Comments Elsewhere

Five comments on NDAs, and none of them at all are to the point.

The reason that Apple’s legal brickbats are problematic from a free speech standpoint is not that the First Amendment somehow prohibits contractual NDAs. It doesn’t. But the publishers of ThinkSecret, AppleInsider, and PowerPage never signed an NDA with Apple. They never made any agreement with Apple that they wouldn’t leak any information that comes into their grubby little hands, and they’re under no legally enforceable obligation whatsoever not to do so.

Apple has every right to pursue legal action against people who have breached their contract, but they have no right at all to use legal force against people who never agreed to Apple’s terms in the first place. The legal maneuvering is nothing more than high-powered bullying to try to force innocent third parties to give up their sources when they aren’t under any legal obligation to do so. Copyfight is exactly right to frame this as an issue of corporate bullies attacking protected speech.