07/12/2006, 7:50pm, EDT

Wednesday, July 12th

Apple forgoes appeal, bloggers win

Apple has decided not appeal a recent Court of Appeals decision that barred the company from issuing a subpoena to online journalists, bloggers, and their ISPs. In late May, a California Court of Appeals overturned a lower court's decision and protected Mac websites and magazines from Apple's subpoenas until Apple could show cause--an important case for Mac websites, online journalists, and bloggers alike. Frowned upon by news organizations, the subpoenas were an effort by the Cupertino-based company to uncover the person who leaked information about an unannounced product called Asteroid almost 18 months ago--the company was trying to compel the reporters to reveal their confidential sources. The negative publicity surrounding the lawsuits was noted by several publications as well as major newspapers in the US, although one publication says it was not doing any harm to the company.

Siding with the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) along with several other traditional publications, the Court of Appeals declared that bloggers and online journalists were entitled to the same Constitutional and state law protections as traditional journalists as well as ruled that Apple could not subpoena information from a journalist's internet service provider (ISP). A separate

The unanimous ruling from a three-panel judge overturned the trial court on all counts, saying that the online journalists, which included the PowerPage and AppleInsider were deserving of protections under both the California Shield Law and The First Amendment as well as federal laws that protected their email carriers.

Apple had nearly 40 days to file an appeal, but recently filed a case management statement officially saying that it did not appeal. The statement noted that the Appeals Court overturned the trial court on the protective order issue and "Apple did not appeal that decision."

A separate civil lawsuit against rumor site ThinkSecret is still pending.

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Tack

As it Should Be

07/13, 3:10am, EDT

I was shocked to learn Apple was pushing this far on the issue. This will probably mark a huge decrease in Apple's ability to strong-arm its own supportive media, and I think it's long overdue. If they're smart, they'll lay back and give some rein, but I've really very little faith in Apple Corporate.

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bigpoppa206

r u nutz?

07/13, 3:22am, EDT

Apple had every right to pursue the actions they did. At the same time, it is probably best that they drop this at this time. In the future, I bet they close whatever holes they found in the company and let go of those who would share company secrets by breaking their NDA agreements.

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debohun

Where's the white hat?

07/13, 7:13am, EDT

Did Apple lie? As this article mentions, it has been 18 months since "Asteroid" was leaked. The big question in my mind is, since no product has been forthcoming, who initiated the leaking? If this was a made-up product that Apple leaked itself as part of an internal sting operation, I want to know how much this little fiasco cost the taxpayers in court expenses. It's one thing to try to keep corporate secrets, it's entirely something else to abuse the U.S. court system in a process of trying to achieve political goals though allegations based on false circumstances.

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testudo

Re: where's the white hat

07/13, 12:38pm, EDT

Did Apple lie? As this article mentions, it has been 18 months since "Asteroid" was leaked. The big question in my mind is, since no product has been forthcoming, who initiated the leaking?

What do you mean, who initiated the leaking? Are you saying Apple leaked the story to the rumor sites? If so, that's stupid, because they were trying to sue to get their apple contacts, and all that would have came out of this was that apple leaked it themselves.

After that it doesn't matter. If Steve Jobs leaves a 'confidential' memo on his desk, so flunky finds it, reads it, and passes it along, they're still breaking their NDA and stuff.

As for where the product is, perhaps its in the trash heap with so many other products apple has worked on and discarded, due to cost issues, lack of market, funtionally unfeasible or just completley buggy (it is apple hardware after all). There's a lot of stuff Apple works on that doesn't make the light of day.

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test22

Where's the white hat

07/14, 6:39am, EDT

Did Apple lie?

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test22

As it Should Be

07/14, 6:42am, EDT

I was shocked to learn Apple was pushing this far on the issue.

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test22

r u nutz?

07/14, 6:50am, EDT

Apple had every right to pursue the actions they did.

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test22

test

07/14, 7:06am, EDT

test

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lkrupp

Gice us Fairplay DRM code

07/17, 1:09pm, EDT

Now that the courts have said it's alright for a blog site to publish trade secrets and hide behind the title of "journalist" when can we expect Think Secret to publish the source code for Apple's Fairplay DRM? If a "journalist" can publish unannounced product information why not copyrighted source code too? Mac users have the right to know this stuff now, right? And Mac "journalism" sites have the right to give Mac users what they want to know, right?

What really galls me is the title "journalist" is now given to any putz with a blog. But then "real" journalists are little better than that anyway.

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