Please do not buy anything from Apple -- especially an iPhone or related equipment -- for the month of June 2010.

Also please sign the petition in support of workers who make iPhones:

http://www.gopetition.com/online/36639.html

Many of you have probably already read about the spate of suicides among young workers at the Foxconn factories in Shenzhen. Foxconn makes iPhones for Apple. Civil society groups within China are calling for an international boycott of iPhones during the month of June. They are also asking people to sign their petition in support of Foxconn workers, here at http://www.gopetition.com/online/36639.html.

If you have not already heard about the Foxconn situation, I have pasted below the best, most detailed description I have found. Mainstream Western media outlets, such as the BBC, the New York Times, and Slate are relying heavily on company press releases. Worker rights groups have been trying to draw attention to Foxconn workers' suffering since before the first death. Foxconn conditions are more hygenic and the pay is higher (at least when it's not being withheld on various pretexts) than in many other factories, but the atmosphere there is very bad.

The best article:

http://interlocals.net/?q=node/343 The second half of this article assembles facts about each young person's death translated from original local media reports.

An in memoriam website by Chinese college students:

http://guanaifskgy.blog.163.com/ This site included some very moving pictures of a dead worker's family members who traveled to the Foxconn factory campus to make a demonstration of their grief. For some reason the picture has been taken down, but I will try to find it elsewhere.

The protest at Foxconn offices in Hong Kong:

The young woman on the megaphone is a friend of mine, Debby. The text at the end of the video says, "When you use these hi-tech devices, think of the workers behind them."

-- AmandaBell - 01 Jun 2010