News organizations fight to have tape of Steve Jobs video deposition released to the public
During Apple's ongoing iPod antitrust lawsuit, the plaintiffs introduced video testimony from Steve Jobs that was recorded in April 2011, a few months before his passing. Per Apple's request to the plaintiffs, Jobs' video footage has not been made public.
Now comes word via CNET that a trio of news organizations -- CNN, Bloomberg, and the AP -- are petitioning to have Jobs' video deposition released to the public citing a "public interest" in the footage.
"Given the substantial public interest in the rare posthumous appearance of Steve Jobs in this trial, there simply is no interest that justifies restricting the public's access to his video deposition," attorney Thomas Burke, who is representing all three media organizations, wrote in the filing Monday.
Apple, meanwhile, plans to vehemently oppose the motion, though it remains unclear, at this point, what legal basis they'll put forth to keep the video free from the public eye.
All told, Jobs' video testimony is about two hours long and mostly centers on Apple's contracts with record labels and the company's efforts to maintain strict control over the iPod/iTunes ecosystem. In one particularly interesting excerpt we highlighted earlier in the week, Jobs detailed many of the stipulations from record labels that accompanied Apple's iTunes Music Store contracts, one of which was that record labels reserved the right to remove their music from iTunes if they discovered anyone had hacked Apple's FairPlay DRM.
The iPod lawsuit is expected to wrap up this week and, for the time being, is proceeding without a named plaintiff.
