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Inside Apple's Global War on Leakers

42 points by jbegley 9y ago

joezydeco 9y ago
“Surprise and delight. Surprise and delight when we announce a product to the world that hasn’t leaked. It’s incredibly impactful, in a really positive way. It’s our DNA. It’s our brand. But when leaks get out, that’s even more impactful. It’s a direct hit to all of us.” "Surprise and Delight" seems more like AppleSpeak for the billions of dollars of free publicity generated when a new product is announced with no prior expectation. That seems to be magnitudes of order larger than, say, a competitor learning about a new Apple cloud service or iTunes feature.
- SkyMarshal 9y ago
  That's definitely what they mean, but nothing wrong with that. If that's their business strategy and they've made that clear to their employees who voluntarily joined the company anyway, and some employee undermines or ruins it and costs the company some or all of that value, then that's a fireable offense.
  - joezydeco 9y ago
    The point was that it seems the financial impact of a leak is not expressed overtly to Apple employees or to the public, just that "it spoils all the hard work and fun we're having". Perhaps it needs to be that expressed that way to the American workers. Putting it all in terms of the bottom line is probably a hollow message when the market cap of your company is approaching a trillion dollars.
ghughes 9y ago
It sounds like the point of this "briefing" - replete with polished videos featuring a who's who of executives hammering the point home - is to threaten corporate employees not to leak. Apple isn't hosting these meetings to satisfy anyone's curiosity; it's to make an implicit threat that if you leak, you'll eventually be caught by talented people whose full-time job is to catch you using the experience they gained at various three-letter agencies. > “But there’s a whole slew of folks that can be tempted because what happens if I offer you, say, three months’ salary?’ In some cases we’ve seen up to a year’s worth of salary being rewarded for stealing product out of the factory.” Apple workers on the production line make approximately $350 a month, not including overtime, according to a 2016 report from China Labor Watch. Duh. If you give valuable intelligence to workers who are paid a pittance, that info is inevitably going to find its way into the hands of people who are willing to pay a pretty penny for it. Good luck to anyone who hopes to address that without altering the economics of the situation.
- Ajedi32 9y ago
  They _did_ address it though: > “In 2014 we had 387 enclosures stolen,” he says. “In 2015 we had 57 enclosures stolen, 50 of which were stolen on the night of announce, which was so painful.” In 2016, Rice says the company produced 65 million housings, and only four were stolen. “So it's about a one in 16 million loss ratio, which is unheard of in the industry.”
- tinus_hn 9y ago
  Apple products are not made by 'Apple workers' in an 'Apple factory'. Apple products, like Logitech products, Microsoft products and just about any electronics available, are made by workers in enormous generic factories like Foxconn.
bagacrap 9y ago
That picture of the roll call at the Chinese factory --- do you think they would do that on the California campuses, which the article states have been the source of many leaks? I think not, they wouldn't stand for it. It seems like an abuse of power over the factory workers to treat the honest ones so distrustfully. It seems like there's an inherent flaw in your business if it's predicated on "surprise" rather than execution. Not to say Apple doesn't execute, but if they relied entirely on product quality over product cult this wouldn't be an issue.
- drewbailey 9y ago
  Maybe not for all parts of the U.S. campuses, sure. Those facilities aren't producing hundreds of thousands of new iPhones everyday. It wouldn't surprise me if there were similar security measures in place for areas where prototypes and sensitive information are handled though.
- tinus_hn 9y ago
  > Not to say Apple doesn't execute, but if they relied entirely on product quality over product cult this wouldn't be an issue. Reality check: nobody relies entirely on product quality. If people don't know your product exists they aren't going to buy it, even if it is the best in the world. Every company needs to let people know about their products, either by advertising, media events, expo presence, explicitly putting them in the hands of influencers etc.. It's just that Apple tends to create things people want and knows how to present that. So they only really have to announce a product exists and that they think it's great and there will be a huge amount of buzz, people will buy it and probably be happy with it.

42 points by jbegley 9y ago

“Surprise and delight. Surprise and delight when we announce a product to the world that hasn’t leaked. It’s incredibly impactful, in a really positive way. It’s our DNA. It’s our brand. But when leaks get out, that’s even more impactful. It’s a direct hit to all of us.” "Surprise and Delight" seems more like AppleSpeak for the billions of dollars of free publicity generated when a new product is announced with no prior expectation. That seems to be magnitudes of order larger than, say, a competitor learning about a new Apple cloud service or iTunes feature.

SkyMarshal 9y ago
That's definitely what they mean, but nothing wrong with that. If that's their business strategy and they've made that clear to their employees who voluntarily joined the company anyway, and some employee undermines or ruins it and costs the company some or all of that value, then that's a fireable offense.
- joezydeco 9y ago
  The point was that it seems the financial impact of a leak is not expressed overtly to Apple employees or to the public, just that "it spoils all the hard work and fun we're having". Perhaps it needs to be that expressed that way to the American workers. Putting it all in terms of the bottom line is probably a hollow message when the market cap of your company is approaching a trillion dollars.

ghughes 9y ago

It sounds like the point of this "briefing" - replete with polished videos featuring a who's who of executives hammering the point home - is to threaten corporate employees not to leak. Apple isn't hosting these meetings to satisfy anyone's curiosity; it's to make an implicit threat that if you leak, you'll eventually be caught by talented people whose full-time job is to catch you using the experience they gained at various three-letter agencies. > “But there’s a whole slew of folks that can be tempted because what happens if I offer you, say, three months’ salary?’ In some cases we’ve seen up to a year’s worth of salary being rewarded for stealing product out of the factory.” Apple workers on the production line make approximately $350 a month, not including overtime, according to a 2016 report from China Labor Watch. Duh. If you give valuable intelligence to workers who are paid a pittance, that info is inevitably going to find its way into the hands of people who are willing to pay a pretty penny for it. Good luck to anyone who hopes to address that without altering the economics of the situation.

Ajedi32 9y ago
They _did_ address it though: > “In 2014 we had 387 enclosures stolen,” he says. “In 2015 we had 57 enclosures stolen, 50 of which were stolen on the night of announce, which was so painful.” In 2016, Rice says the company produced 65 million housings, and only four were stolen. “So it's about a one in 16 million loss ratio, which is unheard of in the industry.”
tinus_hn 9y ago
Apple products are not made by 'Apple workers' in an 'Apple factory'. Apple products, like Logitech products, Microsoft products and just about any electronics available, are made by workers in enormous generic factories like Foxconn.

bagacrap 9y ago

That picture of the roll call at the Chinese factory --- do you think they would do that on the California campuses, which the article states have been the source of many leaks? I think not, they wouldn't stand for it. It seems like an abuse of power over the factory workers to treat the honest ones so distrustfully. It seems like there's an inherent flaw in your business if it's predicated on "surprise" rather than execution. Not to say Apple doesn't execute, but if they relied entirely on product quality over product cult this wouldn't be an issue.

drewbailey 9y ago
Maybe not for all parts of the U.S. campuses, sure. Those facilities aren't producing hundreds of thousands of new iPhones everyday. It wouldn't surprise me if there were similar security measures in place for areas where prototypes and sensitive information are handled though.
tinus_hn 9y ago
> Not to say Apple doesn't execute, but if they relied entirely on product quality over product cult this wouldn't be an issue. Reality check: nobody relies entirely on product quality. If people don't know your product exists they aren't going to buy it, even if it is the best in the world. Every company needs to let people know about their products, either by advertising, media events, expo presence, explicitly putting them in the hands of influencers etc.. It's just that Apple tends to create things people want and knows how to present that. So they only really have to announce a product exists and that they think it's great and there will be a huge amount of buzz, people will buy it and probably be happy with it.