The best of Times, the worst of Times

The New York Times hit a high note and a low note this weekend. On the upside, the Gray Lady’s Nick Bilton took notice of what some in the Apple community have been pointing out for months.

On Worker Conditions, Apple’s Rivals Are Silent (via The Loop)

Although some technology companies share some information about their audits, none go into detail about the violations they find or what they are doing to fix problems.

“When violations exist, they don’t follow up nearly as well as Apple does,” said Li Qiang, executive director of China Labor Watch, which monitors and investigates labor conditions in China.

Maybe now the “blame Apple” crowd can shut their blameholes.

That’s right. Their blameholes.

Sorry if that was just too real for you.

On the downside, in comparing executive compensation, the Times’ Natasha Singer conflates what Tim Cook will make over 10 years with what other executives will make in a year.

Philip Elmer-Dewitt catches the error:

Although the text of the article correctly reports that Cook’s annual salary last year was a relatively modest (by CEO standards) $900,000, the lead sentence — and the graphic — make the same mistake the Associated Press and other publications made in January when Apple (AAPL) issued its 2012 proxy statement.

They confuse a bird in the bush with a bird in the hand.

To collect the full 1 million shares of Apple stock (technically, restrictive stock units, or RSUs) Cook was granted in 2011, he has to stay at the company for 10 years.

Singer doesn’t appear to have a background in business coverage but either she or her editor should have caught this. Fortunately for them, we pedantic Apple nerds are here to provide another edit free of charge.

No need to thank us. It’s just a thing we do.