Linked List: May 28, 2010

Friday, 28 May 2010

Malcolm Moore: ‘Why Foxconn Cannot Stop Its Suicides’ 

Malcolm Moore, the Telegraph’s Shanghai correspondent, suggests that Foxconn has painted itself into a tragic corner with its policy of paying large settlements to the families of suicides:

For a worker on the basic rate of 900 yuan a month, the compensation amounts to the equivalent of over ten years of gross salary. For a worker who is doing overtime and earning 1500 yuan a month, the compensation is still worth six years of salary.

If these enormous payments don’t stop, the suicides are unlikely to either. But if Foxconn takes the pragmatic option, there is every chance that its workers, fanned by the media, will revolt at its callousness. I would not want to be in Mr Gou’s shoes.

Dave Winer on an Apple TV Without Local Storage 

Dave Winer:

I’ve said it before and it’s worth saying again. Apple is building the Disney computer network. All the streets are clean, and the entertainment too. There’s no porn here, and as long as there are no ports it’ll stay that way.

Decreasing the amount of storage inside the Apple TV is interesting, but sort of obvious once you think about it running iPhone OS. No iPhone OS device has ever supported hard disk drives, and I doubt they ever will. And solid state storage is expensive. It’s all about streaming and caching. You’ll get Apple-sanctioned content from the iTunes Store, but I’d wager you’ll be able to stream any H.264 content you want over the web, or from any Mac or PC on your home network. You won’t need USB ports to watch porn; you’ll just need Wi-Fi. You won’t be limited to iTunes Store content any more than you are with the existing Apple TV today.

Engadget Gets Wind of K66, the iPhone OS-Based Next-Generation Apple TV 

The code name has been in the iPhone OS 4 beta SDK for months. Joshua Topolsky reports:

Not only will this be priced to sell (like hotcakes), it seems that Apple is moving away from the model of local storage, and will be focusing the new ATV on cloud-based storage (not unlike Amazon’s streaming scheme, though we’re talking instant-on 1080p, a la Microsoft).

The big question — which I do not know the answer to — is what the interface is going to look like. It certainly can’t be a direct touch interface. You can already use an iPhone/iPod Touch as a remote for the existing Apple TV; presumably that’ll still be an option, but I don’t think Apple can sell a $99 set-top box that requires a $199 remote. And will there be a TV app store? If so, when? (Maybe not right away.) A web browser?

Fred Wilson Changed His Mind About the iPad 

Fred Wilson:

And that is what I missed in my first day with the iPad. It feels less like a computer than any computing device I’ve owned. It’s easy on me in a way that the other devices are not.

Fake Steve on the Foxconn Suicides 

Dan Lyons:

But, see, arguments about national averages are a smokescreen. Sure, people kill themselves all the time. But the Foxconn people all work for the same company, in the same place, and they’re all doing it in the same way, and that way happens to be a gruesome, public way that makes a spectacle of their death. They’re not pill-takers or wrist-slitters or hangers. They’re not Sylvia Plath wannabes, sealing off the kitchen and quietly sticking their head in the oven. They’re jumpers. And jumpers, my friends, are a different breed. Ask any cop or shrink who deals with this stuff. Jumpers want to make a statement. Jumpers are trying to tell you something.

I linked to the “hey, Foxconn’s suicide rate sounds high but it’s lower than China’s overall rate” thing not as proof that everything is just fine at Foxconn, but for context. Every suicide is shocking to the non-suicidal. Maybe there really is something profoundly wrong at Foxconn — jumping is indeed a spectacular, gruesome means of suicide — but the rate isn’t as high as some reporting on it would have you believe.

The iPad Debuts Around the World 

The third guy interviewed by CNN waiting in line in London is wearing a very handsome t-shirt.