Understanding Apple's Employee Motivation and Retail Challenges

Apple has had a lot going on lately: we did a whole episode about the controversial child protection photo scanning features, which have now been delayed. A law in South Korea might force the company to change how App Store payments work; the company settled a Japanese case about the App Store recently, as well as a class-action lawsuit in this country. The verdict in the Epic trial will arrive and there are renewed questions about Apple’s relationship with the Chinese government. And, of course, it’s September — the month when new iPhones usually come out.

But in the background, Verge senior reporter Zoë Schiffer has spent the past few months publishing story after story about unhappy Apple employees, who are starting to talk to the press more and more about what working at Apple is like, and how they’d like it to change. Nilay Patel talks to Zoë about the work she's been doing and what the future holds.

Links:

Here’s why Apple’s new child safety features are so controversial https://bit.ly/3n9E07W

Apple delays controversial child protection features after privacy outcry https://bit.ly/38QdWX2

Apple and Google must allow developers to use other payment systems, new Korean law declares https://bit.ly/3BQeXeb

Apple concedes to let apps like Netflix, Spotify, and Kindle link to the web to sign up https://bit.ly/3kT88Sg

Epic Games v. Apple: the fight for the future of the App Store https://bit.ly/3ySf873

Slack CEO Stewart Butterfield on competing with Microsoft, the future of work, and managing all those notifications https://bit.ly/2VqBZck

Apple employees circulate petition demanding investigation into “misogynistic” new hire https://bit.ly/3h4Sqm4

“Misogynistic” Apple hire is out hours after employees call for investigation https://bit.ly/3naaL5c

Apple asks staff to return to office three days a week starting in early September https://bit.ly/3yNcUWn

Apple employees push back against returning to the office in internal letter https://bit.ly/3BJYSXy

Apple delays mandatory return to office until January 2022, citing COVID-19 surge https://bit.ly/3l433H5

Apple places female engineering program manager on administrative leave after tweeting about sexism in the office https://bit.ly/3jNwuO0

Google fires prominent AI ethicist Timnit Gebru https://bit.ly/3toFXhZ

Apple Shareholders Show Their Support for Tim Cook https://nyti.ms/3tkAn01

Apple says all US employees now receive equal pay for equal work https://bit.ly/3zSbpYj

Apple keeps shutting down employee-run surveys on pay equity -- and labor lawyers say it’s illegal https://bit.ly/3BNa85E

Apple says it has pay equity, but an informal employee survey suggests otherwise https://bit.ly/3zSJYh0

Apple just banned a pay equity Slack channel but lets fun dogs channel lie https://bit.ly/3hbiyvB

Apple employees are organizing, now under the banner #AppleToo https://bit.ly/3hazJNP

Here’s what we know about the Google union so far https://bit.ly/2WWNfNK

Google employees push back after mishandled sexual harassment revelations https://bit.ly/3DUVv23

Apple cares about privacy, unless you work at Apple https://www.theverge.com/22648265/apple-employee-privacy-icloud-id

Black women say Pinterest created a den of discromination -- despite its image as the nicest company in tech https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2020/07/03/pinterest-race-bias-black-employees/

Apple ordered to pay California store workers for time spent waiting for bag searches https://www.theverge.com/2020/9/3/21419729/apple-california-pay-workers-class-action-bag-searches

Read the transcript here:

https://www.theverge.com/e/22423538

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices