It seems that Apple's legal department have got their knickers in a knot* over an ad campaign for the iGasm, which is a rather intimate accessory for the iPod. The ads look just like the original "silhouette" iPod spots (see the ad at right), just not so much, you know, for the family.

Now, this certainly isn't the first iPod sex toy we've seen (or benign iPod case that only looks like a sex toy), nor is it the first time Apple has sued such a manufacturer for their advertising. And it probably won't be the last.

*I know, I know. I just couldn't resist.

[Via MacDailyNews]

Nancy Heinen, Apple's former general counsel who was just replaced by Donald Rosenberg, has retained a Berkley white collar crime lawyer just in case she needs to defend herself against charges resulting from the whole messy options backdating problem. Heinen abruptly exited her post at Apple last spring with no explanation given and neither Apple nor Heinen has bothered to elaborate on what exactly went down or even whether she was fired or resigned on her own.

Heinen has hired Cristina Arguedas of Arguedas, Cassman & Headley, who said in an interview last week that federal authorities have not contacted Heinen about her possible role in Apple's option grants and Miles Ehrlich, a lawyer at Ramsey & Ehrlich. "Every executive, CEO, CFO, general counsel, any high-up person in Silicon Valley in their right mind is getting themselves legal representation because of this legal environment right now," Arguedas said. "I have a number of clients who are executives who think it would be a good idea to be represented. It doesn't mean anything that they have chosen me to do that."

Fellow TUEWstress Erica Sadun discovered that Cristina Arguedas, aside from being Apple's ex-lawyer's lawyer is go-to-lawyer for lawyers in general, according to the Wall Street Journal law blog. In addition to defending Nancy Heinen, she has also defended legal eagle Ann Baskins, Hewlett Packard general counsel, among others. Is there a special Counsel the Counselors class in law school we wonder?

More than 90 companies are the subject of stock option inquiries right now. The FBI said Wednesday that it's investigating 45 backdating cases, while prosecutors in the past three weeks have charged five former executives of two companies, including two ex-CEOs. Sounds to me like Heinan is very wise to retain counsel at this stage of the game.

An appeals court has ruled that Apple is not entitled to subpoena information from a blog's email service provider in order to uncover the identity of  Apple employees who allegedly leaked secret  information to several blogs about Asteroid, a firewire interface for GarageBand that Apple was developing. The decision against Apple has implications beyond the facts of this case. It was a major victory for bloggers, webmasters, and email service providers.

One of the issues in the case was whether bloggers are entitled to protect the identity of their sources to the same extent as offline journalists. In the opinion in favor of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), who represented the blogs Powerpage.org and AppleInsider, the court rejected Apple's contention that the blogs were not engaging in legitimate journalism, writing:

"We can think of no workable test or principle that would distinguish 'legitimate' from 'illegitimate' news. Any attempt by courts to draw such a distinction would imperil a fundamental purpose of the First Amendment, which is to identify the best, most important, and most valuable ideas not by any sociological or economic formula, rule of law, or process of government, but through the rough and tumble competition of the memetic marketplace."

EFF says that the decision is also a victory for anyone who uses email, because it means that litigants in a civil lawsuit can't subpoena your email from your service provider.

The text of the court's opinion is available from EFF. For background on the case, take a look at our earlier post.

A California appellate court heard arguments yesterday on a highly charged discovery issue about a subpoena issued by Apple in its trade secret lawsuit, Apple v. Does. The twists and turns of legal process can be a mystery to non-lawyers and even to those of us who had the dubious honor of sweating through law school and years of practice. So here's some background that may help put yesterday's proceedings in context.

The discovery issue is an offshoot of the main Apple v. Does case, filed in December 2004, in which Apple alleges that unnamed defendants ("Does"), leaked trade secrets about an unreleased Apple product to several blogs, including PowerPage.org and AppleInsider.com, which published the information. The unreleased product, code-named Asteroid, was a firewire interface for GarageBand.

The discovery dispute argued yesterday is a side issue about a subpoena that Apple sent to nFox, the email ISP for PowerPage.org, seeking emails and other information that might reveal the identity of the sources who leaked the alleged trade secrets. PowerPage.org publisher Jason O'Grady, along with two other online publishers, filed a motion for a protective order against Apple in February, 2005 asking for a stay of the nFox subpoena. Neither nFox, O'Grady, nor the other online publishers in the discovery action are named parties in the main lawsuit. O'Grady et al are represented in the discovery suit by The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF).

Here's the situation. A young girl (3rd grade) has ideas on how Apple can improve her iPod. So, she writes a letter expressing her ideas as a class project, and sends it off to 1 Infinite Loop. She received a reply...from Apple legal. The letter stated that Apple does not accept or appreciate unsolicited product ideas with all the warmth and humanity that you would expect from the legal department of a billion dollar company. I don't know what this girl's teacher expected to happen, but I'm guessing it wasn't this.

Apple has since apologized to the girl and is now thinking of implementing a new policy for interacting with kids.

[Via Cult of Mac]