SOURCE: Yahoo News
Student Seeks Legal Aid in Apple Case
Fri Jan 14, 8:50 PM ET - By MARK JEWELL, AP Business Writer
BOSTON - The 19-year-old publisher of a Web site facing a lawsuit over an article about a top-secret $499 Apple computer said Friday he can't afford to defend himself.
Apple Computer Inc. is suing Harvard University student Nicholas Ciarelli's Web site, www.ThinkSecret.com, alleging it illegally published company trade secrets. The Jan. 4 lawsuit also targets the Web site's unnamed sources for the leaks.
Ciarelli, whose identity as the site's publisher and editor was only published this week, is not named as a defendant. But he still needs a lawyer, and said he is hoping to find free or low-cost legal help to argue that he deserves First Amendment protection and used proper newsgathering techniques to break news about the Mac mini computer and other inside information about Apple.
"A lot of lawyers are interested in my case, but few are able to do it for free or low cost," Ciarelli, of Cazenovia, N.Y., said in an e-mail interview. "I'm seeking representation."
The Electronic Frontier Foundation, a San Francisco-based civil liberties group, said Friday it would not defend Think Secret even though it is defending two other sites, AppleInsider.com and PowerPage.org, that Apple is trying to subpoena to reveal sources.
Unlike the Think Secret case, those sites are not being sued.
"In addition to being subpoenaed...
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