A lot of what I've posted on this thread was about the massive contract manufacturing company Foxconn, and its practices that I believe amount to a 21st century version of slave labor. I think it's by definition unfair competition when free workers are forced to compete with distinctly unfree workers.

Foxconn is usually described as Apple's main manufacturer, and Apple as Foxconn's biggest customer, though Apple is coy about it, and Foxconn is hidden away on its list of suppliers as "Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd. (Foxconn)". I consider Apple inextricably tied and implicated in Foxconn's actions.

Apple being Apple, always obsessed with polishing its image, has a PR initiative that portrays it as the world's most responsible company when it comes to suppliers and labor practices. Supplier Responsibility at Apple is the Web landing page, Apple Supplier Responsibility is the PDF full report.

The lengthy report (that never mentions names, ever) claims that Apple is aggressively policing its suppliers to eliminate abuses like those at Foxconn...which appear to be continuing undiminished in any way.

I found it a bit disturbing that in a report that claims to be addressing abusive treatment of employees, the word "suicide" is nowhere to be found. Creepily odd, considering that Foxconn's been in the news for the last year or so with reports of a very high rate of suicide among its employees. A couple of weeks ago 300 employees in one facility threatened to commit suicide to protest horrible working conditions. Apple is either unaware of the news reports, or is sweeping them under the rug.

Read Apple's reports for yourself. You can tell that after reading them I judged Apple to be in it up to its neck, and the protestations of goodness and niceness ring more than a little hollow to my ear. But maybe there's a more charitable reading.

In other Apple news: 2011 (edit: fourth-quarter 2011) profits amounted to a little under one billion dollars per week. Ya know, I have to wonder why Apple claims it can't afford to pay American workers, when it's awash in cash. Apple could maintain its current pricing, pay more to its workers, and still turn in a spectacular profit. Is there anything other than greed at work here?