Dare we hold out hope for an honest-to-goshness courtroom throwdown after all? Just yesterday we noted that Apple (having settled a lawsuit against a 22-year-old student who leaked prerelease builds of Tiger on the 'net) was setting the stage for arranging a settlement in the Think Secret lawsuit, too, by commenting that "it is not our desire to send students to jail." Think Secret, as you no doubt recall, is run by a 19-year-old Harvard undergrad (also known as-- you guessed it-- A STUDENT) named Nick Ciarelli who is currently being sued by Apple for having posted what he allegedly knew to be misappropriated trade secrets about unannounced Apple products such as the Mac mini. Apple's comment about wanting students to roam free and unfettered across the majestic plains of academia sure sounded like a less-than-subtle invitation to get everyone eating bagels around a conference table and hashing out some sort of vaguely amicable resolution.

Or not. If the Boston Herald is anything to go by, it sounds like Nick's mouthpiece isn't exactly the settling type. "I don't know what there is to settle," says law-talkin' guy. (We may not be practicing lawyers, but the first thing that pops into our heads is, well, the lawsuit.) "He didn't steal, he didn't break into computers; Apple just wants to intimidate people and control the news." Well, no one who knows anything about Steve Jobs is likely to dispute that latter point, there, but if we were Nick, we might be a teensy bit concerned that our lawyer's comments to the press make him sound like he doesn't actually know what his client is accused of having done in the first place.

See, no one, as far as we know, has ever accused Nick of stealing anything or of virtual breaking and entering. But the law apparently makes it pretty clear that, unless you're blowing the whistle on some sort of illegal cover-up that harms the public interest, it's not okay to publish or otherwise distribute someone else's trade secrets, even if you're not the one who swiped them in the first place. And no, regardless of the zillion foaming-at-the-mouth opinion pieces you've no doubt encountered on the subject, this case isn't about "bloggers' rights vs. those of the traditional media" at all; the same standard applies to anyone, which is presumably why you don't see The New York Times publishing leaked product specs very often.

But what do we know? Like we said, we're not exactly qualified to render an expert opinion, here. All we can say is, given what little we know about the case, to us laypeople, the comments made by Nick's lawyer sound dangerously... well, off-topic, we suppose. The good news is, we're not Nick, so we don't have to worry our pretty little heads over it. In fact, we can revel in his lawyer's apparent complete unwillingness to settle, because that means we get to watch this case make fireworks in the courtroom instead of fizzling out at the negotiating table. It's just that if Nick's defense is going to be "he didn't steal, he didn't break into computers," we're a little concerned that Apple will have such a slam-dunk case that the whole thing will be over before the cameras start rolling. Pace yourselves, fellas! We need our dose of courtroom histrionics, you know.