Apple Disclosures About Jobs To Face SEC Review 187
suraj.sun writes "US regulators are examining Apple Inc.'s disclosures about Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs's health problems to ensure investors weren't misled, a person familiar with the matter said.
The Securities and Exchange Commission's review doesn't mean investigators have seen evidence of wrongdoing, the person said, declining to be identified because the inquiry isn't public. Bloomberg News reported last week that Jobs is considering a liver transplant as a result of complications after treatment for cancer, according to people who are monitoring his illness."
Here here! (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:leave steve alone! (Score:3, Interesting)
Ethical Question: SHOULD HE EVEN GET A LIVER? (Score:5, Interesting)
So, let's say Jobs needs (I guess his doctors would decide if he needed it) a liver. Where does he get it? I mean, in the U.S., the scarce organs available for transplant are decided (I think) by some medical board that determines the medical usefulness(?) of the organ to the patient. That is, will it help the patient live a substantially longer, healthier life.
I don't think that they take into consideration the person's wealth or any other measure of that person's *value* to society. So, even if billions of dollars of market capitalization are at stake and millions of customers depend on his brilliance, he may be turned down for say, a 16 year old girl who has her whole life in front of her. I could be wrong though, there may be some provision for "importance" to society. Anybody know the answer? (Of course the medical board's answer may be different from what you think it should be!)
Now, living as I do in a third world country, I can see how Jobs could easily fly here and "procure" one if he needed it. (I'm not saying that he'd take one from a living person of course, just that he would get bumped up to the front of the line). Wouldn't look too good for Apple's image to so openly go around the American system but he would save his life (and presumably Apple). I'm afraid to say that as an Apple fanboy I'd rather him do that than die.
Re:leave steve alone! (Score:3, Interesting)
re: medical privacy - correct.
Problem is they lied and denied his condition. There's a difference between saying nothing - and pushing out misinformation to manipulate stocks. That's a no-no.
Re:leave steve alone! (Score:3, Interesting)
...Whether Apple would be fine without him or not is completely irrelevant.
Which is EXACTLY why this should be an irrelevant matter that the SEC should not be involved with. If the stock price goes up or down based on ONE mans health condition, or public knowledge thereof, that's the fault of the company. It certainly isn't the way things work for the other 99% of public corporations out there, so why in the hell should Steve or Apple be under such SEC scrutiny because of an obscenely loyal following?
Perhaps if the rest of the board would get off it's knees and stop chanting "Hail Steve, Hail Steve", they would be able to make some progress in finding OTHER equally charismatic leaders, since it's rather painfully obvious at this point that a sexy leader is required for them to survive. Guess the other 10,000+ employees don't really count, eh?
Re:leave steve alone! (Score:5, Interesting)
So Apple just manufactures iPods? Actually it's quite the opposite, they don't do any of their own hardware manufacturing and instead come up with the ideas for hardware and farm out their creations to 3rd parties often in China.
Software is simply the expression of an idea.
Apple is very much an idea company.