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journal: think
Sweating it [UPDATED]
What’s that I smell? A PR disaster on the horizon?
In case you haven’t been following the news. Apple is finding itself in a rather uncomfortable situation over allegations of sweatshop labor by Foxconn, one of the companies Apple contracts to manufacture the iPod. (Read about the initial allegations.) After vehemently denying any wrongdoing last week, Foxconn came clean and admitted to breaking Chinese labor laws (which are not the strongest in the world, mind you). As if that wasn’t bad enough, Foxconn directly implicated Apple, stating that Apple approved of the factories (though it is unclear when Apple gave Foxconn the green light).
What’s a poor public relations rep to do? Yikes!
So far, this story hasn’t escaped too far out of geek circles, but once it hits the mainstream media, I wouldn’t be too surprised if there will be PR reps clinging to a ledge on the top floor of Apple’s headquarters, threatening to jump.
Apple’s course of action is clear: they need to act. Now.
I have no idea whether Apple actually approved of these poor working conditions or not, or if Foxconn is lying (they did lie with their denial, after all, but it’s hard to say), or if Apple did approve but during Apple’s visit Foxconn shoved as many skeletons in the closet at they could possibly fit in there. For those reasons, I can’t place blame on Apple right now. But at this point it really doesn’t matter. The mess is out of the closet and all over Apple’s hands.
There are a few things Apple can do: they can give us “no comment” which may not go over very well with the general populace. Alternately, Apple can come down hard on Foxconn. Apple’s investigation is a good start, but now that Foxconn admitted, it isn’t enough. One possibility at this point could be to cut off any and all ties with Foxconn--break off all contracts (they are in violation of Apple’s Supplier Code of Conduct, after all), or at the very least reprimand Foxconn in a way that hurts their bottom line--and publicly admonish Foxconn. And if Apple did approve poor work conditions, they need to be honest and come out and say it. Will it hurt Apple? Yes. Is it something that would need to be done? Definitely, because if Apple denies any wrongdoing now, but down the line it comes out that Apple did condone Foxconn’s allegedly piss-poor working conditions, it will hurt them more than if they confess up-front. On top of that, Apple needs to take steps to ensure that suppliers are following the laws--and basic human rights doctrine. A good way of achieving this would be to make surprise inspections of suppliers’ factories. Any way the go, there’s a lot Apple can do to mitigate this. And in the end, hopefully all this attention will lead to positive change in the industry. There’s no doubt in my mind that this sort of thing is an extremely common practice for tech companies.
This mess certainly hasn’t been good news for Apple, but it hasn’t reached PR disaster status--yet. It’s your turn, Apple. Make the right move.
[updated 6/28: some minor clarifications and changes
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| Nick | comments | views |
thinkback
http://www.appleinsider.com/article.php?id=1841
I love it when they say, “They are only being paid $50 a month!!!!” with no information as to what $50 a month is for someone living in rural China.
But this pressure on western companies to impose western civil rights culture onto Chinese companies is a very good thing, IMHO. I love how a hippie CEO who used John Lennon in his ads has women working 15 hours a day and living in dorms, cranking out iPods. Oh, the hypocrisy!!
| Jun. 27, 2006 | ||
| 10:26 am |
This is what you get when you ship jobs overseas. However, the hypocrisy of the media really annoys me. Why isn’t anyone screaming at Dell, Gateway, Compaq, Lenovo, and so on over what their manufacturers’ workers are doing?
This is what you get when you ship jobs overseas. However, the hypocrisy of the media really annoys me. Why isn’t anyone screaming at Dell, Gateway, Compaq, Lenovo, and so on over what their manufacturers’ workers are doing?
Someone has to be caught each time and the cycle of better standards will spread until people raise their standards again and call foul. It’s a good thing and it doesn’t matter who it is who gets caught as long as people like you extend it over to the other similar offenders.
| Jun. 27, 2006 | |
| moreApple | 12:26 pm |
I don’t think there’s a bias against Apple in this regard.
1. The iPod is one of, if not the most popular product today. It’s huge. It’s part of pop culture. That popularity brings more scrutiny.
2. In my opinion, Apple sets itself up for this kind of scrutiny because they try to promote this progressive image, which relates to what I said about their hippie CEO.
That’s the same reason Google is getting more press about its relations with China and their willingness to compromise their principles.
| Jun. 27, 2006 | ||
| 12:27 pm |
To ask Apple to cut off Foxconn would be essentially asking it to reduce iPod capacity by something on the order of 80%. Foxconn, Hon Hai and its associated companies is one of the largest OEM producer of computers and electronic equipment in the world and touches something like 50% of all the computers manufactured globally and is China’s single largest exporter of goods. Its market cap is over 23 billion US Dollars which, though less than half of Apple’s $49 billion market cap makes it one of the most important companies in Asia and definitely one of the most important in China.
To ask Apple to cut them off would be like like asking Apple to abandon its iPod business. Oh, and they supply nearly every major PC manufacturer and most mobile phone manufacturers as well.
My point is that Foxconn isn’t run by evil people out to screw the Chinese (they themselves are Chinese) and that while the scuttlebut here regards Foxconn as if they’re some small sweatshop that is easy to switch out of with no consequences, they are not. They are a key part of many tech companies’ supply chains and are key enablers of low cost PCs, computers and phones that is a multi-billion dollar behemoth.
Foxconn has probably broken Chinese labor laws but probably to a much lesser extent than most Mainland Chinese companies and is held up by the Chinese government as a model company.
It’s easy for people who have never been to China or SE Asia to think conditions are horrible. But when lunch costs $0.20, $50 a week begins to sound good.
Also, reports of ‘military style calisthenics’ is probably true. Many Japanese and Chinese companies have daily calisthenics which everyone, management included are required to take part in. It builds morale and fitness. However, depending on how it is written, westerners who don’t know of this practice will think it harsh.
There are two sides to every story. People should do their research and ask if what has been reported is either slanted or realistic when taken in context and not be so ethnocentric when deciding whether or not to issue forth an opinion.
To ask Apple to cut off Foxconn would be essentially asking it to reduce iPod capacity by something on the order of 80%.
That’s a good point (though does anyone here know how many iPod each OEM Apple contracted makes?), but if Foxconn is indeed abusing their workers--and I don’t mean cultural misunderstandings, I mean violations of basic human rights--then I expect Apple to take some sort of action against Foxconn. Maybe not necessarily pull the plug on all relations with the company, but they should do something.
| Nick | Jun. 27, 2006 | |
| 11:36 pm |
$50 a month is pretty good for rural China where there may not be a vending machine in sight, but we’re not talking rural.
Anyone working in a technical field would get quite a bit more than that. Not only is the industry thriving, so are its foreign investors. However, some of these investors do not want to invest in the time and effort to enforce quality control. The “Made in China” label will cover that somehow. This is the part I don’t like. Accountability is no longer placed on the companies that would eventually sell these products, but on the countries of where they were produced. If life was fair, America would make their own products, hang on..they do.
Apple may have a million and one other companies putting their products together, so not only should they be getting the credits but also the blame when things go wrong.
It’s easy for people who have never been to China or SE Asia to think conditions are horrible. But when lunch costs $0.20, $50 a week begins to sound good.
Please tell me where the hell I can buy lunch for 20c. I’m not talking about a bowl of soup either.
I dislike the idea of outsourcing, sure it saves money, but it costs you in quality, either in the physical product or the service you provide (notice how much Dell’s customer service started sucking when they started hireing people in India), and it screws with the economy, which eventually comes around to bite you in the ass.
| Jun. 30, 2006 | |
| 2:36 pm |
I hate the Indian call centers. They are nice people and everything, but it’s hard to understand them many times.
I remember how funny it was when I called America Online’s customer service (for my wife, she refuses to give it up) and was given an Indian call center.
| Jun. 30, 2006 | ||
| 2:43 pm |
I am wondering why this site doesn’t report any of the problem surrounding Apple products, and there is definitely a lot there to talk about!
I am wondering why this site doesn’t report any of the problem surrounding Apple products, and there is definitely a lot there to talk about!
I can say when I blogged here about powerbook g4 problems it was hard to really rip on Apple...the more I showed how the fan and palm rest were ruined the more out of control the situation of actually solving it with Apple seemed...so it’s not always easy to complain fiercely online while trying to deal maturely and calmly with a corporation who is your vendor. But if social graces could’ve totally been left aside without loss of Apple’s technical support (my fear) I’d still complain about everything I see wrong with Apple: 1) fan noise 2) not open-source enough (which leads to) 3) slow upgrade cycles 4) iTunes DRM, 128kbs AAC vs. ALAC; no OGG/FLAC, low resolution TV shows instead of scaling down procedure for sending to iPod 5) iMac has thick chin and back 6) no cheaper version of mini “appliance style"---if you buy one now and you just want front row you are wasting your money and it won’t work out of the box without a keyboard so I suppose in 10.5 they’ll have a VNC remote-configuration feature 7) no black or grey iMac 8) no wireless mighty mouse; scroll wheel gets grimy and mine is hard to clean 9) no native dolby digital ac3 support in iTunes 10) no DVD-ripping app with organizing tool 1:1 lossless (lossless compression) 11) .Mac is too expensive and has too little hard drive space and the encryption feature in iChat is only useful with other people who have .Mac as opposed to OTR in Adium for all Adium or GAIM users (free) 12) the iPod, or just about anything, costs much less than it sells for (so they could either pay more to their suppliers or charge us less or both)...but it’s still a business...but I don’t see Apple as totally competitive pricing wise. 13) but it is true that if you keep making many products your company’s line becomes harder to understand so it’s not necessarily wrong they make so few choices but in the end I’d like more and more appliance computers so I can have them all around the house
I am wondering why this site doesn’t report any of the problem surrounding Apple products, and there is definitely a lot there to talk about!
Liam?
| Jul. 01, 2006 | ||
| 2:00 pm |
I have seen your blogs/reports Bryan, thanks for that. However, it has come to my attention that there is a hell of a lot more problems out there that I was not aware of.
Feature wise, I am aware of the differences between what I use/seen and Apple products. But what I do not understand is how a more expensive product with lesser features can generate so much complaints. I am not sure if a lot of it is hype, but judging from the reports and pictures, it doesn’t look like it.
My greatest concern is not whether a computer can produce great products, but ones that is worth keeping. Users should not need to consume so much so quickly.
On a side note, I went to the new Apple store nearby to try the 17” Macbook Pro. Should be the ultimate 17” laptop..I mean notebook available right? Firstly, I couldn’t enable the 2 finger touchpad feature. The surroundings of the keyboard was warm-hot (depending on how long you rest your hands on them), the letter “k” on Macbook was peeled off! And there was something terribly wrong with the colouring/contrasting of the screen. I also noticed that the screen doesn’t go all the way down like my current notebook does. I was so close, but yet still so far from buying one of these. Disappointed, but grateful at the same time. I think I’m just going to buy more Ram for my laptop.
I think further discussion of Apple’s shortcomings beyond its labor choice should fall into the forums as opposed to this blog entry.
Apple is secretive about many things including what they pay to build their products. I am glad the media has exposed potential abuses the company may or may not be responsible but must now confront and be responsible about. That is, they should lower the hours of these Chinese employees and not confine them to what amounts to labor camps.
1.
Well Foxconn just did something Apple hates...I mean Apple has probably cut off contracts before because of companies announcing things (or just the fact that they are partners with Apple) without Apple’s approval. This claim by Foxconn will surely challenge the relationship between them but the public needs to know if Apple is part of the problem.