

The Agony and The Ecstasy of Steve Jobs - bproper
http://www.betabeat.com/2011/10/18/steve-jobs-sold-out-says-playwright-behind-powerful-drama-i-steve/

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pat2man
I have seen his performance and it is excellent. Possibly the best geek
performer I have ever seen. That being said his message is quite biased
against outsourced manual labor. While he addresses he problems that are
caused to Chinese workers it doesn't in any way address the fact that Chinese
workers are joining companies like Fox Con every day in order to get
themselves away from an even worse life.

I encourage everyone who can to go to one of his performances but keep in mind
that this is one part of China that is actually raising the quality of life
for its citizens. It is a horrible situation from our perspective but it's not
as easy as blaming one company for all these problems. If Apple pulled out of
China it would nOt fix anything.

If we want to help the developing class we need to look at the classic issues:
education, employment and a government that recognizes the freedom and rights
of it's ciizens.

~~~
ktrgardiner
We talked about exactly this in my Ethics in Technology class and came to the
same conclusion you've stated. Yes, this is terrible from our perspective
because we outlawed those kind of working conditions years ago. But if there
were better options, then there wouldn't be so many people working for Fox
Con. And if it's bad to us but manageable to them, then there is worse out
there that they are trying to get away from.

Thinking and talking about the situation in terms of our lives sensationalizes
more than it informs.

~~~
jtbigwoo
_And if it's bad to us but manageable to them, then there is worse out there
that they are trying to get away from._

If every person's situation is relative, then how do we oppose slavery or
abuse? It's better than starving to death, right?

The real problem here is that there's no recourse in our current economy.
China makes well over half the electronics we buy so it's not like a boycott
of Apple would necessarily help.

I see two approaches that could help. We can appeal to the humanity of CEOs,
boards, and investors and try to press them to enact change. Or we can use
their vanity by embarrassing them with productions like "The Agony and Ecstasy
of Steve Jobs."

~~~
ktrgardiner
In response to: If every person's situation is relative, then how do we oppose
slavery or abuse? It's better than starving to death, right?

While I get what you are saying and am by no means arguing in favor of Fox
Con, I believe you are turning my shades of gray argument back to black and
white. There isn't a strict dividing line between the acceptable and
unacceptable; it's a gradient. There is worse than Fox Con and there is worse
than what is worse than Fox Con (and so on, ad nauseam).

My point is that it is foolish to use Fox Con as the poster child of this
issue when there are far worse situations. It does a great disservice to the
argument. Most people will stop at Fox Con in their exploration of the
situation and say to themselves "That's horrible. We should do something about
that," instead of "It's horrible that Fox Con is a better option for most
people and that there is worse out there. We should dig deeper and fix the
problem from the ground up until Fox Con is the worst of the worst and then we
can fix that."

------
lambdasquirrel
If, say, a Motorola or Samsung device garnered such status, I wonder if people
would dig up shit on said devices.

Lets face it people. If you bought something from China, you are complicit. If
you bought something from a country poorer than China, say, oil from Nigeria,
you are probably worse than complicit.

Don't like it?

My parents come from one of these modernizing nations. Should we be more
humane? Sure, but this sort of journalism is juvenile. The general sentiment
amongst expats and exchange students alike is that these countries will rise
up. The only thing worse than being exploited by capitalism is not being
exploited by capitalism.

~~~
bproper
I think you're probably right that this kind of inhumane labor extends to all
gadgets. The article says as much.

But isn't the point that Apple is lionized as a "revolutionary" company and
Mr. Jobs as a "genius" and a humanitarian?

And BTW, how is the opinion of expats and exchange students enough to speak
for the whole nation? They are likely not the ones working in the factories.

~~~
afterburner
Exactly! It is the reverence given to Steve Jobs that makes this particularly
interesting. We all _assume_ other companies are screwing someone over to get
us cheap goods, but somehow Apple marketing made buying their products
practically a _religious_ experience.

~~~
epochwolf
> Apple marketing made buying their products practically a religious
> experience.

Not sure buying one is a religious experience. However, using their products
definitely can be. It's annoying to have to reboot a device because it isn't
connecting properly anymore after being on for a couple of _weeks_ but it's
nice knowing all you have to do is reboot. With other devices, a reboot is a
hit or miss fix and you need to do it more often. I've only had one serious
issue with macs that isn't fixed by a reboot and that's the network
configuration holding on to dhcp leases or old certificates when they
shouldn't.

The _it just works_ stuff people talk about isn't completely accurate.

* My apple tv 1 shows up in itunes but nothing can connect to it. It's gone wandering again after a few weeks without a reboot. I think it's lonely.

* I couldn't get openvpn to compile on Lion, I had to find a workaround. Most of the issues I deal with are small things. The video drivers have never crashed on me.

It's not that everything just works. It's that more of it works than it does
with other products. It also has a high amount of polish. I love the way OSX
renders fonts. So much that using ubuntu makes me cry.

------
farlington
> For all I know, my Motorola may have been made there as well.

Yes, Foxconn makes Motorola phones too. Farley admits the obvious: that making
it about Jobs and Apple sells more tickets and makes a more interesting story,
and that it's really a rant against the entire electronics industry. And given
the very ugly history of industrialization in the West, I can't help thinking
there's a certain naiveté behind the moral outrage.

~~~
brlewis
And other electronics: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foxconn#Clients>

------
micah63
All Apple had to do to be different was to have their own factory in China (as
opposed to contracting FoxConn), use the cheaper workforce, and treat the
employees better. Blind outsourcing is the culprit here I believe.

~~~
bdunbar
_All Apple had to do to ... was to have their own factory in China_

Like that is easy.

Companies use organizations like FoxConn for a reason: cost is one of them.

Expertise is another. Apple is good at what they do. Being able to make the
stuff they design requires a whole 'nother corporate skill set.

~~~
micah63
Corporate greed is always about blind outsourcing. You get the savings and you
don't care how you get them. I have no doubt that Apple is capable of
manufacturing their own devices. They chose not to. If workers were getting
treated like crap, Apple is to blame. period.

I'm not saying don't make stuff in China, I'm saying we can be good employers
in China and set a standard by treating employees like we would expect NA
employees to be treated, with respect and dignity.

------
relic17
For the sake of those who do not refuse to think for themselves, let me say
this: there was no agony in Steve Job's life, only the exaltation of living a
full, rich, happy life in the course of which he saw the realization of his
highest values. Steve Jobs was a true hero: an extraordinarily productive and
creative man who inspired and gave hope to so many by showing them what
incredible achievements are possible to a human being. He showed them a life
worth-living. And, most importantly, Steve Jobs was a PROFOUNDLY MORAL man.

He was moral because of his values - the relentless pursuit of beauty and
perfection in his work and life, to the utmost of his ability. He was moral
because those values came from within himself, from the functioning of his own
mind, and not second-hand from the morass of ideas going by the name of
“morality” today. He was moral because he never gave up his ideas for the sake
of others’ approval. He was moral because he did not give the unearned and
undeserved and he did not seek the unearned and undeserved from others. He was
moral because he had a SELF that embodied the best in man.

Those who measure morality by how much you give away to others, known or
unknown, deserving or undeserving, do not understand that. They do not
understand that before you can give, you have to create, but before you can
create, your primary concern must be the process of creation itself, not the
potential beneficiary of that creation. Yet, that is the only mechanism
through which all can truly benefit. They do not understand the difference
between forcing or cheating or defrauding and signing a voluntary contract.
They feel guilty for buying a phone, but never question the morality that
tells them they should feel so and never seek the roots of that guilt. They
rail against the capitalist creator, but ignore the fact that bad working
conditions are the logical result of a controlled economy, as if hundreds of
millions of victims of communism were not enough to prove that. They scream in
defense of the poor Chinese worker, but never ask how it happened that that
worker never rose against its real oppressor.

Yes, Steve Jobs is my hero. And my other hero is Ayn Rand, who helped me
understand what makes people like Steve Jobs possible. But she only showed me
- my mind had to do the rest. I thought for myself, taking nothing for
granted. I urge everyone to do the same.

------
bproper
I don't understand how this guy can be so self righteous. If Apple's labor
practices are so bad, why doesn't he stop buying their devices?

~~~
vorbby
They cover this in the article:

"Wasn’t it a bit hypocritical of Mr. Daisey to condemn Apple when he continued
to buy the company’s products? “There are no alternatives in our ecosystem,”
Mr. Daisey pointed out, noting that FoxConn makes more than half the
electronics purchased by Americans each year. For all I know, my Motorola may
have been made there as well. “What I can do is to force people to wrestle
with the reality of how their precious gadgets are made.”"

------
bstar77
As far as I'm concerned, anything with the "Made in China" label has to be
equally scrutinized. We in the US are complacent in buying these products, but
this also applies to toasters, refrigerator magnets and just about everything
sold in the dollar store.

I refuse to make my quality of living worse because this nation is undergoing
it's own industrial revolution and hasn't worked out all of the humanitarian
kinks. I buy US products whenever I can, and don't when it's not possible-
buying and entirely "American" smart phone is not possible.

Singling out Apple here is not going to fix the issue, China as a nation needs
to address this aggressively. With a population of about 1.5 billion people,
the governments needs to protect it's workers like a union would here.

------
javert
If people are working at FoxConn _voluntarily_ (i.e, they choose to go to work
there because they believe their lives are better that way), who cares?

If people are being _forced_ to work there by the government, then U.S. and
European governments need to decide if they're willing to allow trade with a
government that uses slave labor. (I highly doubt people are being _forced_ to
work there, though.)

~~~
raganwald
_If people are working at FoxConn voluntarily (i.e, they choose to go to work
there because they believe their lives are better that way), who cares?_

Now you are moving the goalposts from discussing Foxconn to the question of
whether we should regulate free will.

I’m not asking you to agree with my stance on any of the following questions,
but I do ask you to recognize that they are equivalent to your question, and
to recognize that many other people hold differing views from your own:

* If people want jobs working at a construction site that doesn't follow safe practices like wearing a hard hat, who cares?

* If people want to work for $1 a day, who cares?

* If people want to work for an employer who insists on sexual favours as a condition of their employment, who cares?

I think you can recognize that while there are folks who don’t care about any
of these questions anywhere in the world, including North America, in the US
and in Canada there are a sufficient number of people who do care that we can
readily say that our moral standard is such that we claim to care as a
society.

As for being _forced_ to work somewhere, I’d say you’re rarely forced to do
anything, you just find yourself in an environment where the alternatives are
so drastically unappealing that you effectively have no free will in the
matter.

This is why we choose to impose safety standards in the workplace: We have
discovered that the free market will act in such a way that safe workplaces
are extremely rare, and in turn people seeking jobs will discover that they
have few if any options available to themselves.

~~~
javert
I think that the questions you raise _are_ extremely pertinent, so I agree
with you there.

 _We have discovered that the free market will act in such a way that safe
workplaces are extremely rare_

I just don't buy that. I think "extremely rare," there, is a very gross
exaggeration. And I think the frequency of dangerous workplaces greatly
decreases, as national prosperity increases (which, modulo other kinds of
interference, happens over time).

I mean, come on - even Foxconn is _relatively safe_. I'm not hearing accounts
of people getting killed, I'm hearing (at _worst_ ) accounts of people being
fired after acquiring certain kinds of repetitive stress injuries.

On the other hand, I _do_ have a moral problem with someone forcefully
interposing between two trading parties (in this case, employer and employee).

In fact, _that kind_ of case is the _only_ kind in which people are forcibly
prevented from exercising their free will.

------
chhhrislake
the big question for me is how far down the pipeline does steve's vision
extend. i think his passing won't affect the care and quality for maybe the
next 2 years but after that i'm worried.

~~~
ryandvm
People like to say that Apple will be fine in the post-Job era, while
simultaneously paying him credit as one of the most amazing CEOs in history.
But I find this an interesting bit of cognitive dissonance.

Either Steve _was_ the key to Apple's top-notch products and meteoric rise, in
which case Apple has lost their magic; or he wasn't, in which case Apple will
be fine. It really can't be both ways.

~~~
incremental
It can. As CEO, one of his responsibilities was to create an organisation that
would endure. Apple itself may be Steve Job's greatest creation. The test of
the next 10 years is to see if that is true.

~~~
rwmj
As far as we know he didn't even organize his own succession, which is one of
the most basic responsibilities of a CEO of a multinational. Even when he knew
he was terminally ill. So I don't see much hope that he organized the rest of
Apple as some great enduring company either.

~~~
PakG1
Where do you get that? He recommended in his resignation memo to the board of
directors that they make Tim Cook CEO, as per their succession plan.

------
javert
_“There are no alternatives in our ecosystem,” Mr. Daisey pointed out, noting
that FoxConn makes more than half the electronics purchased by Americans each
year._

Does anyone have a citation for that? That's hard to believe.

