“If 4,000 people go on strike at an iPhone factory in China, will anybody know it? That’s the question at the heart of an ongoing puzzle over whether, in fact, iPhone 5 production was shut down by a labor action in the northern Chinese city of Zhengzhou on Friday,” Adam Minter reports for Bloomberg. “For most of the world, the news broke on Oct. 5 when China Labor Watch, an influential New York-based workers’ rights group issued a press release claiming a strike had occurred at a plant producing iPhone 5s that ‘according to workers, involved three to four thousand production workers.'”
“Foxconn, Apple’s primary contractor and the owner of the factory where the alleged strike occurred, denied that anything more than several isolated incidents between workers and quality control personnel had occurred and insisted that iPhone 5 production would not be delayed,” Minter reports. “The lack of additional information is highly unusual: In contemporary China, it’s the rare brawl that isn’t recorded by somebody’s smartphone, while large-scale unrest is either accompanied or followed by a virtual data dump of accounts, photos and films. To be sure, Foxconn restricts the ability of its employees to carry phones into factories, but there’s no question that many Foxconn employees not only have smartphones (a brief perusal of Foxconn employees who tweet to Sina Weibo proves it), but also use them. A search for the origins of China Labor Watch’s report reveals that at least one person recorded the Oct. 5 events. His real name is unknown, but on Sina Weibo, China’s leading microblogging service, he goes by the handle Ye Fudao…”
Minter reports, “On Oct.5, after the second of Ye’s tweets, China Labor Watch issued its press release, with the headline, “3000 to 4000 workers strike at Foxconn’s China factory.” Ye’s photo of workers gathered at a bus stop was atop the release. China Labor Watch blacked out Ye’s contact details from the lower right-hand of the photo, though added a caption below the photo reading, ‘Ye Fudao/worker for Foxconn ZhengZhou.’ Even a cursory reading of the press release suggests that Ye’s contribution to it — willing or unwilling — extended beyond the photo… In the end, the fact that such a poorly sourced story has become a major news event tells us much more about how Foxconn and Apple are covered in the press than they do about conditions in the factories. Neither company should be viewed as a victim, but neither should their critics be granted a waiver on having to prove the truth of their claims.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: We smell something Daisey-esque.
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“Did Chinese iPhone assemblers really go on strike?”
No, they obviously did not; just another “advocacy” group decided to make PR at Apple’s expense.
I think the SEC should launch a full investigation into each of these rumors that’s cause stock prices changes resulting in $$$ billion dollar plus changes in valuation. More stock price manipulators should be in jail.
DeRS,
Hey its China….. That LARGE cloud of dust particles that seem to be highly radioactive……. well, the Chinese government can assure you that it is NOT a large radioactive dust cloud…
so there.
“Did Chinese iPhone assemblers really go on strike?”
No, they did not; it is just another attempt by “advocacy” group to make PR at Apple’s expense.
What you said so nice you had to say it twice.
We smell something Daisey-esque.
More like Daisy Duck.
Evidently this is all a misunderstanding about a friendly baseball game at the plant. A few visitors reported hearing someone on the premises yell, “Strike!”
“Stlike!”
Lie The Big Lie- it e
Lie The Big Lie- it works for Romney and the Ks
http://www.wyzant.com/Help/History/HPOL/FDR/Fala/
oh, stfu.
Look whos opened the trap…
This is the same group that claims Samsung is using child labor so either they are making everything up, or they know more than we do. which is it ?
So ONE person — ONE SINGLE PERSON — reports the claim an event that supposedly lasted many hours (some “articles retelling the story claimed the “strike” lasted at least one full shift and some claimed it lasted as long at two full shifts) on a micro blogging site including a picture of some people standing at a bus stop that supposedly involves the iPhone 5 production line and NO ONE bothers to check out its veracity before publishing it?
Whatever happened to the old rule that you either needed
1) two INDEPENDENT sources
or
2) Hard physical evidence
Since in the following five days no one has been able to validate the story, there should be a prominent apology from China Labor Watch!
I hate all lawsuits and hate lawyers even more, but this almost makes me think that a bunch of Apple stockholders should get together and sue China Labor Watch out of existence.
Who the hell is China Labor Watch? when you dumb things down and legitimize tea party type noise and factual substance, source confirmation (double and triple) go down the toilet together with standards, truth, honesty, integrity, excellence, and dignity.
You reap what you sow – take it back
Big mistake: in factual substance …
Since Watergate, every journalist and would be journalist has been in search of the BIG byline story. Their search is so intense that confirmed facts are no longer sought. The quick byline from a story soon forgotten is the goal. Collect enough and you’re considered a “star”. Bottom line, “facts” no longer matter.
Shadowself……???????? Proof and hard evidence????
You did read the part about how this was in China, right????
You know, where people still go missing…. all the time….
Just a thought.
Uhhh I don’t care. I gots my iPhone 5. Uh huh.
Me too, “annnnnnd… LOVING it!”
Yes they did… that is why iPhones have not been at any Apple store or carrier store for over a week. Apple will never flat out admit something like that nor will Foxxconn!
It’s not like they ran out of stock daily… they have been DRY for days… up to 8 days so far!
Yeah John, I have to believe that you are right. I don’t believe this is just some anti-Apple group or some wacky left wing liberal bunch making up stories. I do believe that Foxxconn is lying. This is trouble now and will be trouble going forward for Apple. This can be more problematic for Apple than Samsung and Google combined. This has always been the biggest concern for me as an investor in AAPL. Apple somehow needs to have production in friendlier confines. This won’t be the last time we hear of such problems. Apple needs to do something soon.
I hope both you and John are aware that a stopped production line on October 5th would not have caused a shortage of iPhone 5s at Apple stores for “over a week”. It’s only been 5 days since the purported strike. I doubt a hiccup in production on October 5th would have been felt yet at the retail level. Nice try though. I hope your employers are paying you well.
Nice one
I’m not sure of your points? I didn’t say that it was responsible for a shortage of iPhones. Please learn to read and try not to be so paranoid. You have a habit of accusing people of things on this site. You seem to have a bad day every day. I’m simply expressing an opinion. And I do not work for anyone. Are you seeing black helicopters over your house too?
John said “that is why iPhones have not been at any Apple store or carrier store for over a week.”
You said “Yeah John, I have to believe that you are right.”
Perhaps YOU need to learn to read, or at least remember what you wrote.
Or, if you meant John was correct about some other part of what he said, you merely need to learn how to express yourself more clearly, rather than use words that indicate approval across-the-board of everything John said.
Sorry to go Philo on everybody but. The media plays the biggest role in a Democratic society. A free press is an unbiased press that reports only the facts and is the peoples last bastion of Truth, Honesty and Justice. Today, unfortunately I see a press that is so biased they cannot be trusted. The press today has an agenda not to bring forth facts for debate but to try and shape an agenda they lean towards. Apple, for example is demonized and bashed by the media when the truth is they are trying to make the best products for the customer irrespective of profits. The press demonizes morality, honesty and truth to the detriment of Democracy. For what purpose? The media is nothing more than a propaganda machine today, no different than Nazi Germany and the Goerbal machine that demonized a whole race. Unfortunately only the educated and the righteous can see it.
Paging Dr Godwin!
So, are you educated or righteous?
Please don’t eat the Daiseys!
The Financial Times (no cheerleader for either Apple or Foxconn) had a reporter on the spot by Sunday and found no strike, just a small group of 200 or so frustrated quality control workers, o.1% of the 200,000 workers in the Zhengzhou factory. Also not mentioned: Foxconn workers who worked during national holidays got triple time, as required by law. How come there is *never* a story about Huawei or ZTE phone factories?
Of course they did not go on strike. China … Last time I checked was a Communist country. Worker’s revolution, and all that jazz… (As we Americans see it, a Dictatorship. But, Hey … I read Marx in College.) So there is no reason for the workers to go on strike. After all Communism by definition is a Workers Utopia. (sniff .. sniff… Hope you smell my sarcasm.)
On Oct.5, after the second of Ye’s tweets…
A couple tweets. A picture of people at a bus stop. All hell breaks loose.
This is not journalism. This is FUD. And ANYONE can play. 😛
Just when Adam were listing Ye Fudao’s lack of Weibo updates due to anger at the media, Ye posted today on his website a correction of Adam assumptions.
From: Ye FuDao
Dear Mr. Adam Minter: you have the freedom to criticize. Similarly, I also have the right to express anger at your baseless criticism and doubts! I state again: your criticism and doubts have absolutely no basis whatsoever!
Ye Fudao pointed out on his Weibo that a Chinese website, called “3G Menhu” (www.3g.cn), exaggerated his reporting, and he also pointed out that these websites used the pictures from the Taiyuan strikes. That website is still using wrong photos in its articles.
This translation may lead to a misunderstanding. What adam translated as “three small factories” are the complete production lines for iPhone 5s at Foxconn Zhengzhou, which has about 200,000 workers. Among these workers, at least 7000 workers are quality inspectors. You can imagine the consequence when many of these quality inspectors went on strike. I hope that he didn’t intentionally translate Ye’s post in this way.
Another Foxconn worker also responded to this issue on his weibo. This is the link of his weibo.
“I ask everyone to understand a worker. What we face is nothing that you could imagine from your offices. We are the same as 100 million other workers, just wanting to make our lives a bit better, just wanting to get a bit more of that which we have made. Based on our consciences, we post that which we see. We have no need to make things up. The real knowledge we have of specific details and the whole story is limited, so don’t malign us when we cannot provide the minor details. Thanks. Respects to @Ye Fu Dao.”