Greenpeace Targets Apple's iPhone
That green glow around Apple (AAPL) didn't last long. Only three days after the company gave over the front page of its website to proclaim itself "bursting with pride" over boardmember Al Gore's Nobel, the environmental activists at Greenpeace have attacked Steve Jobs for failing to make his cellphone as green as his competitors'.
In a slick video posted on YouTube (and pasted below the fold), the organization paints Jobs as a hypocrite for promising a "greener Apple" but failing to take the minimal steps that Nokia and Sony Erikson took to earn a higher rating in Greenpeace's Guide to Greener Electronics. After earning cheers from Greenpeace last May, the company has actually slipped a few notches on the organization's green meter.
It's difficult for nonscientists to judge how benign or dangerous the traces of brominated fire retardants in the iPhone's antenna or the phthalate plasticisers in the white headset really are. But by failing to perform the due diligence that would have told the company what its competitors were doing about those components — or to match the "take back" recycling programs that have earned Nokia and Sony Erikson high marks with European greens — Apple has left itself open for another round of negative environmental agitprop.
My question is:
What did Greenpeace do with that iPhone when they got done tearing it up? Did it end up in a local land fill? Did they incinerate it, releasing toxins into the air? Things that make you go "hmmmm…"
No, Tony from NH you have it all wrong. You said "Who cares? Greenpeace is a bunch of ecoterrorists anyway."
Shows how you have been bamboozeled by righ-wing thnk-tank propaganda. The Exon Valdez – now THERE was eco-terrorism. The daily destruction of rainforests – there is eco-terrorism. Eco terrorism shoudl be the wanton destruction of the environment. When did you ever cower in fear from a tree-hugger?
Is it possible that the name "Greenpeace" has a subliminal meaning? The more "green" you give them, the more "peace" you receive…
Good for them for putting this pressure on Apple. Less toxic stuff in iPhone is good. As long as the evaluation is objective.
Old Greenpeace: a passionate environmental group
New Greenpeace: shameless corporate shakedown artists and PR shills
If you backtrack and closely read their assessment of Apple's "greenness" and Apple's factual response, you will see that Greenpeace was a mile off. Of course, by then, the damage was already done in their drive-by accusations and smear campaign. They never recanted, and only claimed victory when confronted by facts instead of assertions.
In the court of public opinion, the accuser holds all the cards. The accused are guilty until proven innocent, which is exactly the opposite of what our legal system allows. Greenpeace knows this, and could care less.
I once respected Greenpeace. No longer. Going after low-hanging fruit smacks either of desperation or a lack of moral integrity. There are other ways that Greenpeace could approach this issue. But in their blind zeal for shamless and self-righteous promotion, they have lost sight of integrity, and in the process, have lost the very audience of middle America they have sought to win.
Shame on you, Greenpeace. You've sold out.
It's a good thing that Greenpeace is irrelevant. I might have actually listened if another group would have said this.
Greenpeace should reverse their standing on the Iphone. Its features actually allow you to gain information without firing up a power hungry desktop. It also allows you to gain information without having to drive to the source of the information.
Being an investor with morals, an environmentalist and one interested in politics I have to say that Greenpeace is just freeloading off the publicity of Apple for its own self-promotion.
There is a reason Al Gore is on Apple's board. He sees Apple as a force for technological innovation and positive change. Greenpeace on the other-hand acts like the right wing nuts who praise Bush because someone else designed his small Texas vacation home energy efficiently but call Gore a fraud because he owns a large old energy inefficient historic mansion in Nashville, subject to all kinds of historic and retrofiting restrictions. To appease such folks he now has to go overboard in retrofitting the place. Do these nuts ever consider the value of preservation of housing and greenfields in Gores case–he pays large energy credits anyway.
Apple led the way in the use of LCDs, now in mercury free LEDs, in wireless to the savings of miles of copper ethernet cable, to smaller computers using less materials and endless savings of tons of scrap CD packaging etc. etc. Greenpeace at heart is just another political hack of an organization.
It doesn't help your arguement which is just another stab at apretty good company, but Steve's "greener apple" comment mean that they now use highly effient bulbs in all stores? That is a huge savings. Did he ever say that the iPhone is the greenest phone on the planet? The world understands your cause, but please direct the hate better. Oh, and what a waste of a perfectly good phone.
People with money attacks those who has less money so they can keep their position and their power