Apple Accuses Worker of Leaks 374
booboothefoo writes "A former Apple Computer contract worker in Sacramento has been slapped with both civil and criminal charges for allegedly
leaking Apple's trade secrets on the Internet." I think the real message here is "don't trust contractors." Or maybe "rumor sites are evil." Or maybe "Setec Astronomy."
Setec Astronomy (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Setec Astronomy (Score:5, Funny)
-We're the United States Government. We don't do that.
Re:Setec Astronomy (Score:4, Informative)
Whistler: Cryptography systems are based on math problems so complex that they can't be solved without a key.
They also explained why being able to easily solve just one of those problems would render all encryption based on the same problem (Long factorials, anyone?) moot. We're coming up against this with Quantum technology. While it will provide encryption that can't be broken, all previous encryption will be pretty easily brute-forced with even a relatively weak quantum computer.
Re:Setec Astronomy (Score:2)
Re:Setec Astronomy (Score:2)
Re:Setec Astronomy (Score:4, Informative)
"cooty's rat semen"
"too many secrets"
Re:Setec Astronomy (Score:3, Funny)
Oh, and don't bother modding this as OT...i'm taking -1 already.
Darwin at Work (Score:2, Interesting)
Not that it hurt anything (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Not that it hurt anything (Score:5, Insightful)
I have no simpathy for him he signed it, he knew what he was donig when he broke it. Why do you feel it makes a difference if sales where hurt?
Re:Not that it hurt anything (Score:2)
Re:Not that it hurt anything (Score:3, Insightful)
You're developing a product in a highly competitive market. That means you're paying employees and contractors money for, say, a year without any payback. That research is an investment.
The first damage comes when your leak gives your innovations away to your competitors. All that work, all that research, and your competitors can figure out your ideas for free, possibly even beat you to the marketplace.
But then theres more damaage: by leaking proprietary information, he damages the relationships between contractors and employers. Like the post says, "Don't trust contractors."
additional damages... (Score:4, Insightful)
or maybe the message is have some ethics? (Score:3, Insightful)
why can't employees (especially so-called "professionals") have some ethics and do simple things like NOT STEAL FROM THEIR EMPLOYERS?
Re:or maybe the message is have some ethics? (Score:4, Insightful)
Way back once upon a time, I worked a fab line as a "contractor", it royally sucked. "Night and fog" atmosphere, people you work with would just stop showing up, and getting curious about why was a good way to follow them out the door.
--Dave
Re:or maybe the message is have some ethics? (Score:4, Insightful)
The wonderful thing about the word "fair" is that the opposing parties on any issue will have radically different ideas of what it means.
It is also the word that the parent of a six-year-old hates most. If I had a nickel for every time I've cringed at, "But it's not fair!" I wouldn't have to work for a living.
In other words, my friend, quit your whining.
why cant companies do something simple like NOT STEAL FROM THEIR EMPLOYEES?
If Slashdot ever posts an article about an employer stealing from an employee, you can post this comment again. For now, though, I think we should all just stick to the subject at hand. Okay? Thanks.
Re:or maybe the message is have some ethics? (Score:2)
Re:or maybe the message is have some ethics? (Score:2, Insightful)
If the contractor took the job because that was the only job offer and he has no qualifications to work in another field, then tough luck. Shit happens when the economy is bad - that doesn't give you carte blanche to do what you want and break contracts.
Not quite (Score:5, Insightful)
That's funny, the message I took away from it was that if you violate a contract, the company has the right to, and often will, sue you.
Re:Not quite (Score:5, Insightful)
Exactly! From the article, here is a statement to further your point along:
Apple says an employment agreement that Lopez signed with Volt's Sacramento office prohibited him from divulging confidential information.
This is eactly what these agreements are for -- when you have some dumbass who decides to go against a contractual agreement, the nondisclosure is the company's legal route of recourse.
No tears shed for this guy. I hope they take him to the cleaners.
Re:Not quite (Score:3, Insightful)
He must be pretty much behind the 8-ball if he doesn't understand that schematics and other details regarding upcoming products are confidential until the company has launched it. (some details might still be confidential after the launch...) If he's not sure, why not ask before going ahead on posting it?
Re:Not quite (Score:4, Interesting)
Or the moral is... (Score:2, Insightful)
Heh, Sneakers reference. (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Heh, Sneakers reference. (Score:2)
i thought Setec Astronomy was an anagram for Cootys Rat Semen
Re:Heh, Sneakers reference. (Score:3, Funny)
Just for fun, my favorite anagram: "electrical engineering" to "rectilinear negligence".
Re:Heh, Sneakers reference. (Score:2, Insightful)
No karma for you!
So? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:So? (Score:5, Interesting)
In the case of Apple Computer, yes, it is news. Remember that Wozniak was one of the founders, and he is a famous phone phreak, a blue box-er like Captain Crunch. He was hacking Ma Bell and hiding from the Feds back in the day.
Every corporation has a corporate culture. When was the last time you saw Microsoft publicly attacking it's one of its developers for 'leaking secrets'? It happens, but Apple has a disturbing history of jealously pursuing it's employees. The corporate culture of Apple has transitioned from the hackers' culture of Woz to a Culture of Fear. If you are a developer at Apple, high profile anti-employee actions like this send a message: secrecy first, collaboration second.
It's a very interesting transition. I'm not making a value judgement about, other than to say yes, it is News for Nerds.
Re:So? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:So? (Score:4, Insightful)
IMO, if this was Apple going after an employee going after some developer for discussing information in a forum publicly without attempting to hide his identity, and not giving away "trade secrets", then it would be news. This is a corporation following up on the terms of a contract, nothing more.
Re:So? (Score:5, Insightful)
This has nothing to do with collaboration. The guy was leaking info to a rumors site about an upcoming product. He wasn't seeking input from the community about how to make it better. It probably just made him feel cool.
They'd be setting up a legal defence fund. (Score:2)
Iron Fist (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Iron Fist (Score:2)
I very much doubt it. Publishing is one of Apple's core markets, maybe their most valuable, and the only one in which they hold a real lead. The last thing Apple would want to do is piss off one of the largest content producers and distributors on Earth.
In the interest of free information (Score:5, Funny)
Re:In the interest of free information (Score:5, Funny)
One button mouse masterstroke to be followed by one button keyboard
Joe: What does the one button do?
Salesman : Whoa! I'm getting in over my head. Here's the number for technical support.
Re:In the interest of free information (Score:2)
No, that's Microsoft, and their drive to make everyone only use standards that they own. Apple was very proprietary in the old days(ADB, NuBus, round serial ports, AppleTalk), but no more.
"People like paying twice as much"
More like "some people will pay more for quality. The rest, we can't satisfy without losing money". Unless you think they should compete with Dell on Dell's own strengths?
Re:In the interest of free information (Score:3, Funny)
I take it that would be the "any key"?
-
How do they prove this? (Score:2)
Think of HOW MANY people see Apple's products before they hit the stores/web
What kind of evidence do they have?
Re:How do they prove this? (Score:3, Informative)
He took digital photographs of the new motherboard and case (and his workshop surrounding it) and sent them to a rumors site. He also posted a PDF with specs [macrumors.com].
A little work with the background of the photos, the IP address of the forum poster, and the list of people with access to the models probably led Apple straight to him.
The guy broke the rules, so he gets sued. (Score:3, Interesting)
He shouldn't have done it. There's no defense for it. Apple might be going at it heavy-handed, but only a fool would have tried this knowing that Apple (Jobs) will hurt -vendors- over leaks. He bitch-slapped ATI over leaking, so he's going to -hurt- some guy that leaks a photo or sketch of a new machine design.
Yes, it's heavy-handed. Yes, it made me wince. But all in all, the guy did fuck up.
Re:The guy broke the rules, so he gets sued. (Score:2, Informative)
I think the fact they brought cival and criminal charges against him proves they didn't skip over the justice system they just leveraged the crap out of it.
Marketing? (Score:3, Insightful)
Why would they want to jeopardize that?
My guess is that this guy seriously pissed some people off by doing other things.... like..... mocking the interface at the company xmas party.
Re:Marketing? (Score:2, Insightful)
That way Apple can't get enough old machines out of the channel and they're losing money with it.
what!? (Score:2, Informative)
Just do what I do.... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Just do what I do.... (Score:2)
Re:Just do what I do.... (Score:2)
I've successfully gotten NCAs changed couple of times. The standard ones seem to require you to leave the industry for six months if you ever leave the company. I'd never sign one of those.
Imagine the problems you would have with a non-compete from, for example, IBM. They compete in virtually every segment of the computer industry, so there's no way you could find work without competing with them in some way.
Whenever I've raised the issue I've always managed to get some wording inserted that limits the scope. I did pull the "I'll just ignore this thing" act once too - worked ok.
Re:Just do what I do.... (Score:2)
Re:Just do what I do.... (Score:2)
Ever better. take it home to review it, scan it, modify any language you dont like, and print it off and sign it, return it. They'll never check it over.
Re:Just do what I do.... (Score:3, Informative)
And don't think this gets you off the hook... because you've now attempted to enter into a contract under bad faith, and/or attempted to defraud, and their lawyer is going to eat you for breakfast.
IANAL, and so some of the above may be offbase, but I doubt it's far offbase.
Re:Just do what I do.... (Score:2)
This is what I did, and I was never asked again. BTW, I work for Apple and I can, quite safely, reveal that their new G5 will be out in Q2 2003 - it will have an AMD processor and the whole case is now shiny chrome.
The Message I'm getting (Score:5, Insightful)
Really, in Lorne Greene/Marc Anderssen Internet years/time, how old is this news?
How controversial is it? If it weren't Apple but somebody as supremely unsexy like say, Unisys, would it even be news?
This is neither news - it's past it's prime, nor is it something "that matters".
Or Maybe Apple Truly Seeks to Protect Innovation (Score:4, Interesting)
My understanding is that if Apple does not actively protect and police its trade secrets, then its innovative goods and ideas no longer receive protection as trade secrets. No evidence is required to show that Apple is an innovative company --- if it did not receive protection for its innovation, then it may have little reason to create future innovative products.
Considering the pervasiveness of companies to recruit employees from other companies by using 'moles,' and Microsoft's history of heavy-handed tactics, perhaps Apple has another reason to protection its innovation: Microsoft.
Do you truly believe Microsoft has never placed a 'mole' or has an Apple employee it relies on for information? For also this reason, Apple has no choice but to pursue trade secrets claims in court against everyone it can, or it will entirely lose protection.
Pretty much, Apple is all about innovation and cutting-edge products. Take that away, and all I see is a company making an OS, keyboards, and mice.
Re:Or Maybe Apple Truly Seeks to Protect Innovatio (Score:2)
Weeeeeeeeeeell, yeah, that's kind of the point. A trade secret is protected because it's, a secret. Once someone tells it then it's, ummmmmmm, not a secret anymore.
That's the only protection a trade secret has. There's no secret registry of secrets where you can secretly tell someone your secrets to keep them secret. That would kinda go against the "secret" part of trade secret.
Once a secret isn't secret anymore suing anyone is completely pointless in terms of protection of that secret, in fact, Slashdot story as case in point, suing kinda "spreads the news around."
You're confusing trade secrets with trade*marks*, which are the only IP a business is required by law to actively protect in order to maintain their IP.
KFG
Re:Or Maybe Apple Truly Seeks to Protect Innovatio (Score:3, Insightful)
Suing the guy isn't meant to protect that (former) secret; it's long since become public knowledge. Suing is how they protect the next secret, and the ones after that...
a little hint about why apple does this . . . . (Score:2, Interesting)
they do this because if they do not aggressively pursue enforcement of certain Intellectual Property (IP) laws, a court may find one day that their brand has been allowed to erode. In other words, their TM will become watered down from a legal standpoint, so its stronger for them to sue everyone they can, than to let most of it slide and then lose when it counts.
this is what happens to a company after they sue m$ and win the battle, while losing the war.
You're confusing a variety of laws here... (Score:2)
Trademark does indeed need to be defended in order to be help as such. That has nothing to do with IP or trade secrets (two different things).
Trade secrets are only enforced contractually. They have no special protection. A leak is a leak - if you leak a trade secret to me, you can be held in violation of any contract in place, but I can do whatever I want with the information. (If you don't believe me, google on "+RC4 +cypherpunks +RSA +anonymous")
IP means a large number of different things, with patents being a large centerpiece. This case has nothing to do with IP.
In short, defending contractual agreements has nothing to do with one's brand from a legal standpoint. Try not to get confused in the future.
-j, not a lawyer, etc.
Negative Apple Press Week? (Score:2, Insightful)
When did the e-mail announcing NAPWeek go out? I missed it.
Re:Negative Apple Press Week? (Score:2)
In reality, they are just as prone to succumbing to power-hunger as any other entity. IMHO this doesn't alter the facts that matter.
What actually matters is the ergonomics of the product. Microsoft's attitude towards ergonomics places them at far lower levels of saliency, and it seems as though the Gnome/KDX teams suffer from 'far too many cooks in the kitchen' syndrome when it comes to this matter. I must play with RH8 to see what can be accomplished.
Many people would rather stand behind a free-as-in-"blank" organization than a heavy-handed, 'we'll litigate at the drop of a hat if you fsck us' organization, and so be it. Apple's actions don't really sway my allegiances in that respect.
OT - sig commentary :) (Score:2)
Not if you chase them with a
Don't Trust Contractors (Score:5, Insightful)
The only real difference between a contractor and an employee is how you get your paycheck. To say that someone is going to be more honest just because they are an actual employee is assinine.
I'm a contractor and I take my job very seriously, there is no way in hell I would ever betray the confidence of any of my employers. Not just because it would tarnish my reputation with future employers but also because I am that kind of person.
The company I am contracted to right now is very contractor friendly, I've seen some that are not. But the whole attitude that contractors are somehow less deserving of trust than regular employees really irritates me.
Now this guy clearly broke his contract. But it would not have made a difference if he were a regular employee or a contractor, the responsibility for trust is in the individual, not in how his contract of employment is written. I'm sure regular employees at Apple have the same moral obligations to keep a lid on trade secrets.
Re:Don't Trust Contractors (Score:4, Insightful)
Apple Isn't so Bad (Score:4, Informative)
and to the guy talking about 'ripping off BSD code and selling it for Millions' Apple GIVES AWAY DARWIN under open source guidelines, and it works on PC's and on Mac's, they only 'sell' the Quartz interface (the one WE developed), quit bitching, they give it away, they aren't ripping it off, its a superior product, its free, they used it, this is what SHOULD be happening, Microsoft is a different story.
Big deal (Score:2)
Leaks and Contractors (Score:4, Funny)
This is why I do my own plumbing. Anyone who puts their toilet main in the hands of other is surley misguided at best.
Wow... (Score:3, Funny)
So... the guy broke an NDA concerning the DNA and now faces a DA because he didn't CYA!
Making an example.... (Score:4, Interesting)
"This suit against Lopez helps show the company vigorously tries to protect its secrets, Mireles said. In addition, such suits could serve to deter other potential leakers, he said"
Apple has taken legal action against coworkers that leaked info in the past (also mentioned in the article) but I think the real reason why they got upset is
"Steve uses Macworld and other appearances more effectively than any other (technology) leader," Bajarin said. "In that context they want to have that surprise element," because posting those secrets early dilutes the impact, Bajarin said."
of course the lawyers will argue:
"Innovation is in Apple's DNA, so the protection of trade secrets is crucial to our success. Our policy is to take legal actions where necessary to preserve the confidentiality of our intellectual property," Apple said in a prepared statement.
Just because Apple made a great new OS - doesn't mean they're avid sourceforge users
trade secret? (Score:3, Insightful)
A secret formula, method, or device that gives one an advantage over competitors.
So how would releasing specs on a site that is dedicated to "rumors" help the competition? The action is probably a violation of the employee's contract, but a list of specs is certainly not a trade secret.
Are gateway and dell (I'm guessing they would be considered Apple competitors) going to change their strategic plans because of a list of specs given on an Apple rumor site? Probably not, I doubt that really care about Apple as a competitor, besides using their designs.
So even if Apple does win this lawsuit, I really doubt this will send a message to other employees contemplating sending specs. This along with Apple's other attempts to vehemently defend their "Trade secrets" and "trademarks" will backfire as usual. Apple should learn to use the role of underdog to boost its "nice guy" image instead of pushing legal actions that even MS wouldn't stoop to. Instead of attempting to rely on the unveiling of secret products at trade shows. Maybe they should try a different strategy?
Re:trade secret? (Score:3, Informative)
Irrelivant. It doesn't matter what your competitors do with the leaked information. That makes as much difference as defending the willful violation of someone's copyright by saying that you didn't make any money doing it.
What matters is that this information was a secret and he signed an agreement to keep those secrets. The law doesn't care what Dell would or would not do with the leaked information. The law only cares that confidential information was leaked.
Re:trade secret? (Score:3, Interesting)
Well so any information that is not publicly known in a corporation is a trade secret? Using that mentality Apple can sue if an employee discloses whether or not Steve Jobs wears boxers or briefs.
Re:trade secret? (Score:3, Interesting)
First off, if the contractor did leak the information then he was clearly in the wrong.
Second, Apple's attempts at "copyrighting" industrial design have always been a bit odious. I mean look at all the iMac-alike lawsuits they fired off. Don't you think some of the old terminals had already covered the ground of "screen w/ integrated electronics and keyboard on cord" form factor? Apple made it a little cooler with the translucent plastics, but it wasn't exactly ground breaking. Now, I can see a case for their newer iMac with the lamp arm (I still can't figure out if they're cool-looking or not).
So, the contractor violated an NDA. That's all well and good. But, did he really leak "trade secrets"?
BTW - the formula for coke is a trade secret. This means that no one really knows what's in there and Coca-Cola has to work hard to protect that information. This information was merely secret for the time being and was going to be fully revealed to the public just at a time of the company's choosing.
My latest NDA, written by a lawyer? doubtful (Score:3, Funny)
For my last co-op position I was asked to sign a NDA as usual. Only in this case they decided to give me the NDA two months into my four-month work term, and it was not retroactive. Oh, and aside from that little blunder, it did not have a date on it!
As in, nowhere to put a date. Just a sig, no date! I asked if it was written by a lawyer and they said it was, but I am very doubtful. IANAL but I would think that a NDA without a date on it would be worthless in court. I would like to see what they could pull in court if I simply released some info before I had signed the NDA, or after I had signed the non-dated NDA.
So let this serve as a note to companies out there, having a NDA doesn't mean shit if it's not written correctly by a competent lawyer!
Re:My latest NDA, written by a lawyer? doubtful (Score:3, Interesting)
Since signing the NDA wasn't a condition of employment at the time that it was signed, the NDA cannot be enforcable against the employee unless it is supported by consideration (ie, they must PAY you something for signing the NDA). Without consideration (a legal term), there is no contract.
The paranoid lawyer within me says that the they gave you an NDA without a date to muddy the waters and try to cover up the fact that it was signed after you were given employment, and was not in fact a condition of employment. The lawyers knew there was a potential problem and tried to bury it.
However, keep in mind that the lack of an NDA does not fully excuse an employee for liability for leaking trade secrets.
IAAL, but IANAELA (I am not an Employment Law Attorney).
Apples aren't built by Apple employees... (Score:2, Informative)
Apple decided years ago to dump the overhead, both both legal and financial, associated with having a manufacturing labor force on their payroll. People who build Apples have a job and get paid only when Apple's inventory is down and they need to build some units.
How strongly attached would you feel to Apple if you got a call Monday morning at 6AM telling you to report to the factory - with no certainty that you'd have a job for the entire week. Or if that phone call doesn't come at all and you need money for rent.
Or, when at noon, they blow the whistle and say "that's it, everybody go home, and don't come back tomorrow". Remember, you don't get paid for hours you're not actually on the assembly line.
The pay for assembling Apples is about the same as for flipping cheeseburgers but without the security of knowing that you'll probably have a job next week.
This is "A Good Thing" for Apple because they don't have all that foolishness of hiring people for real jobs, paying them benefits, wondering what to do with them when production requirements slow, or taking accounting hits for layoffs.
The net of it is that Apples are to some large extent built by people who are willing to get along making a few bucks now and again, and who don't feel any loyalty to Apple or their products.
Is it any suprise that they leak information?
Oh... (Score:2)
I thought this was going to be a story about an employee who took too many lavatory breaks.
Don't trust Contrators? (Score:2)
Re:or maybe the moral is that Apple isn't Willy Wo (Score:4, Insightful)
When you sign a non disclosure agreement and then disclose information covered by the agreement you have violeted a contract. At that point any company will follow through with legal action against you. Not just Apple or Microsoft. Any company that has trade secrets is going to do what they can to protect them. This isn't apple holding on to brainspace. This is about someone violating the terms of a contract and Apple following through on enforcing it.
Re:or maybe the moral is that Apple isn't Willy Wo (Score:2)
Re:or maybe the moral is that Apple isn't Willy Wo (Score:3, Insightful)
Oooh, it's the People's Republic of China defense! Wow, you must be right, then!
Seriously, Apple is far from the only company with a supposed "history" of going after people to maintain what they call "trade secrets." Trade secrets are probably the most underappreciated intellectual property protection device to those who really don't spend their time thinking about it. Does anyone here know the formula for Coke? Kentucky Fried Chicken's Original Recipe Chicken? The secret sauce on the steak frites at La Relais d'Entrecote in Paris?
We talk about patents all the time on Slashdot, but for every patent a company pursues, there are loads of trade secrets they are protecting through secrecy. It has real advantages to patents, becuase unlike a patent you don't have to reveal a trade secret to get legal protection for it---you just have to be diligent about keeping it a secret. On the other hand, if someone obtains information about a trade secret through legal means---usually as a result of negligence on the part of the company or its employees---then that protection is gone. Legal trade secret protection actually requires that a company such as Apple be reasonably diligent about plugging leaks.
Are you smoking crack? (Score:3, Insightful)
On a side note, it's crap like this that really screws it for other contractors. When I was a contractor at HP, we had such a good working relationship with the people there that we were allowed to use the basketball court. None of the other contractors were.
Re:or maybe the moral is that Apple isn't Willy Wo (Score:3, Informative)
Re:or maybe the moral is that Apple isn't Willy Wo (Score:3, Funny)
Hm. In light of the absolutely insane emotional reactions that Slashdotters have to Microsoft, HP, and Red Hat, I'd say that that's not a particularly interesting story either.
If there's one at all, it's that Slashdotters, as a group, tend to take everything way too seriously.
Re:Immuteable (Score:4, Funny)
I donno think that word means what you think it means.
"Immutable" means not changeable, or "carved in stone." The past is immutable. CDROMs are immutable. Stone tablets are immutable.
Given that definition, your comment makes basically no sense, so I have to think that you meant something else.
Re:Immuteable (Score:2)
Two of my favorite movies referenced in one article, everythings comin' up Millhouse!
Re:Immuteable (Score:2)
Re:Immuteable (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Immuteable (Score:2)
Re:Immuteable (Score:2)
Also, note that it's "immutable," not "immuteable." When you wrote "immuteable" initially, my natural conclusion was that you meant "un-mute-able," as in "cannot be silenced." This is, of course, not a word, but it makes more sense in context than "immutable" does.
This is a case where a misspelling on your part significantly changed the meaning of your message.
Re:stop bashing contractors (Score:2)
Re:or maybe (Score:4, Informative)
As a contractor, you have to be an idiot to leak stuff: who'll hire you in the future, especially if you're a Macintosh specialist...
Re:or maybe (Score:2, Interesting)
He signed a contract, made a promise... (Score:3, Informative)
Just because information WANTS to be free, doesn't mean it SHOULD be freed at first opportunity. That (overused) quote really means "once information is out it is gone", not that sometimes it's not possible to keep information secret for some time, just that it is hard.
Re:Amazed by the Slashdot Response (Score:3, Insightful)
Oh, of course.
So lets share secrets. Yours first. Social security number, date of birth, credit card numbers, etc. It's all just information.
If you tell someone something and ask them to keep it a secret, you get pissed at them when they don't. When you do the same thing and have them sign a legal affidavit saying that they won't tell anyone else the secret, then if they do you have the power of the court behind you.
And, you know what? They didn't have to promise not to tell the secret. You didn't have to share it with them either at that point. But once you promise, damn right you're going to get torched for breaking that promise.
Oh, and before you start going off on non-sequitors, the law does provide for breaking contracts when revealing wrongdoing. There's an entire section of law dealing with whistle blowing, so as to protect and encourage people to report illegal activity.
Re:Apple... you disgust me. (Score:5, Insightful)
Lemme see. The guy signed an agreement, took the confidental information, and purposely violated the agreement and posted the information on the internet. Oh, yeah, there was a line crossed, but news flash - it wasn't Apple.
If I had a company, and one of my employees breaks any NDA agreements like that, I'm gonna fire him first and turn him over the authorities second.
I don't care what sort of Stallmanistic view of society you have, you cannot possibly believe that somebody should be allowed to sign an agreement, and then break it because they feel that "information should be free".
When you sign your name to an agreement - thats it. You can't just go back later and say "oh, I was kidding". I hope when they throw the book at this guy, it hits him square in the forehead.
Re:Apple... you disgust me. (Score:2, Interesting)
I don't care what sort of Stallmanistic view of society you have, you cannot possibly believe that somebody should be allowed to sign an agreement, and then break it because they feel that "information should be free".
There are times when an employee ought to be able to break a NDA with impunity. When a company is behaving in a manner that is illegal or unethical a whistle-blower should have the protection of the law. Further when a company behaves in a manner that is illegal it could be argued that the employee has a legal duty to break any NDA that would involve them in a conspiracy "to pervert the course of justice," (at least that's the legal term that would be used in the UK).
Take an extreme and fictitous example, a food company uses a secret ingredient and has all its employees sign a NDA to preserve the secrecy of that ingredient. An employee discovers that the secret ingredient is rat poison, what should they do? I would say the should report it to the authorities and the press, and the company should not have recourse to law through the NDA.
The point I am trying to make here is that NDA's should be valid when they are used to protect trade secrets, and that the term trade secret should be strictly defined such that it covers knowledge that gives a company a competitive advantage over rival companies but not knowledge that a customer needs to make an informed choice about the value of that companies product.
One problem with the NDA's that employees are asked to sign is that they are over broad and it is the company that gets to define which pieces of information are secret. NDA's are open ended and one sided contracts.
Consider an old practice of IBM. They used to sell printers with a switch that changed the speed of the printer hidden inside the printer. They sold upgrades to these printers that involved an engineer visiting the customer's premises snd flicking the switch when the customer wasn't looking. Pure and simple IBM used secrecy to rip off customers. Trade secret or sharp practice?
Now consider the case in question? The information apple wanted to cover up was the fact that now wasn't the time to buy one of their machines. They didn't want their customers to be able to make an informed choice about when to buy. The information wasn't of a nature that would allow a rival to improve their product or make their product more efficiently. I don't see this as a legitimate area for NDA's to cover.
Re:Apple... you disgust me. (Score:2, Insightful)
I agree - in fact it is your duty to report any illegal activities. But that should be reported to the authorities, not splattered all over half a dozen web sites before you get around to actually providing that pesky thing called proof.
Consider an old practice of IBM. They used to sell printers with a switch that changed the speed of the printer hidden inside the printer. They sold upgrades to these printers that involved an engineer visiting the customer's premises snd flicking the switch when the customer wasn't looking. Pure and simple IBM used secrecy to rip off customers. Trade secret or sharp practice?
Ah, but was it illegal? If so, then your point stands, but you simply can't be violating your signed agreements just because a company acts in a manner that you find repulsive. You can choose not to sign the agreement. You can choose to terminate your employment once you discover the truth. You are simply asked not to reveal the secrets once you have learned them.
And if you feel that it is illegal, then go tell a lawer or the approprate agency, and they will tell a judge, who will decide if it is potentially illegal, or just ethically corrupt.
But no matter the situation, taking confidental information that you promised to cover up and posting it on the web is wrong. I don't give a damn about your opinion, or your morals, or even the complete lack of ethics that 80% of these companies have. Its illegal for now. If you don't like it, then lobby to have the law changed. Until then, I say sign on the dotted line and live up to your oaths.
Re:So what's the secret? (Score:2)
Re:As bad as Microsoft, if not worse (Score:3, Insightful)
Sure, the Anti-Micro$h!t Linux-Uber-Alles geeks might rant like mad, but they are also taking Apple to task for this right now.