No, not last year’s Halloween costume. It seems that Apple is suing three college students over violation of an NDA and a few other charges. Apple is mute on the issue, but a number of developers for the Mac gave a few words in an interview at DrunkenBlog.

I don’t know the details of the case, but from what I’ve heard the students did share a pre-release version of the upcoming Mac OS X Tiger. While I may not agree with the law that allows this, I agree that Apple is legally given the right to go after these people. Fortunately, and this is one of the few situations I think this is fortunate, companies need to worry about their public image. I hope that awareness of this case will reach sufficient mass to cause Apple to consider that whatever reasons they might have for being tough on these students might not be good enough, and that the students’ actions (which had almost nil affect on Apple) do not warrant this kind of behavior.

Don’t shoot yourself in the foot Apple. I’ve liked you as a company up to now, and that is very rare. Either drop the suits or release a public statement explaining why you feel it is necessary to pursue them - a legitimate reason, none of this “setting an example” bullshit people have been speculating on.