Russian kangaroo court fines Apple two seconds of profit over News row
A Russian court this week fined Apple about $4200 for failing to suppress Apple News content about Russia's invasion of Ukraine, equivalent to barely over two seconds of profit for the company.
Moscow, Russia
Apple was found guilty of violating a law "against discrediting Russia's military and spreading false information about the Ukraine conflict" by a justice of the peace in a magistrate's court, according to the Associated Press. Specifically, the court found podcasts and articles offered through Apple News to be at odds with current Russian law prohibiting discussion of the war siding with Ukraine.
It's not clear if the court differentiated Apple News as an aggregator, or as a writer of content. Also not clear is if it was interested in the distinction.
Also cited in the ruling was The Wikimedia Foundation, publisher of Wikipedia. Wikimedia faces a stiffer fine totaling 3 million roubles, or about $31,850 at today's exchange rate. Wikimedia has previously indicated that its information was well-sourced and in line with its standards, reported Reuters.
Apple stopped all sales and operations in Russia shortly after the country invaded neighboring Ukraine. But that hasn't stopped Russian authorities from pursuing the company in and out of court.
Earlier in 2023, Apple lost a staggering one hour of profit to Russia over supposed antitrust violations related to the App Store.
And in June, Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) alleged Apple made backdoors into iOS to enable the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) to surveil Russian officials and civilians. Apple immediately refuted the allegation, stating that it has "never worked with any government to insert a backdoor into any Apple product and never will."
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You would lose that bet. There is ample evidence online that Russians by and large gleefully support Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine, just as they’ve supported Russia’s past military actions.
We know there exist people who gleefully support the war.
We know that there are large numbers of people who fled Russia to avoid being sent to fight in the war.
We can reasonably suspect that anybody staying behind who does NOT support the war would be wise to keep that lack of support to themselves.
But we really have no idea what proportion of the Russian population genuinely supports the war -- and we may never know.
Did they not fight and die for freedom? For our constitution and all the freedoms it guarantees, including the freedom of speech? Then how can it possibly, "disrespect their great sacrifice," when Americans exercise those very freedoms in whatever form that takes? Do we not actually honor them when we engage in freedom of speech, particularly when that speech is not popular? I say we do. Not a single American died to defend the flag, they died defending what the flag stands for, and it cheapens their sacrifice to say otherwise.
The flag itself is just a piece of cloth of no significant value. However, what the flag symbolizes is of the greatest value. People objecting to flag burning as a form of protest, of protected speech, either don't understand what free speech is, or don't actually believe in it. Burning a flag as a form of protest because you think your country is on the wrong path is one of the most powerful statements you can make. It should not be done casually, but we should celebrate that they have the freedom to do it. When we loose the freedom to burn the flag, we will have lost the very thing those soldiers died to defend.
Calling it a "kangaroo court" blurs the line between reporting and opinion piece in the very headline, in a way that doesn't even reflect the actual happenings.
The court found Apple guilty anyway. Seems pretty clear.
Exactly right. Case in point is the statement from a Vietnam POW below:
Because the mere sight of the flag meant so much to me when I saw it for the first time after 5 1/2 years, it hurts me to see other Americans willfully desecrate it. But I have been in a communist prison where I looked into the pit of hell. I cannot compromise on freedom. It hurts to see the flag burned, but I part company with those who want to punish the flag burners. Let me explain myself.
Early in the imprisonment the communists told us that we did not have to stay there. If we would only admit we were wrong, if we would only apologize, we could be released early…
Because we would not say the words they wanted us to say, they made our lives wretched. Most of us were tortured, and some of my comrades died. I was tortured for most of the summer of 1969. I developed beriberi from malnutrition. I had long bouts of dysentery. I was infested with intestinal parasites. I spent 13 months in solitary confinement. Was our cause worth all of this? Yes, it was worth all this and more.
Rose Wilder Lane, in her magnificent book, The Discovery of Freedom, said there are two fundamental truths that men must know in order to be free. They must know that all men are brothers, and they must know that all men are born free. Once men accept these two ideas, they will never accept bondage. The power of these ideas explains why it was illegal to teach slaves to read…
They tried to “re-educate” us. If we could show them that we would not abandon our belief in fundamental principles, then we could prove the falseness of their doctrine. We could subvert them by teaching them about freedom through our example. We could show them the power of ideas.
I did not appreciate this power before I was a prisoner of war. I remember one interrogation where I was shown a photograph of some Americans protesting the war by burning a flag. “There,” the officer said. “People in your country protest against your cause. That proves that you are wrong.”
“No,” I said. “That proves that I am right. In my country we are not afraid of freedom, even if it means that people disagree with us.” The officer was on his feet in an instant, his face purple with rage. He smashed his fist onto the table and screamed at me to shut up. While he was ranting I was astonished to see pain, compounded by fear, in his eyes. I have never forgotten that look, nor have I forgotten the satisfaction I felt at using his tool, the picture of the burning flag, against him.
Aneurin Bevan, former official of the British Labor Party, was once asked by Nikita Khrushchev how the British definition of democracy differed from the Soviet view. Bevan responded, forcefully, that if Khrushchev really wanted to know the difference, he should read the funeral oration of Pericles.
In that speech, recorded in the Second Book of Thucydides’ History of the Peloponnesian War, Pericles contrasted democratic Athens with totalitarian Sparta. Unlike the Spartans, he said, the Athenians did not fear freedom. Rather, they viewed freedom as the very source of their strength. As it was for Athens, so it is for America — our freedom is not to be feared, for our freedom is our strength.
- James H. Warner, Captain O-3, U.S. Marine Corps
https://www.sun-sentinel.com/1989/07/16/flag-burning-doesnt-bother-former-pow/
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2006-06-26/html/CREC-2006-06-26-pt1-PgS6471-2.htm
Those who get their panties in a bunch over such things are just showing what snowflakes they are. They typically have never read the Constitution, but can sing along with Lee Greenwood’s insipid spiel ad nauseam.
“Also just burning anything anywhere is illegal.” Just one of several bizarre, uninformed and Mal-informed statements.
Also, a lot of unsubstantiated broad-brush whines. WHO is “suppressing free speech and press” and HOW? The subsequent Wehrmacht inspired word-salad rant sounds like someone finished their weekend allotment of meth before the weekend even arrived.
As for the pro-Putin claims of Russia's "bread basket", the numbers aren't so bad after the initial panic:
https://markets.businessinsider.com/commodities/wheat-price/euro
One last word on the claimed "Russia bread basket": Holomodor.
https://holodomor.ca/resource/holodomor-basic-facts/#:~:text=The%20term%20Holodomor%20(death%20by,peasantry%2C%20who%20resisted%20Soviet%20policies.
https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/mr-jones-film-exposes-the-fake-news-campaign-behind-stalins-ukrainian-genocide/
and for the claim it wasn’t a “Kangaroo Court” but a real legal “formal institution “: most kangaroo Courts are formal institutions in their countries. Does not make them any less a kangaroo court. Countries that don’t respect the rule of law have kangaroo court systems by definition.