DISQUS

mathewi As I mentioned to someone else, there should be a pretty high bar set
for squashing free speech, and "Apple says some blogger really hurt
their sales" just isn't good enough for me, I'm afraid -- nor is your
anecdotal "evidence."

Detailing all the problems in the blog post you linked to would take
too long, but here's a start: Harrell's argument begins by saying we
give journalists a long leash when it comes to committing crimes --
but Think Secret didn't commit a crime. Having a blog that posts
rumours doesn't qualify as "tortious interference," no matter how many
times he says it does.

And the term "trade secrets" doesn't extend to things you were
planning to reveal soon anyway, at least not in any ruling I've ever
seen. KFC's special recipe is a trade secret -- what colour the new
iPod is going to be just doesn't qualify.

Harrell also says that Think Secret wasn't "engaged in journalism in
any meaningful sense of the word." So free speech should be suppressed
unless it meets some standard of "important" or "meaningful"
journalism? That's a nasty road to go down. That's more than just
bollocks -- it's idiotic.

As for the argument that bloggers "need to be chilled" and journalists
should be sued from time to time to "un-stick their moral compass," I
only said it was bollocks because words failed me -- and continue to
fail me. It's so asinine it's difficult to come up with a cogent
response. What Think Secret did wasn't "immoral" in any way that makes
sense, so I'm not even sure what Harrell is driving at. Companies
aren't moral entities, and so revealing their "secrets" couldn't
possibly be immoral, or even unethical for that matter.

It's just a big, fat truckload of stupid.

StevenHodson You mean accused like Windows users are? Everything I have seen and read shows that there is indeed a Apple/Mac community that can be very rabid in defense of both the company and the platform. To suggest otherwise is facetious to say the least.

There are a lot of sites that do exactly the same thing to Microsoft and Windows, or even Google, that Nicholas did to Apple but the fact is that if either of those two companies tried to pull the same stunt that Apple has the hew and cry would have heard from one end of the Internet to the other and I would bet that the so-called mythical Mac community would be right in there rubbing their hands in glee and pointing out how bad MS is.

Of course Apple has all the right in the world to continue the fight in higher courts. But as with all litigations there is backroom dealing and offers being made all the time. Chances are that Apple weighted the potential bad press against the willingness for Nicholas to grab some cash and run. A deal was offered .. a deal was accepted .. that is fine .. that is how law is played these days. the point is that this should never have happened in the first place.

We can muse all we want over what actually happened in those meetings and how the deal was hashed out but in the end the only person who could let us know for sure would be Nicholas ... but I bet a confidentially agreement was also part of the deal as well.

mathewi So because Apple says rumour sites affected its financials, we should
just automatically believe it, Shawn? You're a pretty trusting guy.
But then, I guess because it's Apple, we're supposed to just assume
that its motives are pure.

And thanks for the link to the "more seasoned" response. My only
question after reading it is: seasoned by what? I can think of a lot
of things that post has been soaking in, and none of them are
complimentary. Bloggers "need to be chilled"? Journalism's moral
compass needs to be "un-stuck by the occasional high-profile lawsuit"?
What a load of bollocks.