It's practically a tradition in the computer industry to see Microsoft as the bad guys. They have a near-monopoly on PC operating systems, office productivity suites, and other products. They also have a habit of squashing their competition. Increasingly, however, it seems that Apple is looking like the bad guys. Whether it's Greenpeace attacking their environmental record, users complaining about Time Machine backup and restore issues, the MobileMe service causing lost email, etc., it seems that angry people are increasingly pointing the finger at Apple. That being the case, it's interesting to see that Apple's own employees have filed a class action lawsuit against the company for its overtime pay practices.
According to the Palluxo.com article linked above, "Earlier this month, David Walsh filed a class action lawsuit in U.S. District Court in California against Apple for allegedly violating labor laws. The company's former senior network engineer alleges that Apple wrongfully exempted engineers and network support staff from protections enacted by the Federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). Walsh claims that Apple employees were required to work more than 40 hours a week without being compensated for their overtime pay - in violation of state overtime laws."
As I understand the situation, with the usual "I'm not a lawyer caveat", Apple did things to skirt the overtime laws. For example, the law claims that certain management positions are exempt from overtime. To get out of paying overtime to several employees, Apple classified their jobs as "managers" when they really were no different than other companies' "non-manager" positions. This allegedly allowed Apple to require these people to work overtime and use the letter of the law to avoid paying overtime pay. If true, this is a very shady and exploitative business practice.
How will this turn out? Palluxo.com thinks they know: "Since a lengthy court battle could be very expensive for Apple, it is likely that the Cupertino-based company will this case out of court. Similar lawsuit against Rite Aid ended with a $25 million settlement."
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