Info
Digital Digest: iPod plants in China, Google Music, eMinor
Apple issues report denying claims of worker abuse at its iPod factories; Google Labs cooks up a way to eavesdrop on users' music-listening habits; North Carolina music start-up lands $2 million.
Apple finds violations but no abuse in Chinese iPod factories
Apple said it found violations but no abuse.
Apple said today that it has concluded a two-month audit of the conditions in an iPod manufacturing facility in China and determined that although there were violations, the plants did not use child laborers or abuse its workers.
The audit stemmed from allegations that surfaced in June about a plant operated by iPod manufacturing partner Foxconn Electronics. The June report in the UK's Mail on Sunday claimed that Foxconn employed underage workers and forced them to endure 15-hour shifts for $50 a month.
Apple responded to the charges by sending a team of human resources, operations, and legal employees to the Chinese factory. The company said it rejected inhumane treatment of workers but would not comment specifically on the charges until the audit was complete.
In its report issued today, Apple said the plant did violate some of the company's policies, such as having employees work more than 60 hours a week 35 percent of the time and work more than six straight days a week without a day off 25 percent of the time. The report also said that Foxconn's living conditions were "impersonal," with workers housed in former factories or in open spaces with little or no privacy or slept in "triple" bunk beds. Apple said that Foxconn has purchased additional land on which it will build more housing.
But the audit, which included analysis of personnel documents and interviews with more than 100 randomly selected employees, found that all employees are paid at least minimum wage, with more than half making more than that, and all workers receive full health coverage. Minimum wage for Shenzhen in southern China, where the factory is located, is about 800 yuan ($100) a month.
Foxconn employs more than 200,000 people at its factory, with Apple using about 15 percent of that capacity, Apple said.
Apple also said it has hired a workplace-standards company and plans to audit all its iPod and Mac suppliers this year.
Google is listening--if you want it to
Google Music Trends
Users of Google instant-messaging program will soon be able to have the search-engine powerhouse track their music listening habits--if they so desire. Google Labs is launching Google Music Trends, a listing of the most listened to songs on Apple's iTunes, Nullsoft's Winamp, Microsoft's Windows Media Player, and Yahoo's Music Jukebox. Google Talk users sign up by clicking the Google Music Trends option in the Settings menu. Thereafter, each song listened to in the aforementioned players will be tracked, anonymously, and Google will post the top artist and song choices broken down by genre, as well as their movement in popularity on the chart. The identity of individual listeners and their music choices are confidential on the public pages.
Carolina music startup eMinor lands $2 million
ReverbNation.com
eMinor, a North Carolina-based startup, is hoping that ReverbNation.com will sweep the nation. The fledgling company's soon-to-debut online music community for independent musicians received an infusion of cash today to make that happen. eMinor, which launched in February, calls for ReverbNation to be a more indie-music-centric version of MySpace, providing artists with tools like audio and photo uploads, blogs, and playlists. The company hopes to make money from advertising and fees from music purchased through the site.
Just added
