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Job Cuts Are Just "Job Nicks" (4/4/02)
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Judging by the number of viewers now wearing hardhats and hurriedly shoveling emergency supplies into basement bomb shelters (yes, we can see you-- hi!), apparently many of you have already heard the news: CNET reports that today Apple "cut a small number of jobs as part of an ongoing restructuring effort." We'd like to take this opportunity to step out of character and assure you all that Apple dishing out a few pink slips is no reason to go all squirrelly and start panicking about the imminent end of the world.
Um, excuse us for a moment, won't you?...
THE SKY IS FALLING!! THE SKY IS FALLING!! WE'RE ALL GONNA FRICKIN' DIE IN FLAMES AND SCREAMING HORROR!!!
...Okay, much better. Sorry, we just had to get that out of our systems. Our embarrassing addiction to all things melodrama aside, we're actually fairly confident that Apple's official stance on these layoffs is relatively spin-free; while the company won't disclose exactly how many jobs were trimmed from its sales and support teams (for all we know, it's just the fifty that the company already mentioned in its last 10-Q filing), a company rep very reasonably pointed out that "Apple remains one of the few large companies in the Valley who hasn't had major layoffs in these challenging times." Furthermore, as we've pointed out on at least one occasion in the past, even though Apple occasionally makes with a few pink slips, the company's total number of employees keeps increasing.
Don't forget, Apple's been buying up companies like crazy lately, which, in addition to occasionally increasing headcount, isn't the typical behavior of a corporation in serious financial trouble because its CFO flew to Rio with $4 billion in cash. (We're still watching you like a hawk, though, Fred Anderson, so don't try anything funny.) To us this all implies that, unlike most companies' recent "layoffs due to restructuring" (which our BusinessSpeak-English Dictionary translates as "we're slashing headcount in a desperate attempt to keep our bottom line from plunging into a bottomless chasm of fiscal despair"), Apple's cuts are-- believe it or not-- actually layoffs due to restructuring. How wacky is that? But then again, we've been accused on more than one occasion of seeing the world through Steve-colored glasses, so if you'd like to keep hauling bottled water and creamed corn into the basement, be our guests.
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SceneLink (3669)
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 | | The above scene was taken from the 4/4/02 episode: April 4, 2002: Apple snaps up yet another company; this time it's a FireWire firm called Zayante. Meanwhile, Apple trims a few jobs, which is sure to prompt at least a couple of "Apple is going out of business" wonks to come crawling out of the woodwork, but at least the company finally manages to get a ton of new iMacs into resellers' hands...
Other scenes from that episode: 3668: Sounds Like A Luxury Sedan (4/4/02) Wow, is it just us, or does it seem like Apple has been on a real spending spree lately? Not even two full months ago, word got out that Apple had written a check for Nothing Real, the makers of the high-end compositing software "Shake" that has all of Hollywood a-quiverin'... 3670: The REAL End Of The Drought (4/4/02) "In stock at last, in stock at last, thank Steve Almighty, they're in stock at last!" Okay, fine, so the prospect of finally being able to find scads of G4 iMacs in non-Apple-retail outlets may pale in comparison to the vision of an end to racial injustice and the advent of true freedom for all people regardless of race, color, or creed-- but hey, it's still pretty darn cool...
Or view the entire episode as originally broadcast... | |  |
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