Think Silence: Apple's Heavy Hand on a Blog

A popular news website about Apple has shut down, igniting rage throughout the tech blogosphere over the war waged by Apple's lawyers against the site.

Think Secret, one of a handful of Apple "enthusiast" websites that have been breaking news about the company for years, has announced that as a result of a settlement with Apple, it was ceasing operation.

"As part of the confidential settlement, no sources were revealed, and Think Secret will no longer be published," read the statement.

Nick Ciarelli, Think Secret's publisher, said, "I'm pleased to have reached this amicable settlement, and will now be able to move forward with my college studies and broader journalistic pursuits."

Ciarelli had been locked in bitter feud with Apple for the last several years. Apple was irritated by its employees calling up Think Secret and dishing on the company's internal plans and new products. So Apple's lawyers took Ciarelli to court and demanded that he disclose his sources.

Ciarelli refused. In the end, he got to hold on to his sources under the settlement. But Think Secret was stopped

Judging by the howls emanating from the tech blogosphere, many people took issue with Apple's heavy-handed tactics.

"Oh My God! Apple Killed Think Secret! Those Bastards!" raged Duncan Riley on Techcrunch.

"Damn you, Steve Jobs," cried Matthew Ingram.

"Apple comes off looking like some power-crazed South American dictator," Ingram added, "the kind who can't stand it when the media reveal government secrets and so arrests the entire press corps. Apple should be ashamed of itself."

"Think Secret being shut down completely is a travesty," railed Mike Masnick.

Rex Hammock posted a heartfelt eulogy for Think Secret.

"Nick Ciarelli is to online journalism what LeBron James to the N.B.A.," Hammock wrote. "He's already changed the game -- and he's barely started playing."

As Hammock points out, Ciarelli started Think Secret in 1998 at age 13, while in middle school in New Woodstock, N.Y. Over the years, he became a reliable publisher of accurate inside information on Apple and its projects.

By the time Apple took legal action, Ciarelli was a Harvard freshman and the site was generating enough ad revenue to pay for his tuition and all of his iTunes purchases.

Sam Gustin

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