Hmmm. This is the best argument I’ve ever heard for not using Apple products (besides the overinflated prices). Being flush with cash is probably why the CEO says he doesn’t care about the ROI (return on investment) and won’t make the costs transparent per a shareholder request. Seems like a sensible business request to me.
Some headlines/screencaps. FORTUNE magazine:
More: http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2014/03/01/apple-cook-shareholders-sustainability/
==============================================================
The Mac Observer:
More: http://www.macobserver.com/tmo/article/tim-cook-soundly-rejects-politics-of-the-ncppr-suggests-group-sell-apples-s
===========================================================
Press release from NCPPR:
Tim Cook to Apple Investors: Drop Dead
Apple CEO Tim Cook tells Investors Who Care More About Return on Investment than Climate Change: Your Money is No Longer Welcome
As Board Member Al Gore Cheers the Tech Giant’s Dedication to Environmental Activism, Investors Left to Wonder Just How Much Shareholder Value is Being Destroyed in Efforts to Combat “Climate Change”
Free-Market Activist Presents Shareholder Resolution to Computer Giant Apple Calling for Consumer Transparency on Environmental Issues; Company Balks
Cupertino, CA / Washington, D.C. – At today’s annual meeting of Apple shareholders in Cupertino, California, Apple CEO Tim Cook informed investors that are primarily concerned with making reasonable economic returns that their money is no longer welcome.
The message came in response to the National Center for Public Policy Research’s shareholder resolution asking the tech giant to be transparent about its environmental activism and a question from the National Center about the company’s environmental initiatives.
“Mr. Cook made it very clear to me that if I, or any other investor, was more concerned with return on investment than reducing carbon dioxide emissions, my investment is no longer welcome at Apple,” said Justin Danhof, Esq., director of the National Center’s Free Enterprise Project.
Danhof also asked Apple CEO Tim Cook about the company’s green energy pursuits. Danhof asked whether the company’s environmental investments increased or decreased the company’s bottom line. After initially suggesting that the investments make economic sense, Cook said the company would pursue environmental goals even if there was no economic point at all to the venture. Danhof further asked if the company’s projects would continue to make sense if the federal government stopped heavily subsidizing alternative energy. Cook completely ignored the inquiry and became visibly agitated.
Danhof went on to ask if Cook was willing to amend Apple’s corporate documents to indicate that the company would not pursue environmental initiatives that have some sort of reasonable return on investment – similar to the concession the National Center recently received from General Electric. This question was greeted by boos and hisses from the Al gore contingency in the room.
“Here’s the bottom line: Apple is as obsessed with the theory of so-called climate change as its board member Al Gore is,” said Danhof. “The company’s CEO fervently wants investors who care more about return on investments than reducing CO2 emissions to no longer invest in Apple. Maybe they should take him up on that advice.”
“Although the National Center’s proposal did not receive the required votes to pass, millions of Apple shareholders now know that the company is involved with organizations that don’t appear to have the best interest of Apple’s investors in mind,” said Danhof. “Too often investors look at short-term returns and are unaware of corporate policy decisions that may affect long-term financial prospects. After today’s meeting, investors can be certain that Apple is wasting untold amounts of shareholder money to combat so-called climate change. The only remaining question is: how much?”
The National Center’s shareholder resolution noted that “[s]ome trade associations and business organizations have expanded beyond the promotion of traditional business goals and are lobbying business executives to pursue objectives with primarily social benefits. This may affect Company profitability and shareholder value. The Company’s involvement and acquiescence in these endeavors lacks transparency, and publicly-available information about the Company’s trade association memberships and related activities is minimal. An annual report to shareholders will help protect shareholder value.”
Apple’s full 2014 proxy statement is available here. The National Center’s proposal, “Report on Company Membership and Involvement with Certain Trade Associations and Business Organizations,” appears on page 60.
The National Center filed the resolution, in part, because of Apple’s membership in the Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA), one of the country’s largest trade associations. In its 2013 “Retail Sustainability Report,” RILA states: “Companies will often develop individual or industry voluntary programs to reduce the need for government regulations. If a retail company minimizes its waste generation, energy and fuel usage, land-use footprint, and other environmental impacts, and strives to improve the labor conditions of the workers across its product supply chains, it will have a competitive advantage when regulations are developed.”
“This shows that rather than fighting increased government regulation, RILA is cooperating with Washington, D.C.’s stranglehold on American business in a misguided effort to stop so-called climate change,” said Danhof. “That is not an appropriate role for a trade association.”
For even more information on RILA, read “The Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA): A Cartel that Threatens Innovation and Competitiveness,” by National Center Senior Fellow Dr. Bonner Cohen.
“Rather than opting for transparency, Apple opposed the National Center’s resolution,” noted Danhof. “Apple’s actions, from hiring of President Obama’s former head of the Environmental Protection Agency Lisa Jackson, to its investments in supposedly 100 percent renewable data centers, to Cook’s antics at today’s meeting, appear to be geared more towards combating so-called climate change rather than developing new and innovative phones and computers.”
After Danhof presented the proposal, a representative of CalPERS rose to object and stated that climate change should be one of corporate America’s primary concerns, and after she called carbon dioxide emissions a “mortal danger,” Apple board member and former vice president Al Gore turned around and loudly clapped and cheered.
“If Apple wants to follow Al Gore and his chimera of climate change, it does so at its own peril,” said Danhof. “Sustainability and the free market can work in concert, but not if Al Gore is directing corporate behavior.”
“Tim Cook, like every other American, is entitled to his own political views and to be an activist of any legal sort he likes on his own time,” said Amy Ridenour, chairman of the National Center for Public Policy Research. “And if Tim Cook, private citizen, does not care that over 95 percent of all climate models have over-forecast the extent of predicted global warming, and wishes to use those faulty models to lobby for government policies that raise prices, kill jobs and retard economic growth and extended lifespans in the Third World, he has a right to lobby as he likes. But as the CEO of a publicly-held corporation, Tim Cook has a responsibility to, consistent with the law, to make money for his investors. If he’d rather be CEO of the Sierra Club or Greenpeace, he should apply.”
“As in the past, Cook took but a handful of questions from the many shareholders present who were eager to ask a question at the one meeting a year in which shareholder questions are taken,” added Ridenour, “leaving many disappointed. Environmentalism may be a byword at Apple, but transparency surely is not.”
The National Center’s Free Enterprise Project is a leading free-market corporate activist group. In 2013, Free Enterprise Project representatives attended 33 shareholder meetings advancing free-market ideals in the areas of health care, energy, taxes, subsidies, regulations, religious freedom, media bias, gun rights and many more important public policy issues. Today’s Apple meeting was the National Center’s third attendance at a shareholder meeting so far in 2014.
The National Center for Public Policy Research is an Apple shareholder, as are National Center executives.
The National Center for Public Policy Research, founded in 1982, is a non-partisan, free-market, independent conservative think-tank. Ninety-four percent of its support comes from individuals, less than four percent from foundations, and less than two percent from corporations. It receives over 350,000 individual contributions a year from over 96,000 active recent contributors.
=================================================================
h/t to “cincinatuschili”
UPDATE: Yes, he must have.
@wattsupwiththat Wonder if he's forgotten about all those coal fired power stations running his Chinese factories?
— Karl Bentley (@bentleykarl) March 2, 2014
>>> “These myths transcend the scientific categories of ‘true’ and ‘false.’”
What pretentious pseudo intellectual crap. Pseuds corner material of the first order. You really couldn’t make it up. I guess this is what they now call “Post Modern Science”, but it has as much relation to the truth and the pursuit of knowledge as a snake oil salesmen. And we actually pay these people to produce this at taxpayers expense ?…
Thanks for posting those comments by ‘Jack Spratt’ and the really astounding quotes from Mike Hulme. E.g. “Because the idea of climate change is so plastic, it can be deployed across many of our human projects and can serve many of our psychological, ethical and spiritual needs.”
No science here, not even a hint of empiricism. It’s faith, not in the devotional sense, but as a dangerous tool of ideology and manipulation.
/Mr Lynn
FROM APPLE”S 1984 COMMERCIAL:
Today, we celebrate the first glorious anniversary of the Information Purification Directives. We have created, for the first time in all history, a garden of pure ideology. Where each worker may bloom secure from the pests of contradictory and confusing truths. Our Unification of Thoughts is more powerful a weapon than any fleet or army on earth. We are one people, with one will, one resolve, one cause. Our enemies shall talk themselves to death and we will bury them with their own confusion. We shall prevail!
KINDA PROPHETIC ISN’T IT … Apple has become what they warned us against.
http://youtu.be/axSnW-ygU5g
1984 commercial
I don’t see anything in these articles where Mr. Cook uses the term “denier” This looks like another misleading title intended to get the WUWT faithful riled up.
REPLY: The headline from the first FORTUNE article quite clearly uses the term. If you have an issue with that article and/or headline, take it up with the author, Philip Elmer-DeWitt. – Anthony
Time to buy some apple stock, this guy has to go.
DANG!
I was ready to go with Apple after Microsoft was forcing people into Windows 8.
(Maybe I’ll see if someone has a used Commodore 64 for sale….8-)
In the smartphone market, Europeans are quite interested in Windows Phone. One in 10 smartphones in Europe is a Windows phone, one in 5 is an iPhone. In Italy there are almost 50% more Windows phone users than iPhone users. In the last year the iPhone has been losing market share worldwide except for Japan.
http://www.thewincentral.com/2014/02/24/kantar-worldpanel-windows-phone-at-10-in-eu-5-in-us-17-in-italy-ios-loses-everywhere/?relatedposts_exclude=250
Hey, give the poor guy a break.
He’s just dealing with his own version of “The Pause”.
http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=AAPL+Interactive#symbol=aapl;range=2y;compare=;indicator=volume;charttype=area;crosshair=on;ohlcvalues=0;logscale=off;source=;
This is very distressing. I converted to Apple products some 15 years ago after 30 years in business using Windows (and not liking it).
Tim Cook needs to learn a little humility. Having a different view doesn’t make you a denier or any other ‘nasty thing’. Am I to assume he doesn’t want me to buy Apple products because I don’t share his rigid view of the world.
At present that makes 3 MacBook Pros, 2 Mac Pro’s, 2 3 Apple Tv’s, 3 iPhones and other assorted gear. Tell me like it is Tim, do you want me to piss off to? Well don’t worry I am so offended by your hubris that I have brought my ;last Apple product! Pity, because I was lining up to buy the new Mac Pro.
Way to go Tim. Probably 50% of adults don’t subscribe to the full AGW argument. They are your customers!
There are some things you can think in life, and some you can think and can’t say!
@Pete – That would mean you converted around 1999, and you had been using Windows since 1969? Windows has not been around 30 years to date. It was released in late 1985 (version 1.0 which was pathetic as was 2 and 3 – 3.11 finally started getting it solid).
Ooh, touché! Tim Cook hoist by Apple’s own petard. I wonder if he would understand it. Someone should send it to him.
/Mr Lynn
“The computer for the rest of us” becomes “The computer for the ideologically pure.”
Sigh. I always interpreted it as meaning “The computer for the command-line challenged.” And it certainly was, for me.
Well, I’m not giving up my Macs, no matter what Tim Cook says.
/Mr Lynn
I heard recently that HP was offering to ‘downgrade’ new Win8 computers back to Win7, because customers were rebelling against the now OS. I think Dell may be doing the same.
/Mr Lynn
@Lynn Joiner – only the Pro version and then at a price. They also offered the same “downgrade” when VISTA came out – for the same reason. That is why the installed base of XP is still so large (I suggested to all my customers to downgrade from Vista to XP until 7 came out).
Of all the media that has covered this story so far, IMO, the only story that really “gets” what we were going for and why Tim Cook got angry is one by Tim Worstall today.
http://pando.com/2014/03/03/apples-tim-cook-and-his-dilemma-over-sustainability-and-climate-change/
Let’s go back to the 1990s when Apple, which was desperate for investment and direction, brought back Steve Jobs. Would Steve Jobs have dared make such an outrageous call like Tim Cook?
Cook’s comments are a fine example of absolute arrogance preached from the pulpit of the “Steve Jobs Success Story”.
Tim Cook is no Steve Jobs. Since Jobs passed over, how many genuinely new products has Apple released under Tim Cook?
Ummmm!!!! Errrrrr!!!! Ummmm!!! … Exactly!
The secret success of business is to never risk alienation from any potential or actual investors and customers. No business can afford doing so for any reason be it on religious, political, or other grounds. It is simply not good for business. Yet that is what Tim Cook has done.
But then, why would Cook’s comments surprise us? Just have a look at who is on Apple’s board of directors!
One bad apple spoils the bunch
This is crazy entitlement mentality… Apple is a public company owned by its shareholders.
Tim Cook has to follow the shareholders lead, not the other way around.
Stupid entitlement mentality of the left
Pete says (March 3, 2014 at 4:51 pm),
This is very distressing. I converted to Apple products some 15 years ago
after 30 years in business using Windows (and not liking it).
==========
You were using Windows in 1969?
That’s incredible.
Khwarizmi. His timeline is a little off. MS “Windows” copied the Apple’s actual windowing feature in the late 1980’s. Apple ripped the windows capability from Xerox, from whom they also ripped the mouse. They otherwise would have patented them.
@JP
Ah I agree, find the tech and solutions which work well. There’s been too much awful software (on any platform) I’ve had to use, and I appreciate it when the tools are well made.
As for Cook, the only direct quote I can find is, “If you want me to do things only for ROI reasons, you should get out of this stock.” I’m skeptical he said “denier”, but hey it is a fun-to-be-outraged thread; media is attention seeking, even on the great WUWT.
The notion of having “multiple bottom lines” is out there in some progressive business circles. I’m sure we’d all say there is something wrong with a business which “makes money” just by taking subsidies for alternative energy. Or with companies which are just patent trolls. We have a notion of “real wealth creation” and “fake wealth”. It isn’t just money and investors. That’s the machinery. But is your machinery helping raise the real standard of living, or sucking things into a black hole?
So “multiple bottom lines” is not so outrageous a notion. We all want better environment. The big problem with AGW is that it is just a narrative used to push through all sorts of sucky things.
The shareholders could decide to vote against Apple’s policies on sustainability and climate change, but clearly this was the action of a vocal minority and not the bulk of shareholders. Apple would be in very hot water if they did not pay a lot of attention to energy efficiency. It has many benefits besides CO2 reduction. For a device it means better battery life. For Apple services (such as the iTunes store server farms) it means less costs == higher profits. So its win-win, makes the user experience better, increases shareholder value by reducing costs. Oh, and by the way it plays well with the bulk of people, and government policymakers, who rightly or wrongly are concerned about environmental issues.
While I might be an lukewarmist and a sceptic of a good deal of climate science, as an Apple shareholder I am quite happy with what Tim Cook is doing, and I don’t think they should kowtow to this vocal minority any more than they should to Carl Icahn.
It’s been estimated that when you factor in all the energy costs of an iPhone (manufacture, running energy use, connected services like iCloud) it has the same footprint as a refrigerator. Unless Apple made considerable efforts to ameliorate this, it would become a massive problem longer term CO2 or no, as the energy has to come from somewhere to fire up all those billions of devices.
GEE, if a company refuses to serve minorities they get tarred and feathered but a CEO can tell skeptics to F—OFF?
I really do love the double standard of these people.
It’s hard to believe that Apple once had a ‘think different’ ad campaign.
===================================================================
That’s good to hear. My current PC is about 10 years old. I don’t have a cell phone let alone a “smart” phone. Why would I want an OS that considered a desktop an afterthought?
Interesting that Michael Crichton, author of the Jurassic Park series and responsible for one of the greatest Mac product placements of all time in Jurassic Park was skeptical of global warming claims on the basis of the shoddy science that supports it. Interestingly, Chrichton was biochemist before beaming a novelist. My PhD is in immunology, and my assessment of climate science is remarkably similar to Chrichton’s. Climate science seems to have been the victim of mass groupthink, in which all observations that do not fit the accepted narrative are simply ignored.