No no no. I don't care about their motives. ...but... it's hypocritical for Apple to talk about supporting open standards for flash-like functionality, becaus

No no no. I don't care about their motives. ...but... it's hypocritical for Apple to talk about supporting open standards for flash-like functionality, because they don't care about open standards See what I mean? You're saying it's hypocritical "because they don't care", not "because they don't do". That's why it was confusing. But I think it's a bit off to think that the potential for hypocrisy is confined to the specific context of any particular comment. If not for the fact that you're changing the meaning by ignoring the context, I'd agree, but you are. It is not "off" to consider things actually said in light of things actually done. What you've done here is add an additional statement that wasn't actually stated, i.e. turning "We support X." into "We support X and Y.", and then say it's hypocritical because they don't actually support Y. Perhaps this is clearer with the more specific original quote: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1292218 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1292218 If a gay person says, 'I support marriage rights for gay people but not for lesbians' -- is that not hypocritical? A statement alone can't be hypocritical. Without knowing the action (or in absence of action some other indicator of true belief) there is no way to be sure either way. Just specifying does not make it hypocritical. Word: "I support marriage rights for some homosexuals but not others." Deed: Support marriage rights for some homosexuals but not others. Hypocritical: No. Word: "I support marriage rights for some homosexuals but not others." Deed: Support marriage rights no homosexuals. Hypocritical: Yes. Word: "I support marriage rights for all homosexuals." Deed: Support marriage rights for some homosexuals but not others. Hypocritical: Yes.