YESTERDAY we cited a rant about this post, which obviously broke Godwin's law. The Inquirer removed the Nazi analogy from that post and told the story of what Apple was doing:
PURVEYOR OF RIDICULOUSLY EXPENSIVE GADGETS, Apple has hired a secret police force to keep its black shirted employees in line.
Gizmodo has confirmed the existence of a division that reports directly to Jobs and Oppenheimer.
Dubbed the "Worldwide Loyalty Team", its sole function is to purge Apple stores of people who are not rabid fanboys or toeing the company line on everything.
Apparently the division has moles who are ordered to report deviant activity amongst the staff and management of the stores. High on the list are people who might be talking to the media.
“Apple is now controlling the crowd and suppressing dissent, very much like Microsoft.”It is worth adding that Apple does not break the law here, but it is important to understand how the company works. It is reasonable to describe this as deceitful and even unethical.
As for criminal companies, Intel is a leading example. When the EU Commission found Intel guilty (so did Korea) Intel was quick to respond with the same talking point as Microsoft. They quickly call the regulators "anti-American" (there can never be anything wrong with Intel's and Microsoft's conduct, it must be those envious nationalist zealots!), but this poor defense is contradicted by the US FTC, which is on the move again. From the news:
i. FTC takes Intel to court
THE US FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION (FTC) filed a lawsuit in federal court against Intel today, seeking to stop the world's largest chipmaker from threatening, anti-competitive actions.
Although word processing applications will soon start to auto-complete the sentence, "Intel has been accused of antitrust violations", we'll have to keep typing it, and explain once again that someone has accused the firm of throwing its weight around and dominating the chip market.
Today the FTC said that Intel had unfairly harmed its rivals in semiconductor markets by either offering sweeteners or dishing out threats to its customers. In a statement released today, Richard A. Feinstein, director of the FTC's bureau of competition, said, "Intel has engaged in a deliberate campaign to hamstring competitive threats to its monopoly. It's been running roughshod over the principles of fair play and the laws protecting competition on the merits. The Commission's action today seeks to remedy the damage that Intel has done to competition, innovation, and, ultimately, the American consumer."
Intel, the world's biggest maker of computer chips, is being sued by a US competition authority.
Intel is accused of locking AMD out of key vendors by using "threats and rewards... to coerce them not to buy rival computer CPU chips."