibility - that part of the debate is not in doubt. Immaturity and generalisations always hurt your argument, regardless of topic, so attempts to justify his position are really not relevant.

You then tried to change the argument (and by extension, tried to imply that I was arguing a different topic) by talking about "not recognising that Apple users are pretty much unique in the tech world for lining up [...]". At no point in this argument have I made any such claim one way or the other, and to call me a hypocrite based on that argument is totally inaccurate. I have pointed out that classing *all* Apple users as such is a gross oversimplification and an inaccurate stereotype. Unless you have some documented proof that literally every Apple user "[queues] outside stores for a new piece of electronic jewelry [sic]" then you can't claim that the OP "has a point" at all. His argument is akin to the classic "women can't drive" argument, or the "all Xbox LIVE users are 12 year old kids" argument. It just doesn't hold up. (DISCLAIMER: I am neither a woman nor an Xbox owner).
I've never claimed that Apple users *don't* line up outside Apple stores before product launches, and having not specifically mentioned it you're drawing conclusions based on your guesswork about what I believe. That's also not a very good debate method, but it's a good way to force someone into being defensive, since letting it slide runs the risk of you later being able to claim it as true since it was not challenged at the time.

My entire point to the OP was "use of pejorative terms and generalisations is not a sound debating technique". There's no qualifying information or sidetracking argument against that. You're trying to justify his position for whatever reason you've chosen (I'm not going to make an assumption here) with an erroneous and irrelevant argument and I'm not hypocritical for pointing it out just because you say so. It simply does not follow.

Re:Then what?

[mjwx]

Presumably you're saying that for some reason more than just "they contain tantalum capacitors", as tantalum isn't ipso facto a conflict mineral, unless you're counting Australian rules football: and capoeira matches as "conflicts".

For the benefit of anyone who's never seen an Australian Rules Footy match, it can be best described as two teams of Aussie men trying to kill each other whilst keeping an umpire distracted with a ball.

Re:Then what?

[whereiswaldo]

You know, in a free(-ish) market, this is not a choice. You must use the cheapest, most profitable method that is available. The reason is that if you don't, somebody else will, and they will eventually drive you out of business.

Apple isn't leading the market based on price - their products are among the most expensive. It seems that using cheap labour simply maximizes their profit. I'd be interested in seeing a real justification that Apple would go out of business or lose their place in the market if they used more local companies and labour.
Even if they started with an increase of 5% or 10%, that could plant a seed for future local expansion. They have the clout to make "Made in America" something that other manufacturers want (need) to emulate.

Re:Then what?

[ILongForDarkness]

Apple has learnt is lesson and I'm pretty sure this time Steve Jobs won't throw his hands up.

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

It is actually worse than you suggest. Apple's "standard" is that workers should not work more than 60 hours per week.
Simply put, there is no place ion China where a worker may lawfully work 60 hours per week. The law does not permit it

These are not sweat shops in the traditional sense, but they are exploitation of workers on a massive scale, and it is impossible that Apple's management could not be fully aware of this. Taiwanese intermediaries are the direct villains, but they could not operate or even exist without the willing and connivance of companies like Apple, Nike etc etc.

Consumers are at fault too, I guess, but they are more removed from the issue.

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

And in typical Jo Ham fashion you rush to Apple's defense. You're pathetic.

Re:Then what?

[PopeRatzo]

I've seen no evidence that Foxconn mistreats their workers

You haven't looked. I would recommend the work of journalist and monologuist Mike Daisey, who currently has a one-man show off-broadway called "The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs". In it, he documents his visit to a Chinese Foxconn plant in Shenzhen and describes the unbelievably atrocious working conditions there (including the deaths of many Foxconn workers - not due to suicide - among them a man who dropped dead after working a non-optional 34 hour shift).

In the NPR series This American Life, Ira Glass has a group of investigators, including NYTimes journalist Nicholas Kristof fact-check Daisey's almost unbelievable claims about this factory (that builds iPhones, by the way). After hundreds of interviews with workers and having at least one investigator go undercover there - getting a job, the whole thing - they corroborate his story.

Nicholas Kristof by the way, has written extensively and eloquently about the Foxconn plant and working conditions in Chinese technology factories used by companies like Apple.

I highly recommend that you give a listen to the This American Life episode with and about Daisey. It's easy to find and I've given you more than enough google clues to find it with one search. The first half of the story is part of Daisey's monologue and the second half is about the efforts of Glass, Kristof, etal to corroborate. You can also easily find Kristof's several extensive stories in the NYT online, though they might be behind a paywall.

Take a listen and a look and then come back and tell me if you still have "seen no evidence" that Foxconn mistreats their workers.

One image that sticks in my head for some reason is the dormitories the workers are required to live in. They are 12'x12' windowless rooms with sixteen beds stacked like cordwood, with the space between the stacks of beds so small that a normal-sized American could not move in them. The factory floor and assembly lines are of course monitored by CCTV cameras to make sure there are no unwarranted breaks or work slowdowns, and those same CCTV cameras are in each of the dormitory rooms to monitor the workers in their few off-hours including when they are asleep (the lights stay on).

You have to actually hear the radio show and read the many Kristof stories to get to the really ugly stuff though. On the podcast version of the show (available through iTunes) you also hear an interview with Debby Chan Sze Wan, who was part of an Hong Kong-based investigative team who looked into Foxconn's plants.

Have at it, friend, and then come back and talk to me about the "freedom" that would come from having multi-national corporations operate unregulated and without workers being allowed to organize into unions. And whether the suicides at Foxconn were just examples of workers exercising their "freedom".

Remember, the factories in Shenzhen are models for the manufacturing world.

Re:Then what?

[AmiMoJo]

I think a big part of the problem is that people just don't know about this stuff. I knew about Apple's factory conditions but not the blood minerals thing, and I have been reading Slashdot for over a decade. There is just too much going on, too many issues to worry about to remember them all. I do care and try to buy ethically when I can (Apple and Sony are on the banned list) it isn't easy.

People do actually like ethically produced products, as can be seen by the popularity of fair trade and free range goods. When you are in the shop trying to remember all the newspaper articles about bad companies it is hard though.

I thought about setting up a website called something like "dont-buy-this.com" where people could build a wiki of these kinds of issues, as well as product flaws, but I don't have the time. With a mobile app and barcode scanner it could be popular though.

Re:Then what?

[AK Marc]

Have at it, friend, and then come back and talk to me about the "freedom" that would come from having multi-national corporations operate unregulated and without workers being allowed to organize into unions. And whether the suicides at Foxconn were just examples of workers exercising their "freedom".

The workers have organized into a union, that's what the "P" is in PRC. The issue of unregulated multinational corporations is unrelated to Foxconn conditions. I've been to Shenzhen, have you? I didn't tour Foxconn's facilities, but I did tour Huawei's. Have you heard of them? You do realize that as bad as the conditions are, there are 200,000+ illegals in Shenzhen begging companies for jobs? The conditions are appalling, but they are better than the fields they ran away from. You are denying people begging for jobs the ability to earn income. Why do you hate freedom so much? You talk like you are an anti-capitalist libertarian, why would a libertarian hate freedom so much. Shouldn't people be allowed to make bad choices? And you talk about "non-optional 34 hour shift" while they are not slaves. They could leave at any time and go home to the fields. That they'd rather stay (and maybe even die) as opposed to go home, that indicated that their situation is an improvement over their other choices. It's not like they shoot you if you quit. You just walk down to the train station and take a train to Guangzhou and from there, anywhere in China you want. And no they don't check papers in Communist China the way they did in the USSR. Go home. They don't. Why not? Oh wait, that would require you think about the issue, and not just parrot someone else's opinion you like, rather than think and form your own.

Remember, the factories in Shenzhen are models for the manufacturing world.

I've visited one in Shenzhen and met the workers and seen how they live and where. What have you done to investigate the issue for yourself, read blogs you agree with?

Re:Then what?

[JasterBobaMereel]

And the simple way of populating the site:

1) Put everything on it ...

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you'll find that's called a non-sequitur.

I think you'll find that it's not-hyphenated.

Re:Then what?

[jo_ham]

Good catch - you're right of course. Shame you were too afraid to log in.

Re:Then what?

[PopeRatzo]

I didn't tour Foxconn's facilities, but I did tour Huawei's.

So, you've got first-hand information about something that is not what we're talking about. Very good.

You talk like you are an anti-capitalist libertarian,

I am nothing of the sort. I am a Jesus Christ-style, FDR Democrat. I believe in redistributing the wealth. I believe in strong unions (American-style unions), stronger regulations, an even stronger social safety-net and a top tax bracket well over 50%.

I appreciate capitalism, but it's like Drano - you've got to be very careful about how you use it. And the best way to use it, according to the data, is Northern European style socialism.

And I am nothing like a "libertarian". Libertarians are college freshmen who don't know any better. I scrape libertarians off the bottom of my shoe.

Why were you touring Hanwei by the way? Was it part of your business or job? If so, that would explain why you are so sanguine about the way the workers in Shenzhen are treated.

Re:Then what?

[Anonymous Coward]

You still haven't stated what information you have? The person you replied to has first hand experience. That trumps anything you have to say, which honestly is a whole lot of nothing.

Re:Then what?

[PopeRatzo]

The person you replied to has first hand experience.

He admits to not having been to the Foxconn plant, so how is that "firsthand experience"?

Further, you have to ask yourself, "In what capacity was he touring the Hanwei plant?". If he's there representing a company that is going to use that factory to make a product, then he's got a very strong incentive to not really care whether the workers are mistreated, or worse.

I find the work of a group of professional, multiple award-winning journalists to be more compelling than the conclusion of a probably agenda-driven person who has never even been to a Foxconn plant and who doesn't identify himself or his agenda.

Re:Then what?

[AK Marc]

So, you've got first-hand information about something that is not what we're talking about. Very good.

You said "Remember, the factories in Shenzhen are models for the manufacturing world." I've been in a factory in Shenzhen. I have direct first-hand knowledge about what you are talking about. Unfortunately, that means you think you are a non-sequitur, as a comment directly related to your comment is off topic according to you. Why are you talking about "factories in Shenzhen" when you really mean "Foxconn and Foxconn only"? Or are you just lying to win an argument?

I am a Jesus Christ-style, FDR Democrat.

So you are just anti-capitalist. Got it. You hate freedom and you want to force your brand of "help" on others, even when they don't want it.

Why were you touring Hanwei by the way? Was it part of your business or job? If so, that would explain why you are so sanguine about the way the workers in Shenzhen are treated.

Why would that matter, as workers in Shenzhen are unrelated to your comments on "the factories in Shenzhen are models for the manufacturing world", at least according to you. You answer little, but ask questions fishing for things to attack me. I don't play those liar games. You can't answer any questions about whether they are actual slaves (punished for quitting) or people that volunteer to work in poor conditions because it's better than the alternative, and what those alternatives are. Since you won't address your own topic, except in very narrow and contrived instances, I have to assume you know you are wrong and are lawyering (weasel lies) your way to a limited "win" by throwing down so many artificial restrictions on the "topic" that it's irrelevant to reality, but supports your opinion. I actually like discussing things. I like learning things. And having someone that reads blogs of activists supporting his opinions who has strong opinions on things he has no experience with lecture me like I'm a petulant child is offensive, especially since he dismisses any first-hand knowledge as irrelevant, but quotes blogs. So, if I'd written my opinion as a blog, it would be more valid than as a comment on someone else's blog? Why?

Re:Then what?

[AK Marc]

Further, you have to ask yourself, "In what capacity was he touring the Hanwei plant?". If he's there representing a company that is going to use that factory to make a product, then he's got a very strong incentive to not really care whether the workers are mistreated, or worse.

I was not representing a company. I was completing a masters degree through Carnegie Mellon business school with classes in China (taught by American instructors in English) because I wanted the education and the opportunity to experience a new culture before bashing them over the Internet. I lived on Huawei's corporate campus for 3 weeks in Shenzhen (and lived in a college dorm in Beijing for another 3 weeks for the other half of the class). But then, getting an education obviously means I was biased towards the truth, so of course I disagree with you.

who doesn't identify himself or his agenda

I post under my real name, "Pope". And I have no agenda, hidden or otherwise, other than the truth, something you are obviously uninterested in.

Re:Then what?

[PopeRatzo]

I was completing a masters degree through Carnegie Mellon business school

Then I'm sure the idea of 16 workers living in a 12'x12' room with closed circuit cameras watching them just thrills you.

Last time I heard, "Exploitation of Third World Workers - 301" was a required course for MBA candidates. You probably dream about bringing Shenzhen factory conditions to a plant in South Carolina. You have said that more than a dozen Foxconn workers committing suicide due to the hopelessness and misery of their working conditions is an example of them is simply an example of "freedom" in action. You have exactly the requisite moral compass to be a successful MBA.

I wonder if you would feel the same if the middle manager you hope to become was treated the same way as a Shenzhen line worker.

Re:Then what?

[seantide]

The things you list are not caused by capitalism, they are enemies of capitalism, aren't they? They look more like the creation of socialism, government interference in free enterprise, and cronyism to me.

A true capitalist doesn't just own the means of production, he is also affected by it and is in some sense of his life near it. If not, then he isn't really a capitalist.

We live in a world where government has distorted capitalism badly, and people are mislead into believing the result is the fault of capitalism, when in fact part of the reason for capitalism was to prevent exactly that.

Re:Then what?

[seantide]

Are you so sure people don't care?

I care, but I don't usually have a lot of choice in what I buy, where I shop, etc. I have limitations and have to survive with them in mind. Its very easy to try and avoid doing harm by what you buy, and end up doing more because someone has the information wrong, or you fall into a number of scams where companies lead you to believe they do it better but don't.

Just look at the whole "organic" scam. I have friends in agriculture, and the places they work will take the same produce and just label it differently to sell to the people who "care" about buying organic. Its all the same stuff.

Its worth noting that it isn't capitalist who send labor overseas, since that is by nature a violation of capitalist principles.

Re:Then what?

[seantide]

Yep, and none of that is capitalism. It is in fact pretty much in opposition to it.

Re:Then what?

[seantide]

Then what? Then they will see if people actually care enough to stop using Apple products. They will find that they dont, and life will go on.

Explain to me how this will help.

I need a computer for getting work done, and Apple is no different than any other in terms of negative side effects or production.

I don't _need_ my Windows gaming machine according to some opinion (I disagree, it keeps me off clock towers), but again... buying it from someone other than Apple or whoever else you guys think is evil at the moment isn't likely to change a thing.

It seems to me that you are lamenting the lack of a solution that would't work in the first place.

Re:Then what?

[seantide]

Honestly, even among my fairly well-off friends, I don't see this at all. Most people are computer illiterate to at least some degree, and I see them using whatever they can get and use it until it breaks.

A few die hard geeks buy every new phone and whatever that comes out, but otherwise most people really don't like changing very much. In my experience, I actually have a hard time getting people to buy a new computer or cell phone, they resist the change unless its obvious they need something more.

About the only people I see upgrading on a regular basic are myself and some friends who are game players. Even then, we tend to only upgrade at the sweet spot of price curves and we tend to upgrade rather than outright replace, so we are doing it about as "green" as you could while still meeting required performance.

Ditto for machines I use for work and personal data processing: I tend to keep them upgraded only to the point where they need it, or the risk of their failure would cause me serious harm.

Re:Then what?

[seantide]

Actually that is not capitalism. Capitalism means owning and (originally) living near the means of production.

What you are talking about happens in any business, regardless of if it is capitalist or not.

In fact the primary driving force of cost cutting as you lament here is the modern day corporation, which is heavily rather anti-capitalist (thought that could be largely fixed or compromised on).

Re:Then what?

[AK Marc]

Last time I heard, "Exploitation of Third World Workers - 301" was a required course for MBA candidates.

Only if you are talking to yourself. Go get an MBA and then tell us what you think of the education. Oh wait, you are unwilling to listen to anyone else, especially if they supposedly know more than you.

So instead, you post anti-intellectual garbage about how education corrupts (implying that being uneducated is better than having an education - justifying your failure to complete high school?).

You have said that more than a dozen Foxconn workers committing suicide due to the hopelessness and misery of their working conditions is an example of them is simply an example of "freedom" in action.

They had the freedom to go home to the fields and chose not to. Why do you think that is so (oh wait, I lost you at "you think")?

I wonder if you would feel the same if the middle manager you hope to become was treated the same way as a Shenzhen line worker.

I'd change jobs. They wouldn't. Death is preferable to quitting. Why? Come on, pretend you can think, rather than just parroting blogs that agree with you and answer a question for once. Why do they choose death over quitting, and where would you put the blame for that one?

Re:Then what?

[cynyr]

This is the best description of the game ever.

Re:Then what?

[PopeRatzo]

So instead, you post anti-intellectual garbage about how education corrupts

Son, I spent 25 years of my life in academia, the last 16 teaching at a top-5 US university. I spent more time as a professor than the entirety of your education since kindergarten. Calling me "anti-intellectual" and opposed in any way to education shows that you have a little bit of a tin ear. As long as you've been around here, I would have thought you'd have heard of me. A lot of people here on Slashdot know who I am in real life. Some figured it out from the hints I've dropped over the years. My academic bona fides would fill the back of your pickup truck.

I'd change jobs. They wouldn't. Death is preferable to quitting. Why?

You really assume that they have a choice? Did you open your eyes once while you were in China?

And when did I even mention any blog, much less parrot them?

Let me guess...you were home-schooled, weren't you? It would fit, the Alaska, the cockeyed notion of what "freedom" means, the inability to reason, poor socialization...

They had the freedom to go home to the fields and chose not to.

Do you believe that they only way to take someone's freedom is by putting them in chains? Ah, now I get it...you're young for your age.

Here's something to put into your long-term google calendar: In ten years, when you've spent some time in the real world, you're going to look back at this conversation we've had and cringe. I'll do you a favor. I'll cut and paste and save it for you. I've got a scrap book of such things from people who went on to grow up. Such mementos provide a meaningful way to measure one's maturity.

You don't have to thank me, but I bet you will, in time.

Re:Then what?

[AK Marc]

Calling me "anti-intellectual" and opposed in any way to education shows that you have a little bit of a tin ear.

I call 'em as I see 'em. You bash education because you don't like what you falsely assert they educate people in *is* anti-education. If you don't want to come across as anti-education, then don't bash people for getting an education.

You really assume that they have a choice?

You assume there are armed guards shooting everyone who goes out to buy a coffee? After all, if they have no choice, how is that lack of choice enforced?

Ah, now I get it...you're young for your age.

I worked in the IT industry for more than 15 years before going back to get an MBA because there are no practical technical positions higher than what I had achieved, so career progression required additional education. So, after 20 years in IT, a BS and MBA, what more do you think I'll get in the next 10 years I haven't already learned? Cringe? Just your close-minded trolling will make me cringe. Stating I have no first hand knowledge of Shenzhen plants when I told you I had toured one is cringe-worthy mental gymnastics to justify your provably false activism based on emotion and devoid of fact. That's all that will make me cringe.

the middle manager you hope to become

I was already performing middle-manager duties when I got the MBA. The best you can do is insult someone for wanting to progress their career. We need more tech-oriented IT managers, otherwise, we end up with bean counters only. And when you have only bean counters, all you get is beans.

You don't have to thank me, but I bet you will, in time.

You and your delusions of grandeur. Why would I listen to someone who asks all sorts of questions, never listens to the answers, and refuses to answer any questions asked of him?

one down, one to go

[Anonymous Coward]

Now if they will just stop their big-brother view of computing, censoring political satire (http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/04/apple-bans-satire/), locking down root access from their devices, then maybe I'll considering buying some of their stuff. They actually make good quality products, they're just evil in driving the uneducated masses towards living in golden cages, a direction the world world seems intent on going to its own eventual regret. When a few big players control everyone's computing experience, only then might the majority wake up and realize concentrating power in such few hands is a bad idea. Maybe some in the middle east have already realized it...

Until then.. no Apple, no matter how good their shit might be otherwise.

Apple Should Be Commended

[Anonymous Coward]

Look. Almost EVERY company that makes almost EVERYTHING in your home participates in the awful near-slave manufacturing that goes on in China and other third world countries.

Their motivation aside, Apple is by far one of the best and most responsible manufacturers, simply by doing the (very very) little that they do. Singling out Apple is just Apple hate.

Re:Apple Should Be Commended

[Ethanol-fueled]

You are correct. Apple themselves are not obnoxious, their users are.

Re:Apple Should Be Commended

[Anonymous Coward]

If there are lots of slave-owners but one of the biggest slave-owners treats his slaves well then we still single the latter out for being one of the biggest slave-owners.

If you are a socialist then you believe in global workers' rights.

If you are a capitalist then you believe in individual liberty regardless of government.

I am not sure what sort of beast thinks that it is morally acceptable to treat humans to some standard in your own country but that it's OK to profit from labour in other countries which do not grant that same standard of treatment. It simply makes no sense beyond "it's far away and we can't really see what's going on" - an international version of the apocryphal story of Victoria pulling down the shutters when the Royal Train passed through the poorer areas of the north of England.

Re:Apple Should Be Commended

[jcreus]

I must disagree. Even if *everyone* in the world steals/murders, it's not a good thing! On the other hand, I find calling "best and most responsible" Apple, taking into account their patents, and killing of innovation, inappropiate (though it's not worker-rights-related).

Re:Apple Should Be Commended

[chinakow]

I think that point is not to absolve Apple for their practices because they make a gesture. The point is that we should be looking at the whole of manufacturing industry and condemning them for their collective practices and looking at consumer culture that ignores these practices. Chastise those who perform and those who enable wrong actions. So yes, Apple does something wrong but if we focus on only Apple we are tacitly excusing the same action in Dell and Lenovo and HP, and really, which manufacturer ships more units, HP or Apple?

Re:Apple Should Be Commended

[hedwards]

The point is that under this situation that large slave owner is still a slave owner. Slavery is a pretty right or wrong issue, either you have slaves or you don't. Treating slaves poorly is just a bad business decision the same way that bashing the copy machine is. In the end people are still being treated like property.

Re:Apple Should Be Commended

[Telvin_3d]

See, this is why most companies just say 'screw it, ignore the entire mess'

I doubt there is a single person on Slashdot who can honestly say that they don't own a single thing that was produced at some level using what is effectively slave labor. Apple is doing more than 99% of companies do to ensure that their workers are treated properly around the world. Not perfect, but better than most. And the reward for even acknowledging the problem is righteous condemnation from the peanut gallery while companies that brush it under the rug get a pass.

Re:Apple Should Be Commended

[Guy Harris]

If you are a capitalist then you believe in individual liberty regardless of government.

Not necessarily. If you are, say, a "classical liberal" or a libertarian, you probably would believe that, but if you're only out for profit you might not care.

Re:Apple Should Be Commended

[Anonymous Coward]

This should be done by the government by default whenever something gets imported. For Apple right now, it doesn't really matter what they find or don't find, it's all for the image.

Re:Apple Should Be Commended

[Anonymous Coward]

actually I'm NOT singling out Apple. My former post really said 'Fuck them all'. All European companies parting with european labour-workers to fill their pockets through Chinese slave-work. The same with US-companies. In the mean time we (european/US citizens) have to ditch our welfare and social justice that our forefathers have fought for, to become second rate. We're redundant because we're not good enough consumers anymore.

It's thanks to western labourforce that all these CEO's today have a decadent luxurious lifestyle. It's about time they did something back.

As an example of my efforts not to single out Apple, below is my remark on the Nokia World 2011 clip posted on the interweb.
I've placed this remark on a well-known Nokia forum and on El Reg (http://forums.theregister.co.uk/forum/2/2011/10/26/nokia_world_quite_different/) --> see 2nd page. I dunno if the full keynote is still available online but parts of it can be found on Youtube.

Sorry for snipped syntax and grammatical errors (as English is not my native tongue)
-----
The only thing that really happened was a few non-Fin employees padding each other on the back.

Like that weird Indian woman talking about Carla and Vivien... WTF!!! And that shrieking monkey with his ESPN-app. That's gonna be available to any Samsung and HTC winphone device within minutes. Not to mention mr. beardman with his crap about social websites in one place?!?!? Nokia phones already have that! It's called Social and it ain't new. It's made by former-symbian employees and just ported to WinPhone.

In fact it's insulting to all the poeple whom worked for years on Symbian, OVI-maps, Social-app, the small-footprint webbrowser, the magnificent calender and contacts integration with OVI-maps and many other things that current Symbian owners take for granted, that these guys claim that he navigation app on the 800 is unique.

Apart from it's design there's nothing to differentiate Nokia's Lumia 800 (winphone crap) from other Windows phones. Pronouncing that this Lumia 800 is the first true 'Windows Phone 7-'phone is pure bollocks. There's nothing special about it. An off-the-shelf half backed feature-less OS embeded into the last-years design o/t N9 (which isn't even available this year unlike what Elop insinuate!). It's even WORSE, gone is that beautiful slide-UI, gone is that gorgeous swipe to homepage, gone are ALL the smart things that made the N9 a real unique phone. The N9 was the first true iPhone opponent from Nokia. What we get now is something that looks like an N9 and behaves like ANY cheap LG/Samsung winphone. The only thing that might grab some attention is that Carl Zeiss logo on the back.

Also it's insulting to current customers that these assholes openly tell us that WE aren't important enough for them. They only care about the 'emerging markets' because "hey, we wanna get another billion people connected". It's thanks to the Western World that these retarded assholes can play ball. We provided them with the big money and now we're "redundant"?

I really don't like this. And the weird thing is that NOBODY in that audience even stood up and called against this! They even applauded this insulting 'sing and dance contest'!

Oh... and why try these 'suits on stage' to impersonate Steve Jobs? It's just laughable. with their wrinkled shirts out of their pants trying to look 'cool'. It's not working, Dude!

I just couldn't bear myself to watch this thing through to the end. It's a joke! An insult to ALL the things Nokia has done in the past. They invented GSM for god's sake! They invented smartphones AGAINST Microsoft and now this charade!

AFAIC. Nokia! Go fuck yourself in 'the emerging markets'!

-----

Re:Apple Should Be Commended

[AgNO3]

Then why are you owning any electronics made in china? ANY. you are a slave promoter. You KNOW they are treated not so wonderful in some factories yet you still buy the products. YOU, YES YOU are as responsible as APPLE, DELL, HP for the factory conditions every time you buy a product. FYI the Suicide rate at the Foxconn Factory is HALF the rest of China and Lower then most states in the US. Seems like maybe they might be doing something right compared to the other factories and most US states. Whats it like Being a partial slave owner, know it and not doing anything about it.

Re:Apple Should Be Commended

[Anonymous Coward]

They should be commended for what, exactly? All I've seen is a bunch of talk. They say they're going to increase transparency, but then what? They've offered absolutely no plan of action further than that. They haven't laid out penalties, they haven't said they'll stop doing business with slave laborers, nothing.

They don't deserve any respect for any of this until they stop using the manufacturers they've already confirmed are abusing human rights.

Re:Apple Should Be Commended

[antdude]

Is there a list for each company? I'd love to see what companies companies use.

Re:Apple Should Be Commended

[Anonymous Coward]

They should be commended for what, exactly? All I've seen is a bunch of talk. They say they're going to increase transparency, but then what? They've offered absolutely no plan of action further than that. They haven't laid out penalties, they haven't said they'll stop doing business with slave laborers, nothing.

They've had openly published policies for YEARS and they've been enforcing them. They've fired suppliers and forced companies employing child labor to continue paying wages to children found working while also sending them to school on the company dime instead of working in the factory. TFA links to the Apple report which lays all this out if you bothered to read what you were talking about or do a single search on the topic.

Re:Apple Should Be Commended

[AK Marc]

Chinese slave work? If there was some African country with 95% unemployment and an average wage of $0.50/hr, if someone put a plant there and employed 1,000,000 people at $1/hr, would that be slave work, or an improvement for the workers? Pushing US ideals on everyone doesn't work if they don't share our opinions.

Re:Apple Should Be Commended

[Macthorpe]

If you weren't such a fucking idiot, you'd know that Apple didn't start this patent mess, they just responded to suits against them, by Nokia et al...

They responded to suits against them by Nokia, by suing HTC and Samsung? Wow, that's a legal strategy and a half.

Labour standards

[slackware 3.6]

A foreign country should not be able to sell goods in a country like the US (or any other) unless it follows the labour standards of the country it is selling its goods in.

Re:Labour standards

[Anonymous Coward]

Soooo flip that on end. Does that mean in the US we can follow the labor rules of china if we only sell to them?

And yes I am being a smart ass...

Re:Labour standards

[TheRaven64]

Totally agree. I've proposed this before, and it's really the only solution to the problems of globalism. The US and EU should be imposing import tariffs on anything imported from places with laxer worker rights and environmental protection.

Re:Labour standards

[perlchild]

Following this logic, short on Wal-Mart, immediately, their entire business is based on importing products that would be more expensive if they were made according to the labour standards of the US.

Hint:
China does NOT have to sell to you.

If you somehow managed to get the EU and the US to do a joint bill, it might maybe work.

But which rules would then apply? Aren't labour rules state rules in the US? (And Canada, and a a lot of other places except the EU, which has member states who have such rules)

Re:Labour standards

[Anonymous Coward]

He could have put it better and said "A foreign country should not be able to sell goods in a country like the US (or any ohter) unless it follows a minimum labour standards of the country it is selling its goods in.

Re:Labour standards

[Anonymous Coward]

Unless you force people to work people in the US will not work for 15 cent an hour.

Re:Labour standards

[vakuona]

As a former resident, and still a citizen of a developing country, I will say to you that that is the most protectionist bullshit I have ever heard. Poor countries have _one_ competitive advantage - the ability to charge and work for lower wages (including worse working conditions) than the developed countries. Any form of legislation that forces poor countries to raise conditions is in effect attempting to forcibly remove their competitive advantage and keep their people in perpetual poverty. Western capitalism is still a remarkable agent for development in the developing countries. If China could not sell to other countries, they would not develop. What many (possibly well meaning but ultimately misinformed) people in the west think is exploitation is, well, not too bad actually, compared to the alternatives faced by the people there. The context is that those people have two choices, work for what westerners consider to to be pitiful wages, in what westerners consider to be terrible conditions (and rightly they are from your perspective). But actually, it is an improvement on any other choice they have.

You don't legislate progress like that. People in China (or any other developing country in that situation) are going to become wealthier, and in response, they will begin to demand, of their own accord, better working conditions. Once China exhausts its current essentially limitless labour supply, companies will begin to compete for workers, rather than workers competing for jobs. Things like minimum wage and worker safety standards are fairly recent innovations in the west. It is not fair to impose that on developing countries, because it will stunt their development, and will leave their people worse off.

Elk Grove

[Anonymous Coward]

Hint: Elk Grove, California.

How many steps?

[vlm]

How many steps?

Like many on /., maybe, I've purchased bare LCD modules. You know the type, HM(whatever it was) protocol, in the olden days you'd have to provide offboard neg voltage to control contrast. Anyway the relevant point is there's about ten companies between my OEM LCD modules and some dude digging stuff outta the ground. One company does nothing but turn purified chemicals into glass. Another company runs the refinery that makes the resin that gets mixed by another company with fiberglass and has a sheet of copper stuck on to it to make bare PCB material. Another mixes ingots of lead and tin (in the past, anyway) and a couple other elements and casts ingots of solder for the wave soldering machine (since replaced by reflow process using paste). I might have a window into the LCD board stuffing assembly plant, but I have no idea whats going on at ye olde tin smelter or the other 99% of the people who built my LCD modules.

I know many apple products are mostly OEM devices. They hardly make their own accelerometers in their own silicon foundries. I'm not sure if its relevant to even bother watching the 1% of the population at the assembly plant... In fact the further you are from final assembly, the worse things seem to be, at least in my factory experience.

Re:How many steps?

[dissy]

I believe you mean the hd44780 controller.

I too have a box of such LCDs, and wrote a few LCDproc modules back in the day.

You are quire correct about all the companies involved with the raw construction of the LCD, not to mention the HD chip itself was another addition made by a separate OEM company. These days there are plenty of additional controllers that can sit between that chip and either the LCD (to provide pixel based addressing commands) and the user (4 bit parallel? Too hard for most, so now there are serial converters, USB controllers, and higher level command sets in chips that drive the HD controller, etc)

You can pop over to MatrixOrbital(.com) and see this recent state of the art built around those LCDs. Each incremental improvement is likely an entire new OEM company between even what you were used to back then, and what is sold today.

Re:How many steps?

[ZigMonty]

Sorta like a pencil, taking it to the extreme.

I'm highly disappointed

[Vinegar Joe]

And here I thought Apple products were made high in the mountains of California by gnomes who sprinkled magic pixie dust on them before shipping.......

Re:I'm highly disappointed

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought that was why they were so expensive.

the FLA

[mlc]

The FLA was formed by the apparel industry as a front to make it look like they were doing something to protect the workers in their factories. Now the electronics industry may be joining, but there's no reason to suspect they'll suddenly gain a new appreciation for something other than PR.

Re:the FLA

[viperidaenz]

They'll gain an excuse to increase prices to consumers, on the illusion they are improving worker conditions and paying them more.

I don't know why ...

[khasim]

Their motivation aside, Apple is by far one of the best and most responsible manufacturers, simply by doing the (very very) little that they do. Singling out Apple is just Apple hate.

I don't know why but that comment reminded me of this cartoon for some reason (NSFW).

http://www.oglaf.com/relief/

Ghandi, Apple Spokesman

[decora]

a few other things that are impossible:

taking egghead computer theories and making them into products for children

ripping out the guts of BSD and putting it into a consumer phone

working out deals with the music industry, a notoriously insular, backwards, conservative, static industry, to distribute its product over a whole new channel and create a new type of industry.

making a 8 inch 'pad' that works like a computer and people will buy

bringing back a nearly bankrupt, listing disaster of a corporation and turning it into one of the biggest companies in the world.

all these things were impossible. all these things were accomplished.

Re:Ghandi, Apple Spokesman

[UnknowingFool]

There is technically impossible and realistically difficult. All these things you mentioned were difficult but achievable through work and determination. Technically can you identify the origin of single particles in a smelt? In the world of Star Trek, all it takes is a tricorder but technically in the real world how do you do so? If you have theories please list them here or better yet, tell Apple and Dell and Panasonic (and all the electronic manufacturers). They would like to know.

Re:Ghandi, Apple Spokesman

[betterunixthanunix]

Was there some reason that Apple had to use conflict minerals in the first place? Oh, right, otherwise iProducts would be too big and ugly, or worse yet, Apple would have been forced to do the research that other people did on alternatives.

Realistically, the conflict minerals problem can only be solved by ending the war. Did Apple pay any lobbyists to push for the US to actually get involved? Did Apple pay for people to learn about the problems in Africa? Did Apple so much as stop selling its products for one day to raise awareness?

OK, fine, I will not bash Apple -- if they stopped selling their products for a day, their competitors will just scoop up the lost business, and their competitors are just as guilty. My point is not that Apple is the only guilty company here, it is that they are not some shining star -- they put on a great show about auditing their factories and demanding conflict-free minerals, but at the end of the day those antics accomplish nothing except scrubbing Apple's public image. Why should we care about Apple's public image?

Re:Ghandi, Apple Spokesman

[UnknowingFool]

Was there some reason that Apple had to use conflict minerals in the first place? Oh, right, otherwise iProducts would be too big and ugly, or worse yet, Apple would have been forced to do the research that other people did on alternatives.

What? Apple like many other companies probably did not source their materials to the original source. They simply were not required to or may not known. As they identified, it's very hard to tell. They can only control so many levels of manufacturing. You treat it as if Apple and Dell and others made it a choice to get negative PR from using conflict materials. Where they can control it, they won't use such materials but realistically they can't guarantee 100%.

As a side note, do you know where every single food item on your dinner plate came from? Was everything organic or humanely killed/harvested? If you were conscientious, maybe you did. Most people don't know and can't know unless they spend a great deal of time tracking. The farmer where I get my organic tomatoes, can I be sure he didn't use his children to help him harvest them (that's child labor violations!) unless I went out to the farm that day of harvest and personally inspected it. Multiply that by every single food item. I don't have that kind of time.

OK, fine, I will not bash Apple -- if they stopped selling their products for a day, their competitors will just scoop up the lost business, and their competitors are just as guilty. My point is not that Apple is the only guilty company here, it is that they are not some shining star -- they put on a great show about auditing their factories and demanding conflict-free minerals, but at the end of the day those antics accomplish nothing except scrubbing Apple's public image. Why should we care about Apple's public image?

Um, by posting, it seems you care more than you are willing to admit. Apple has stated their position and listed their suppliers. That in itself isn't much of a news item but your stance that Apple should do more when it may be impossible puts Apple in a different class than others.

a few congressmen have tried to pass such a law

[decora]

there have been several attempts to pass such a law through congress--- it gets, basically, slaughtered, i.e. voted down by all the people who take bribes from corporations + hedge funds.

in fact i spent a day or two editing the article on wikipedia about this bill, but i cant even remember what the bill was called. lols. something about the fair labor competition act or something.

No good if they know when they're coming

[sethstorm]

In another first, the company also announced that it will allow an independent third party to check on working conditions at those factories, and to make its findings public.'
...which will have to report favorable findings if it wishes to operate in that country.

Re:No good if they know when they're coming

[gnasher719]

...which will have to report favorable findings if it wishes to operate in that country.

And you are an idiot. Read this here: http://www.apple.com/supplierresponsibility/ Trying to influence the findings in any audit is a sure way for a company to lose their business with Apple.

Re:No good if they know when they're coming

[R3d M3rcury]

And you are a naif.

Imagine morale at my factory is poor. Well, I'm going to start beating my employees--and I'll continue to beat my employees until their morale improves. That would probably cause me to lose my business with Apple. So I really have nothing to lose by trying to bribe the auditor, do I?

The beauty of this is that when this all comes out, Apple can say, "Well, Gosh! We didn't know this was happening! We'll do something about this right away!" and will proceed to cancel both of those contracts. Those companies will go bankrupt, disappear, and reappear with new names which Apple will then hire.

Here's my question: Why can't Apple actually get their own employees to go over and check on conditions? It's not like Steve's using the corporate jet anymore.

Re:No good if they know when they're coming

[Anonymous Coward]

And you're a fucking retard.

Interestingly

[Lucas123]

I don't see Anobit on that list of suppliers. And, considering Apple just acquired Anobit for its NAND flash ECC firmware, it makes me wonder why they'd do that without having even used its product first. Or could this list from Apple be only what it's willing to reveal?

Re:Interestingly

[Telvin_3d]

Or it could be that, having acquired Anobit, Apple no longer considers them a separate company. Or perhaps Apple had not been dealing with Anobit directly, but rather through a third party who is on the list. Or that the list was compiled from sources that lag behind actual production by a number of months and Anobit will show up on the next update. Lots of possible reasons without having to stretch for a conspiracy.

Re:Interestingly

[gnasher719]

I don't see Anobit on that list of suppliers. And, considering Apple just acquired Anobit for its NAND flash ECC firmware, it makes me wonder why they'd do that without having even used its product first. Or could this list from Apple be only what it's willing to reveal?

Anobit is an engineering company in Israel. If you are worried about their working conditions, shouldn't you be much more worried about the working conditions of software developers in the US gaming industry? Do you think they are subject to cruel treatment, like having to use Windows on a Dell computer?

no, but after long term exposure to n-Hexane

[decora]

they probably think they are gnomes sprinkling magic pixie dust.

its not impossible

[decora]

its just highly improbable.

and Apple gets the shit dumped all over it, because they are the ones who put Ghandi in their advertising.

many people said it would be impossible for India to become a democracy and throw out the British. he did it. and Apple used his image to sell their products --- but more than that, to sell the idea that thinking and creativity are penultimate. Einstein's image they also have used - and he would say similar things. it is only impossible if you accept what exists currently as inevitable - but it almost never is.

Re:its not impossible

[UnknowingFool]

Again: If you can list a technical method of identifying particle by country of origin that will work in this case, please do so. Otherwise you saying it's possible when practically all of the manufacturers including Apple say it's impossible is just talk.

Where is Corning?

[supremebob]

I don't see Corning Corporation on the list, which puzzles me. I thought that Apple uses Gorilla Glass in a bunch of their products?

Re:Where is Corning?

[perpenso]

I don't see Corning Corporation on the list, which puzzles me. I thought that Apple uses Gorilla Glass in a bunch of their products?

If so Corning may license the process to another manufacturer and not do the manufacturing themselves.

Re:Where is Corning?

[Guy Harris]

I don't see Corning Corporation on the list, which puzzles me. I thought that Apple uses Gorilla Glass in a bunch of their products?

If so Corning may license the process to another manufacturer and not do the manufacturing themselves.

Or they might buy touchscreen front panels, built with Gorilla Glass, from some other vendor.

Capitalism this and that...boo hoo

[Anonymous Coward]

Every time a story like this comes out people start complaining about the evils of money, capitalism, corporations, etc. etc. Let's just get one thing straight here: if these people in China didn't work in these almost slave-labor factories where else would they work? How would they get they're money? No one in China is forcing them to work there, regardless of what people claim about China's socialist structure. These people do it because they have to. It may not be fun, but its the only way the can get paid and support their family. So there. I said it. It's not evil, its life. If they didn't work at this shit-hole factory apple had, they'd probably work at a different shit-hole factory owned in part by another corporation that needs some new shiny product. And if it weren't for that, where would they be? Poor and on the streets, probably. So quit it with the high-horse criticisms about Capitalism being evil. It's just a system. It's done nothing to you.

Sure, we can say we need to change things, get people better lives and better working conditions. Yada yada. But the fact is there's always gonna be the haves and the have nots. Get over it.

Apple Should NOT Be Commended

[taniwha]

Jan 1st the California Transparency in Supply Chains Act came into effect - Apple didn't do this because of This American Life, they've been brought kicking and screaming to this point by the politicians and public opinion in general

Companies vs the law...

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not surprised by this. Apple is releasing something that looks good, to fight what they see as a potentially image-tarnishing meme. It has nothing to do with the law... where an impartial auditor that's not beholden to release his findings just doesn't cut it, especially if the company's choosing him. On the same side, they are acting on rumors of impropriety, not actual fact(it would cause a lot more to actually dig into the morass of international and local laws to actually find if there is a violation.

So they just release something for joe sixpack that sounds good with his donut, and go back to being the media darling that they've always been required to be, in order to survive. Their masterful use of media, lasts, because both they, and the media, acknowledge how beholden they are to the status quo.

The media suck at actually reporting technology except for apple's, and apple does much better in the court of public opinion than they would in almost every other field.

Win Win, don't rock the boat, here's your share for this month.

News! Corporation have no conscience.

[Anonymous Coward]

The reality is Apple and all mega corporations could care less about their sub contractors and where or how they source their labour and materials. If the political climate and workforce demand better conditions that increase their costs too much using a particular supplier, then when the contract term expires the contract goes somewhere else cheaper. The viscous cycle of a mega corporation demanding cheap labour and materials is something which we have absolutely no control over. All Apple is doing is damage control by their PR department.

Bill and Melinda have a social conscience and like the Moguls at the end of the 19th century suddenly started putting back some of that which they hoarded.

A corporation which is controlled by a board room and the stock market could care less about the labour and political conditions where their supplies come from. When you see them suddenly project what seems like a social conscience you can bet it is just the PR people saying look out there is trouble on the horizon.

If a company wants to sell to Walmart then if their good labour practices and social conscience effect the price and their brand name is great to some extent because of their practices, Walmart could care less. Just see what they did to the American firm Rubbermaid and you will see what I am talking about. Apple is no different, image is everything so this latest PR stunt is just damage control.

(puts on Elvis glasses)

[arisvega]

AAwwwOne For the money, Two For the show ..

Re:a very interesting show

[Anonymous Coward]

Hi everyone, I'm afraid Bonch couldn't be with us today but in his absence I'd just like to assure everyone that Google factories are much much worse than Apple ones - in addition to inhuman working conditions the factory drones have to watch ads all day long, have to give up all their personal info and, worst of all, don't get a seamless experience. That's right, no seamless experience with Google. Hope that clears everything up. Bye.

Apple posts list of manufacturers of its products.

[hackus]

Then Apple realizes to cut costs on storage, appends the list to next years litagation itinerary..

Sorry, couldn't resist.

-Hackus

The Devil's Advocate

[Asmor]

I really enjoyed the This American Life episode mentioned in the summary, and one of the things I found really interesting was the second part.

The first part was all about the terrible conditions the guy found at Foxcon and other manufacturers. The second part was all about what we should take away from this.

The general concensus is that, yeah, these factories are terrible, but they're actually a step up from the abject poverty the 3rd world would otherwise be in. Even more surprising, things are improving. Factories are starting, ever so slowly, to compete with each other for workers, and that means they're easing off on hours and otherwise making incremental improvements to the workers' quality of life.

This isn't to say that we should be okay with how the workers are treated. Simply that, given a choice between no sweatshops or sweatshops as they currently exist, the workers are actually better off with the sweatshops. And sweatshops are really the first step on the ladder of development. The industrialized Western countries went through very similar pains during the industrial revolution. In a few generations, Chinese working conditions might actually look a lot more like turn-of-the-century American working conditions, even without outside pressure.

Re:The Devil's Advocate

[glodime]

given a choice between no sweatshops or sweatshops as they currently exist, the workers are actually better off with the sweatshops.

The choice isn't limited to no sweatshops or sweatshops as they currently exist. It may be an improvement over the past period of no sweatshops, but no one is proposing that factories be closed and not replaced. The challenge is how to improve things further given the consequences of global politics, culture and economics. To simply call it a win because it is better than one conceivable alternative or has improved from the past is unethical.

Re:The Devil's Advocate

[sessamoid]

given a choice between no sweatshops or sweatshops as they currently exist, the workers are actually better off with the sweatshops.

The choice isn't limited to no sweatshops or sweatshops as they currently exist. It may be an improvement over the past period of no sweatshops, but no one is proposing that factories be closed and not replaced. The challenge is how to improve things further given the consequences of global politics, culture and economics. To simply call it a win because it is better than one conceivable alternative or has improved from the past is unethical.

And one way to "improve things further" is the path that Apple as taken, to hold their suppliers accountable for working conditions. How many other tech companies are doing this? Where are the news stories decrying their use of "slave labor" (which is already inaccurate to begin with)?

Re:The Devil's Advocate

[glodime]

My comment was directed specifically to "the choice between no sweatshops or sweatshops". I have noticed NPR and many mainstream media reporters and commentators like to present a "silver lining" which is often just false a dichotomy or other logical fallacy and a disservice to the quality of the story presented. This seems to be the case here. It otherwise seems like a good report.

And one way to "improve things further" is the path that Apple as taken, to hold their suppliers accountable for working conditions.

Agreed.

How many other tech companies are doing this?

I have no idea. However, given the "me too" impulses of many modern CEOs, I hope that Apple's publicity will spark more companies (not just tech) to act effectively.

Where are the news stories decrying their use of "slave labor" (which is already inaccurate to begin with)?

It may be my reading comprehension, but I don't understand what you are trying to ask or rhetorically highlight.

Re:The Devil's Advocate

[seantide]

Well put.

Its also worth noting that factories in the USA used to be the same way, if not worse, and I mean in very recent history. My own mother and father both worked in factories whose conditions were little different, and daily work involved maiming and injuries (mostly textile operations in western NC in the 1960s).

But In Other News...

[JohnnyMindcrime]

...the the fast approaching 15th Anniversary of Apple's bankruptcy bailout by Microsoft wasn't listed anywhere.

ask the people you bought it from

[decora]

and then, have them ask the people who they bought if from

and then, they ask the people that they bought it from.

---

what if someone lies?

ahh, well, you get a world wide system of tracking going. its not impossible. its done with fruit. its done with alot of stuff.

think about it. microsoft, apple, the MPAA, the RIAA, wal-mart, the NSA, the TSA, etc, are trying to 'tag' everything in existence to track where it goes, when it went there, etc.

Wal-mart has extensive tracking of product after a certain point - from the warehouse to the store shelf to the consumer to the checkout. they have computers that track all of this, cameras covering it, little RFID tags and so forth and so on.

The government can track people in countless ways - spying on phone calls, etc, then finding some alleged terrorist in the middle of nowhere and dropping a drone bomb on them.

If they can track all this junk after it enters 'the system', all they have to do is widen the system. widen the system to include stuff like Coltan.

it might be impossible for one company to do anything, but together as a species... we can do something. and companies can either be part of the solution or part of the problem.

Re:ask the people you bought it from

[UnknowingFool]

and then, have them ask the people who they bought if from

and then, they ask the people that they bought it from.

The first flaw in your scenario is that it ignores recycling and assumes perfect knowledge. While suppliers may know generally where they get original source material, recyclers have no idea where the original source of their material. At best they know the country of the supply of recycled goods, say the US. They cannot know that every single component in a ton of recycled materials did not come from a conflict source. Some of these conflicts have lasted almost 20 years. Looking at a stack of monitors that came from the US, can you tell which models and companies for the last 20 years have used conflict materials? No one in the world can tell you. Yet you say this is all possible.

what if someone lies?

ahh, well, you get a world wide system of tracking going. its not impossible. its done with fruit. its done with alot of stuff.

Tagging a shipment of fruit is vastly easier than tagging atoms. In a kg of gold (which is one of conflict minerals), there are 3.022E24 molecules of gold. How in the world do you tag that many molecules? That's the crux of the problem. You cannot know the original source of every gold atom as gold is recycled so often.

For the sake of argument we ignore recycling. You expect Apple to personally audit thousands of suppliers? How often? Unless you audit every one of them 24x7 for the rest of their contract, you cannot be sure that they used non-conflict materials each and every time.

I've asked you repeatedly for a technical way to do this. You've responded with nothing but unrealistic and impossible scenarios not based in reality.

Right sentiment, wrong problem.

[MachineShedFred]

If you read the Steve Jobs biography, he's quoted as telling the President that the reason Apple doesn't manufacture in the US has nothing to do with labor costs. The reason is that they can't get the 30,000 manufacturing engineers necessary to support 700,000 factory workers because the education system is fucked. China has no problem producing the engineers necessary to keep such a factory going.

Jobs' two meetings with Obama in 2010 and 2011 are detailed in the new biography of the Apple leader by author Walter Isaacson.

The book recounts the first meeting occurred at a hotel at the San Francisco airport in the fall of 2010. Isaacson, relying on accounts from White House aides and Jobs himself, wrote that Jobs told Obama bluntly, "You're headed for a one-term presidency" and urged the Democratic president to be more business-friendly. Jobs told Obama how easy it was to build a factory in China, in contrast to the difficulties caused by regulations and extra costs in the United States.

Isaacson's book says Jobs offered to put together a group of CEOs for another meeting, which was held early this year.

Jobs, who died Oct. 5, 2011, was looking thin and frail because of his cancer but still managed to be passionate about the need for more engineers.

"When Jobs' turn came," Isaacson wrote, "he stressed the need for more trained engineers and suggested that any foreign students who earned an engineering degree in the United States should be given a visa to stay in the country."

The book says that "Jobs went on to urge that a way be found to train more American engineers. Apple had 700,000 factory workers employed in China, he said, and that was because it needed 30,000 engineers on-site to support those workers. 'You can't find that many in America to hire,' he said. These factory engineers did not have to be PhDs or geniuses; they simply needed to have basic engineering skills for manufacturing. Tech schools, community colleges, or trade schools could train them.

"'If you could educate these engineers,' he said, 'we could move more manufacturing plants here.'"

Isaacson wrote that the argument "made a strong impression on the president. Two or three times over the next month he told his aides, 'We've got to find ways to train those 30,000 manufacturing engineers that Jobs told us about.'"

Apple used to manufacture everything in the US, and spent lots of money to do so. Here's a video link from their highly automated factory they built in Fremont, CA for producing Macs back in the day: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dk306ZkNOuc