While you're ranting at Sony/Apple, don't forget to spare some outrage for the Chinese professors, managers, bosses etc. who are willing participants.
Sony are the customer, and could share some blame, but honestly, this smacks of a couple of professors from the uni getting nice kickbacks (ie. "consultancy" fees) and everyone looking good to some local government officials for their "modern" internship programmes. That's generally how stuff works in China.
Capitalism being what it is, no one is required to buy a PS4 or anything else that they do not want to (please do not take me into a rat hole about healthcare or other government mandated purchases). If the only source of water was to purchase it form a corporation that enslaved people I'd get your point, but we're talking about a PS4... it's a video game console... a PS4 does not matter that much if you really care about taking care of workers.
You don't have to go across the ocean to find labor issues. The agriculture industry in the U.S. has questionable labor practices, and everyone has to buy food. There is little transparency with how food is produced, just like how there is little transparency with how the PS4 is produced, at least to the average consumer.
Lack of transparency and awareness channels is why grassroots consumer boycotts cannot be relied upon to improve society/humanity.
It's not just on the producer to create transparency. It's on the consumer to want transparency. There is also a lack of desire for knowledge by the consumer, in either food or PS4 production.
Saying "there's little transparency" suggests that the world (and not a small, vocal protest community) is clamoring for information, and the accused company / industry is failing to provide it. When, in reality, most people really don't care.
I disagree. Lack of transparency is to the benefit of the companies, and they prefer to keep it that way. You are not going to get an honest answer from a company on a touchy subject unless it's already in their marketing/press releases. Usually customer inquiries are handled by powerless and uninformed employees who are not in the loop, and have no power to accurately answer difficult questions. This goes for negative customer experiences, as well as things like working conditions. Companies know that an individual voice is weak and the masses have trouble congregating. At the same time companies often have large marketing budgets to push either what they want people to believe or distractions.
There is also the matter of time. Companies have plenty of time and a unified goal to sell their products all day long. Meanwhile consumers have to split their attention between dozens of different and pressing tasks. Becoming a one-man consumer watchdog group is a job in and of itself. I think it's unrealistic to expect or rely on a majority of consumers becoming experts on all the products they purchase, as well supply chain logistics and day-to-day geopolitical rumblings.
Even if consumers are willfully ignorant, it still does not excuse abuses or poor practices. Your second paragraph is akin to the philosophical tree falling in a forest, "If a Chinese factory worker is abused and nobody cares, is he really being abused?". Of course he is, and consumer ignorance still does not make it alright for the company to exploit the worker.
They should have known or been monitoring the situation, especially after Apple's findings/blight. Ignorance on how your multi-billion dollar flagship home entertainment product is produced sounds like someone who should be out of a job.
I bet that Sony probably don't know, and at worst just turn a blind eye. My guess would be that Foxconn's unofficial position is "fine, the uni/local government wants to throw a bunch of free workers at us, and doesn't care a bit how we use them", and the local gov/university are the active partners.
Do you think Sony execs could have researched and performed checks themselves to make sure this kind of thing wasn't happening? Do you think "built by slave labor" might affect their brand?
Do you really think that professors want to send their students to work?
Same stuff happens in Uzbekistan (only with Cotton). If teachers and professors don't send their students to work during semester, the professors will lose their jobs.
Note that this unlawful child labor happens on the local level. The central government fights it but the minute the Capital turns a blind eye, the local government starts sending directions to local schools and universities.
Teachers and professors make way more money by tutoring. Wasting time in the factory or on the fields hits them financially but teachers have to comply if they value their jobs.
Foxconn is the company which manufactures iPhones, etc. If they're using forced labor for Sony products, they're probably using forced labor for Apple products as well.
sorry, the "/Apple" was because other comments mention Foxconn and Apple, and then it turns into a generalised rant about Apple because people love to hate them. My point was that what hooks us into the story is Sony and PS4, but the reality is that Sony are probably well removed from what's happening, and the real story is corruption between a university, foxconn and some local government.
Sony are the customer, and could share some blame, but honestly, this smacks of a couple of professors from the uni getting nice kickbacks (ie. "consultancy" fees) and everyone looking good to some local government officials for their "modern" internship programmes. That's generally how stuff works in China.