Epic Showdown: Tim Cook vs Mike Daisey (with a guest star as well)

This post is inspired by a stint of research into what Apple executives’ reaction was to the “Agony and Ecstasy of Steve Jobs”. Even though on a corporate communications level, Apple has responded to the conditions portrayed by Mike Daisey, Apple’s executives shied away from making public statements about Mike Daisey’s allegations…until today…

Steve Jobs the Jerk?

Clearly I lack creativity.

Regardless, I imagine Steve Jobs had a domineering, “better than you persona”. While I’m sure I could Google his characteristics and find out what his overall tone was,  for the purpose of this script, I am going to refrain from doing so, and go with my instinct.

——

Me: There has been a lot of upset regarding the treatment of Foxconn workers who manufacture your company’s products. Do you feel as though Apple is responsible?

Jobs: Apple is not the company implementing the harsh working conditions in such factories, nor is Apple the only company whose products are manufactured in these factories. Plenty of our competitors’ products are manufactured under the same roofs, and I do not see them under fire.

Jason DeRulo Talks Dirty to Me

I actually got to meet Jason DeRulo after the concert last week– we talked ethics for a hot sec.

Do you think your goal as an artist is to be the most profitable tour or to express yourself and bring the most joy to your fans?

Is Risk Fun?

We have looked at apple extensively this semester. We can establish Apple is extremely secretive about company operations. We observed how apple distanced themselves from the FoxConn Operations with slickness and panache. We looked in depth about the cult-like consumer culture of apple, especially due to their affinity for alliteration. Just kidding.

“The story does not end here…”

This was originally written here.

I have edited a few sentences to reflect changes.

SPRING 2012

Almost no one calls me in my office.  90% of the calls are my wife or a textbooks ales representative (poor souls- they are ever-optimistic.).

So, when the phone rang two weeks ago, I answered it very informally.  “Unh, hello?”

“Is this Jordi?”  I didn’t have time to realize I should have recognized the voice.  “This is Mike Daisey.”

Mike Daisey Performing

Made in China

Ok, so I understand this is supposed to be a play for educational purposes, but it’s a play about a tech company. I mean, have consumers have become so obsessed with this company that individuals are even performing plays about its history and products?

So Why Did We Care?

In our third time around with the Mike Daisey and Apple story, I am left with three main thoughts, being both novel and recurring.

The first, and most prominent to me, was the question that I have not been fully able to answer across all three blogs: If this wasn’t all about Apple, would we really have cared? Did Mike Daisey’s story of Foxconn, beit true or false, only catch our attention because it was about a Man and a Company so revered by us that we couldn’t dare imagine Apple as being anything but the most ethical, the most innovative, and most popular company.  But what if Mike Daisey had chosen to highlight Foxconn’s conditions under the context of Samsung, or Nokia?  Would TAL have given it airtime?  Would he have been asked to come to speak at tech/no?  The answer I tend to believe is no,

Please Supply Responsibly

How are working conditions in Foxconn now? I wanted to find recent reports or articles written on the current state of working conditions in Apple supplier factories, and came across this article. 

The Gap Between American Understanding and Chinese Reality

As much as I hate to admit it, I definitely have a tendency to initially overreact to a story or piece of journalism after encountering it for the first time. My experiences over the past several weeks regarding the Mike Daisey story are a prime example of that. When I first heard Mike Daisey’s original monologue on This American Life two weeks ago, I came away shocked, confused, and angry. I was ready to burn my MacBook and boycott Apple forever. Maybe it was Daisey’s tone, maybe it was because it was an assignment from a professor, but I definitely believed Daisey and reacted strongly against Apple. I did not stop to consider that parts of the story that did not seem to add up.

Don’t Bite the Apple: A fictional piece

I noticed striking similarities between the events that were portrayed in the Bucknell Forum version of “The Agony and Exctasy of Steve Jobs” and the plot of George Orwell’s “1984”. In the beginning of the show, Apple’s famous 1984 commercial is shown with the catchphrase “…you’ll see why 1984 won’t be like “1984”.” Did Apple uphold that promise? The people marching in the background of the ad in aligned, controlled unison seemed strangely similar to the FOXCONN employees’ strict working conditions. As the play within the play continued on I began imagining a story within a story; that is, the reality of technology firms today within the confines of the story that far too often conceals the truth. The comparisons and generalizations I am going to make may not be entirely true, but it is not my goal to declare any truths, but rather to arouse questions (much like the ending of the Bucknell Forums’ play) or “Think Different”.