The most downloaded show in PRS history is called Mr. Daisey and the Apple Factory, and is very timely with Apple posting record profits and giving 60 million dollars in stock options to its top 6 executives, and the President of USA's state of the union address where he says its time jobs were brought back to America.

The US president is correct not only because Americans desperately need jobs (we Canadians do too) but because companies like Apple are making these record profits on the backs of human beings treated so horribly that no one in the USA or Canada would even contemplate such working conditions, which are more like a horror/sci-fi film than any experience we in North America would consider real. Plants that hold 400,000 plus people, 30hr long shifts, no rotation of manual labour so hands are quickly ruined permanently, sitting and talking are not allowed, employees as young as 12, complaints are handled by black lists that are put out by the ministry of labour insuring anyone who complains will not be able to find employment elsewhere, suicide nets......its seems surreal, but it is reality for the people that made your iPhone and do not have the pleasure of owning one themselves.

In all fairness its not just Apple, but all cheap electronics that we enjoy and throw away when the next must-have gadget gets released. And I am guilty of owning these products too.

For those interested and who listened to that radio segment (I defy anyone to listen to it and not cry) here is a petition demanding an ethical iPhone 5.

http://sumofus.org/campaigns/ethical-iphone/

Please consider signing the petition. Ultimately the power does rest with the consumer.

What is extremely disturbing to me is that Foxconn is opening up another plant in Brazil.........

I will never be able to hold another piece of technology in my own hands without stopping to think whose hands put this together, because as Mr Daisey points out I was one of those people who copy/pasted an image of tiny robots (like a Japanese car plant) putting together my iPod never considering or even asking for the truth of how it was made.

I personally would happily pay a $100 bux or more for an item say manufactured in the USA or Canada so that I could be certain the product was not produced so horrifically. I think most tech lovers would.

Thank you Mr Daisey for opening my eyes, we do need to know, no matter how awful and ugly the reality of the manufacturing of our beloved tech is.