Apple goes to war with the BBC

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/apple/11303052/Apple-working-conditions-Tim-Cook.html

by dnetesn • 12 years ago

49 83 12 years ago

telegraph.co.uk

rtpg• 12 years ago

Williams countered that Apple has tracked the weekly hours of over one million workers within its supply chain, and that its suppliers have achieved an average of 93 per cent compliance with the 60-hour workweek limit this year.

60 hour workweeks... plus "93% compliance" is not exactly reassuring.

LaSombra• 12 years ago

In an email to around 5,000 staff across the UK, Apple senior vice president of operations Jeff Williams said both himself and the chief executive were "deeply offended by the suggestion that Apple would break a promise to the workers in our supply chain or mislead our customers in any way".

Well, that makes 7% being lied to. Did I understand this correctly?

notjackma3• 12 years ago

Clearly Tim Cook and senior management are in a bind.

They keep telling people they're geniuses ('only Apple could do this') and industry leaders in environmental practices.

The BBC film has shown this to be false so either Tim Cook is a pathological liar or he doesn't have a clue what goes on in the supply chain. Meaning he's not the genius the fawning press like to make him out to be.

The best quote in the film is when an Indonesian supplier is asked what he thinks of Apple's envieonmental policy. His response: "Apple bullshit. Bullshit Apple.". The subtitles make this an instant internet meme.

dalke2• 12 years ago

It would be nice to compare those numbers to that of other companies or organizations.

But even if you stay strictly with US companies, is it possible to find the compliance rate for Microsoft, Google, Twitter, Red Hat, etc., much less the various game studios known for overworking their employees?

debacle2• 12 years ago

A 60 hour work week for wage laborers should not be baseline in any country in 2014. Apple is doing what they can to exploit these workers in a PC fashion.

hawleyal7• 12 years ago

I think your argument equates to "Everyone else is doing it mom, why can't I?". It was as much bullshit when you were a kid as it is now.

sgnelson3• 12 years ago

While admittedly, I know nothing about Apple's internal policies and how it tracks these workers and the hours they're working, I wonder how real those numbers are. What I see often (very often) is that people see data and they take the numbers at face value. Could it possibly be that in order to appease Apple, the suppliers are cooking the books on the hours their employees are working? Obviously, in terms of profit margins, they want to squeeze out every penny of labor they can.

What type of data integrity system does Apple have set up to make sure that these are truly the case? With 1 million workers and multiple companies (and all the suppliers) does Apple truly have an independent employee (unaffected by any pressure from factory management) at every factory to watch over the labor standards? I kind of doubt it.

But yes, 60 hour work weeks, how noble of Apple. "Thank you sir, may I have another?" Personally, this really does make me rethink buying an Apple product.

qq662• 12 years ago

It should make you rethink buying any electronic product whatsoever, since Apple's supply-chain audits are, though insufficient, by far the most thorough of any company (since they face the most scrutiny).

notjackma3• 12 years ago

Yes, the suppliers are faking the hours. They show this in the film.

    magnet:?xt=urn:btih:76291D1E48A0930CD649A42E3C7BD82F78E5EE16&dn=panorama+s62e44+apples+broken+promises+hdtv+x264+ftp+ettv&tr=udp%3A%2F%2Fopen.demonii.com%3A1337%2Fannounce
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notjackma3• 12 years ago

It's worse.

The documentary shows how Foxconn and Pegatron fake payroll slips so that long hours don't show up.

93% compliance is rubbish. Workers are forced to sign forms saying they consent to night shifts and overtime, when in fact overtime is mandatory.

Apple's required reporting is nothing more than window-dressing; lipstick on a pig.

Apple's release schedule of one big yearly event and 10 million units ready to ship on day 1 must bear some of the blame. Near impossible demands are being placed on manufacturers desperate to keep a lucrative contract, who in turn drive workers like slaves.

beltex• 12 years ago

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AVaTl2kW6YU

The full documentary by BBC.

arthurfm• 12 years ago

For those of us in the UK (or with access to a UK-based proxy)...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b04vs348/panorama-apple...

kalleboo2• 12 years ago

I would love to see if they could find a multinational company WITHOUT issues like this in their supply chain - I imagine none exist.

(I still support "exposé" programs like this since people need to be reminded what the actual cost of their toys are - but they should cast a broader net)

hawleyal7• 12 years ago

I don't know why "everyone is doing it" somehow mitigates the problem.

k-mcgrady2• 12 years ago

Because they blame one company. From what I've read Apple has done more than anyone else to improve the situation and yet they're the ones that constantly receive blame. Do a report on the supply chain as a whole and how the entire tech industry has workers that are being exploited. They select one company (a popular one) because it'll generate more clicks regardless of the fact that it makes the reporting slightly biased.

kalleboo2• 12 years ago

It absolutely doesn't, which is why I put in that disclaimer. But focusing on one company will just make people say "well Apple products are made with slave labor, so I'll buy a Samsung instead" when the Samsung stuff is made in the same factory with the same raw materials, and it solves nothing.

venomsnake2• 12 years ago

Apple is the biggest to it must be taken down first. I prefer focused attack on apple than watered down on many fronts.

cujo• 12 years ago

Apple is the biggest what? They certainly don't make the most anything. Oh, you mean the most headline grabbing.

coob2• 12 years ago

Which large companies take supply chain auditing as seriously as Apple?

swombat• 12 years ago

The problem with Apple criticism is a lot of it seems full of cheap shots and unfair framing, like this Panorama report.

That makes it more difficult to tell when a criticism of Apple is genuine, because every idiot journalist looking for a controversial story can write a story about something Apple is doing not well enough and get away with it, since everyone seems to love to hate on Apple.

So if Apple really is up to no good in some area of their business, we won't have a clue, because it's drowned out in tripe like this.

patcon• 12 years ago

I am by no means an Apple fan anymore, but I feel the exact same way.

TazeTSchnitzel• 12 years ago

Reminds me a little of how people somehow don't believe McDonalds when they reveal their food sources. Because people love to hate on them, McDs and Apple have higher standards than their competitors.

funkybro• 12 years ago

See also: Facebook and security/privacy

diarg• 12 years ago

Is a rational posture, when companies became that BIG they get above the law. I don't trust that companies neither the controls organisms in charge.

hawleyal7• 12 years ago

Foxconn has an anti-suicide policy. There's a reason.

ceejayoz6• 12 years ago

Foxconn's suicide rate turns out to be lower than the Chinese general population's suicide rate. They've got the population of a good sized city. Per Wikipedia:

Although the number of workplace suicides at the company was large in absolute terms, the rate is still low when compared to the rest of China. (However, the country has a high suicide rate with over 20 deaths per 100,000 persons.) In 2010, the worst year for workplace suicides at Foxconn with a total of 14 deaths, the total employee count was a reported 930,000 people. The average workplace suicide rate for Foxconn that year was 1.5 per 100,000 making it well below the national average suicide rate (around 7% of the national average).

America and most other nations have no-suicide policies, too. Try it and you'll likely find yourself detained and treated involuntarily. I'm not sure why you're considering such a thing to be a shocking fact.

Congratulations for proving the parent post's "The problem with Apple criticism is a lot of it seems full of cheap shots and unfair framing" statement, though.

aikah3• 12 years ago

The problem with Apple criticism is a lot of it seems full of cheap shots and unfair framing, like this Panorama report.

Well given Apple insane margins,and other tricks they pull(like tax avoidance in Europe),Apple case stands out more than other brands because of the company reputation,"success" and wealth.

because every idiot journalist looking for a controversial story

There is no controversy here.Apple(and other brands) are clearly taking advantage of poor working conditions in China and other Asian countries.Nobody in the west would accept these conditions.I'm talking about the slavery like working conditions that existed in the west at the dawn of the 20th century before workers rebelled against it.

In China,well,it's just impossible for such a movement to exist.China is a bloody dictatorship.Western PR just succeeded in convincing us it wasn't.

And frankly,that story isn't really about Apple.Judging by the comments below the article,it's more about us and our denial to accept the fact that the comfort we live in is built on the pain and suffering of others on the other side of the planet. And that's how most wealth have been created through history,exploitation,through colonies,slavery, or other means.

Some people are fine with it,some people don't care,others think it doesn't exist,others think workers "are treated what they are worth",and have no problem spending insane amounts of money in the end product because of its marketing,and a last group understands that effective modern capitalism is just "rationalized predation".

edit: I edited my last sentence because I want to dissociate what thinkers like Adam Smith and others "described",and what we have today.

mcphage4• 12 years ago

And frankly,that story isn't really about Apple.Judging by the comments below the article,it's more about us and our denial to accept the fact that the comfort we live in is built on the pain and suffering of others on the other side of the planet.

I agree. But the problem with framing it in terms of Apple (like these articles often do) is that it provides people an easy out: "Oh, those Apple people are bad eggs, I would never buy something they make!". But it's not just Apple, it's our entire economy, and we as a culture won't ever have to face it if it's pinned on one or two companies.

WorldWideWayne3• 12 years ago

There are more idiot Apple apologists than there are idiot journalists, so it should equal out.

xedarius• 12 years ago

I wouldn't quite call that war, more a disgruntled sigh.

wernercd• 12 years ago

That wouldn't generate as many clicks...

everyone• 12 years ago

Agreed. One of the more egregious examples of hyperbole in an articles title, for the purpose of being clickbait, that I have seen. A better title would be; "Apple refutes BBC documentary"

thyrsus• 12 years ago

Would that we aspired to that definition of "war", in which a country's response to an attack was: "I'm deeply offended. Here are the statistics concerning the behavior to which you object. Here is our program to improve."

frabcus• 12 years ago

This is a good place to mention Fairphone, a dutch foundation who make phones and document their supply chain in public, improving various things about it

kmfrk• 12 years ago

I recommend everyone to subscribe to China Labour Watch [http://chinalaborwatch.org].

Reports of workplace abuse are so recurring that you end up dying a little inside from reading about one huge company after the other pulling this shit - but at least it'll stop you from reverting to an automatic defensive response to bad news about companies like Apple.

fwiw, I still agree that it's generally counterproductive to do reporting focused on Apple, because although they're the most obvious company to scrutinize, it makes it seems as if the issue is specific to Apple and not the systemic rule across corporations.

PS: Consider donating to CLW while you're at it; it's Christmas, after all.

dzhiurgis2• 12 years ago

Sleeping publicly in asian cultures is perfectly normal.

I remember seeing these asian students just passed out on university benches once I started studies abroad.

The journalist says 'it seems that they have no choice'. So he just displayed his cultural unconsciousness and publicly alleged Apple of wrongdoing.

One could easily speculate that people working in western societies are pumped up with caffeine, sugar or other drugs, freely available by their profit-hungry bosses.

Zikes3• 12 years ago

If I recall, in Japan if you're not seen sleeping at your desk then you've not been working hard enough.

andybak• 12 years ago

And it's perfectly acceptable to beat your domestic help in the UAE.

Let's not confuse 'accepted' with 'acceptable'.

aikah3• 12 years ago

Sleeping publicly in asian cultures is perfectly normal.

So is sleeping on the job after 12 hour shifts. The issue isnt sleeping publicly but the 12 hour shift thing. Your argument is a big strawman,even the best spin doctors wouldnt dare using that argument,unless maybe those on fox news.

dzhiurgis2• 12 years ago

What is wrong with 12 hour shift?

And what's up with ad hominem?

coob2• 12 years ago

Genuine question: Which large companies do supply chain auditing to the same or greater extent than Apple do? Do they make the audit publicly available as Apple do? I'd like to compare.

Zikes3• 12 years ago

Walmart does a fair amount of supply chain auditing.

http://corporate.walmart.com/global-responsibility/ethical-s...

Apple goes to war with the BBC

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