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It's fascinating the lengths people will go to both when protecting and leaking unreleased products and manufacturing techniques. While I would do the same in

It's fascinating the lengths people will go to both when protecting and leaking unreleased products and manufacturing techniques. While I would do the same in Apple and Samsung's position, I am worried about the effects of durable secrecy on the sustainability of our society and markets. Markets need competition, and societies need public domain knowledge. If somehow a critical supplier is eliminated there would be no way for a new entrant to fill the gap quickly since all the critical knowledge is secret and centralized.

briandear 7y ago
That knowledge is created by the company. Why should everyone have access to it? Can’t competitors create their own processes? The formula to Coca Cola is still practically a state secret, but that didn’t stop Pepsi et al from competing. Secrets of iPhone manufacturing isn’t something that should be considered worthy of the public domain. Nothing is stopping a competitor from developing their own knowledge and processes. You don’t have to steal to compete.
- wwweston 7y ago
  The question of whether knowledge is property isn't a simple one. Practically, knowledge belongs to anyone who has it. There may be benefits to setting up cooperative rules about how people can use it. But even in societies with capitalism-friendly approaches, there are cases where knowledge is recognized as a kind of temporary property (say, patents) and yet everyone may have access. There are reasons for that. Secrets are a different kind of protection. You can try to keep them, and perhaps you even have incentives to do so. This creates an interesting set of incentives for others trying to find out, as well as for those who know to defect (depending on the legal framework and reach).
- nitrogen 7y ago
  A few points in response: 1. The knowledge is created by people working for the company. Both the people and the company are part of a broader society, and all (people, company, society) have an interest in keeping the ability to manufacture alive. 2. Reinventing everything from scratch while risking submarine patents is wasteful, especially for processes that are obsolete from the view of the original company. 3. The same secrets that go into making an iPhone go into making everything else. I'm not interested in exact dimensions and features being public before release, but I am interested in the general know-how of precision design and assembly being preserved in a way that can outlive the original company. 4. We have lost significant manufacturing capability before. Nobody knows how to recreate the Saturn V rocket. SpaceX, NASA, and others have to recreate that knowledge at high cost. Society at large has a greater interest in preventing this kind of technological regress than in preserving the secrets of one company indefinitely.
wmf 7y ago
Realistically people switch companies all the time and the knowledge distributes itself that way.
- AceJohnny2 7y ago
  which is why blanket noncompetes are terrible.
wongarsu 7y ago
That's exactly why patents were invented: publish your secrets, in return the state gives you exclusive rights on the idea for 25 years. After that everyone can use the instructions from the patent application as they wish. Of course that system doesn't really work as intended anymore.
- Terr_ 7y ago
  Most of the things Apple is trying to keep secret -- like case designs -- shouldn't be patentable anyway.
- caymanjim 7y ago
  That works well when you only have to worry about one state with strong legal protections, like the US or Europe. An enormous part of China's economy is the manufacture of counterfeit goods and clones, due to lax enforcement. Patents are effectively meaningless there.

briandear 7y ago

That knowledge is created by the company. Why should everyone have access to it? Can’t competitors create their own processes? The formula to Coca Cola is still practically a state secret, but that didn’t stop Pepsi et al from competing. Secrets of iPhone manufacturing isn’t something that should be considered worthy of the public domain. Nothing is stopping a competitor from developing their own knowledge and processes. You don’t have to steal to compete.

wwweston 7y ago
The question of whether knowledge is property isn't a simple one. Practically, knowledge belongs to anyone who has it. There may be benefits to setting up cooperative rules about how people can use it. But even in societies with capitalism-friendly approaches, there are cases where knowledge is recognized as a kind of temporary property (say, patents) and yet everyone may have access. There are reasons for that. Secrets are a different kind of protection. You can try to keep them, and perhaps you even have incentives to do so. This creates an interesting set of incentives for others trying to find out, as well as for those who know to defect (depending on the legal framework and reach).
nitrogen 7y ago
A few points in response: 1. The knowledge is created by people working for the company. Both the people and the company are part of a broader society, and all (people, company, society) have an interest in keeping the ability to manufacture alive. 2. Reinventing everything from scratch while risking submarine patents is wasteful, especially for processes that are obsolete from the view of the original company. 3. The same secrets that go into making an iPhone go into making everything else. I'm not interested in exact dimensions and features being public before release, but I am interested in the general know-how of precision design and assembly being preserved in a way that can outlive the original company. 4. We have lost significant manufacturing capability before. Nobody knows how to recreate the Saturn V rocket. SpaceX, NASA, and others have to recreate that knowledge at high cost. Society at large has a greater interest in preventing this kind of technological regress than in preserving the secrets of one company indefinitely.

wmf 7y ago

Realistically people switch companies all the time and the knowledge distributes itself that way.

AceJohnny2 7y ago
which is why blanket noncompetes are terrible.

wongarsu 7y ago

That's exactly why patents were invented: publish your secrets, in return the state gives you exclusive rights on the idea for 25 years. After that everyone can use the instructions from the patent application as they wish. Of course that system doesn't really work as intended anymore.

Terr_ 7y ago
Most of the things Apple is trying to keep secret -- like case designs -- shouldn't be patentable anyway.
caymanjim 7y ago
That works well when you only have to worry about one state with strong legal protections, like the US or Europe. An enormous part of China's economy is the manufacture of counterfeit goods and clones, due to lax enforcement. Patents are effectively meaningless there.