08/31/2006, 12:00am, EDT
Thursday, August 31st
Foxconn backs down on iPod lawsuit
According to the report, it was not immediately clear why the damages claim had been cut; however, China Business News, the publication which published the report, had urged Foxconn to drop the case, saying it "strongly condemned" the lawsuit and would do whatever it could to support its journalists.
The Foxconn lawsuit triggered an ongoing public debate on protections for journalists, prompting atleast one industry watch group to write an open letter to Apple's CEO Steve Jobs. The journalists, whose report followed a similar one by a UK-based publication five days earlier, also setup their own blogs to give their side of the story. Nearly 2 million people had visited the blogs by the middle of Wednesday--mostly voicing support for the journalists--Xinhua reported.
While Foxconn admitted to breaking some local labor laws, Apple reported found no truth to most of allegations; however, it did find some violations related its Code of Conduct for suppliers and said that it was working with Foxconn to resolve those issues; however, Apple's report was criticized by some industry officials who believe that it should have hired a third-party to conduct the investigation.
Apple also said that it would continue to monitor the iPod factory conditions and also examine the conditions in its other manfacturing and production facilities.
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Essentially, Aple did the right thing AND worked within the cultural context, by letting Foxconn save face, in return for getting their act together.
They are (at least in theory) not seeking money, but rather vindication.
Note: I have no idea whether they did anything or not, or whether the suit had a foundation or not. But if you keep suing when you're asking for nominal damages, that must mean you intend to get something from it that makes it worthwhile to you, and clearly that something isn't a monetary value.
Presumably the attorney isn't doing all this work on a contingent fee basis.
And there is your answer boys, Apple told FoxCon that unless they dropped that suit that they would find somewhere else for manufacturing; you can bet your hat on it. And, it is a good thing they did too. If the media went into war mode with this story and Apple continued to do business with FoxCon, there would have been no end to the stink on it for Apple. Apple would have appeared to be condoning the seizure of people's homes in a process where corrupt business and government work together to suppress bad publicity. Not good, not good at all.
By the way Feathers, your observation about the state of journalism (and journalists) is right on, but they still provide a valuable service to society (by exposing exactly such abuses as covered in this situation). It is imperative that they be given as much protection and free reign as possible--whether it is in China with the China Business News reporting on corruption in corporate labor policies, or in the U.S. with the New York Times reporting on corruption in national defense policy.