> I think it was widely assumed that he was gay

By who, Apple fanboys? Your average person probably doesn't even know who is Apple's current CEO let alone that he's gay.

There were at least a couple of places where it was mentioned earlier this year (and it was kind of "known" in the past too).

Two links from April 2014: Out Magazine - http://www.out.com/out-exclusives/power-50/2014/04/15/what-d...

HuffPo (about the same) - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/27/out-power-50-most-p...

You'd have to be a weirdly obsessive anti-gay to spend your spare time perusing Out magazine or lists of most influential homosexuals, though I suppose such people do exist and you'd also have to be pretty weirdly obsessive to refrain from purchasing from a corporation on account of the sexual orientation of a member of its management team.

I'm gay, politically aware, and posting on HN on a MacBook and had no idea, though frankly I also don't browse LGBT power lists.

I don't think so. I'm not the poster you were replying to, I don't care if he's gay, and I don't go read such lists either. The CNBC 'outing' came up either on my facebook trends or on HN, that's the only two ways I get news these days.

Tech media mainly.

Not just tech media - anyone who follows GLBT politics and rights assumed it too.

I had no idea whatsoever. I've never seen this clip before and that was totally an accidental outed.

I actually can think of one co-worker who might have some difficulty with this news today...

I think the issue was that although Tim Cook was not secretive about being gay, he had never publicly spoken about it. The CNBC guy got a lot of flak, but as many mentioned, there are several other places where Cook was identified as a gay man before that clip, so the backlash was a little unfair. It can be awkward to differentiate between public knowledge and "open secrets" when someone hasn't officially come out.

Wow. That doesn't sound like an accident - you don't say someone "is fairly open about being gay" unless you're damn sure they are. What an unpleasant person.

Maybe he listened to NPR two weeks earlier and heard Melissa Block say on the air that Tim Cook was openly gay.

http://www.npr.org/2014/06/13/321778926/letters-the-world-cu...

Outed is not the same as out.

If you heard the regular personality on NPR's "Here And Now" say that someone was openly gay, you would assume he was out.

That's where I learned it. I didn't know for a few weeks later that it was supposed to be a secret we didn't say.

I would wonder why I'd never heard it right from the only person qualified to say, find that he hadn't said it, and doubt the credibility of the person who reported it as true. But I also know what it's like to be afraid of being outed to people you're not out to, so maybe it's different if you don't have that fear.

I'd typically interpret "openly" as implying "out", though.

If your job was to blather on air day after day for however many hours you'd probably say a couple dumb things too. Everyone has "known" Tim Cook was gay forever so it's not a hard mistake to make.

How did everyone know? Or even, guess? I assume there are a few factors which generally correlate with being gay, such as never being seen dating a girl or trying to stick with gay fashions?

It's weird.

There once was a time where, if you were gay, or were close to people who were, you'd pick up hints about others who were gay. These hints would come from others who were gay, or gay-friendly. And they would be passed along like that.

As you moved closer to circles of power, you'd know more and more powerful people who were gay. But there was a code: you didn't bring it up publicly, or with outsiders. (Unless you wanted to be cruel.)

With this knowledge came power. You could read people and situations, understand hints and special relationships. It's a kind of x-ray vision.

But, if you were not gay, and were not close to people who were, you would be completely unaware. You might assume you didn't know anyone who was gay!

Such people were surprised when Rock Hudson (who everyone knew) was outed as gay just before he died of AIDS in 1985. They were surprised when other public figures were outed the same way, even (seriously!) "obvious" cases like Liberace.

We are now somewhere between that world (which was complex and had fascinating intrigues) and a different world (which is more open and fairer).

Source: before I met my wife, I didn't know anyone who was gay. But in fact, I was just ignorant that I already did.

I knew because NPR told me. I knew he was gay before I knew it was supposed to be a secret, so if I were on that panel I would have said pretty much the same thing.

Hey, how awesome of you to drag stereotypes into this …

If you had read the article it should become quite clear to you why quite a few people knew and some people even wrote about it.

Since in general journalists will avoid to publish the sexual orientation of someone unless that person made public statements about it, most journalists just didn’t write about it. (I think that’s exactly the right guideline to follow. It is awesome when people come out to help others who are struggling, but this is still a personal decision and I don’t think journalists should make that decision for people. There should never be an obligation to come out.)

> Hey, how awesome of you to drag stereotypes into this ...

Is it criticism? Because if it is, it's misplaced. I did read the article. I am myself gay. According to the other answers, it seems it was known "in the scene". Do you mean everyone who's gay should either be in the scene or stop asking questions?

> it should become quite clear to you why quite a few people knew

It didn't become clear to me. Does that mean I don't get social clues? Does that mean I'm not fluent in English? Does that mean I miss a brain cell? People are different, we don't all understand things, so even if it seems unbelievable to you, please still answer the question.

I knew because of all of the gay people who participated in a particular active social scene. It was common knowledge in that gay community, and had been since he took over at apple.

I never really questioned it, because... because it was common knowledge. No one ever mentioned that he wasn't out, so I wrongly assumed he was fully out until I heard about that newscaster who messed up.

I figured (wrongly) that the reason it was never mentioned publicly was because no one thought it was comment-worthy. I naively thought "oh good, look how far we've come".

Gawker makes sure to mention it every time they cover him. I trusted Gawker on that one since Nick Denton is gay as well

Then you'd think he would be better about not treating someone as fully out when it's not clear he's out to more than friends and family.

Well it was all over the media; I'm assuming through reports of people close to him?

That's a mistake but it should be a career limiting mistake nonetheless.

To me this is like saying if you've ever written a bug into production software it should be career-limiting.

A more apt comparison would be to accidentally reveal a hidden feature of your application to the public.

It's apt because it's a small mistake with potentially bad consequences that is just an inevitable result of the work.

Disclosures of that nature are not at the same order as writing bugs into production software.

Except a bug in production software can disclose that same thing, except on a much more massive scale than a human? Almost any mistake a human can make can be translated into software and expanded by many magnitudes with a software bug.

True - writing bugs into production software can be far, far worse. For example, leaking patient health information from a medical database.

I disagree, which is why I chose that analogy.

It is interesting to read this. Not that I have any evidence, but I was under the impression that Apple was already more attractive to the gay community than the other companies...I would not be surprise if this will increase this section of their target market.

Apple, Google, and Microsoft all rank very high as inclusive companies, along with many of the big tech companies. When it comes to buying phones and other gadgets, from my circle of friends, the gay community is pretty much aligned with the general population in terms of the mix of choices. While we're happy to see a CEO be openly gay, it's not going to change our buying habits.

I guess I could be wrong, but I know I certainly won't to exchange my Xperia Z3 for an iPhone just because Cook came out.