What I don’t understand is: how can the agreement be a secret? Yes they say that in the agreement is says that you are forbidden from talking about the agreement. But what if I don’t sign? (and choose not to be an iPhone developer). What in the world could they enforce? I suppose they could have an agreement you have to sign just in order to see the actual agreement. That can’t be right, can it?
You’ve figured it out.
All they can do is yank your developer status if you do something that they don’t like. The agreement isn’t secret - you know what’s in it. You are just forbidden to discuss it. If you want to discuss it, don’t agree to it, and don’t plan on being a developer.
It just seems odd that this would be a highly anticipated “secret” agreement. If anyone were interested in seeing what this agreement said, couldn’t they just say they want to be a developer, get shown the agreement to sign (as a first step) and then just not sign it?
I think the goal is to prevent a lot of chatter in the blogosphere. Basically, Apple doesn’t want developers whining in public about some part of the agreement. Whether it’s “right” or “fair” or even desirable is a different matter.
They could make you sign a non-disclosure agreement before showing you the actual secret agreement.
I am failing to see the big deal on this one.
For one, I agree with the OP that this is so trivially easy to get a hold of that slapping a FOIA on NASA to get it is just ridiculous.
Also, thousands of people must have seen this document over the last 3 years. If it leaked, how would they know who leaked it? Anyone could just mail it to anyone else and Apple would have no idea of who to punish.
Lastly, is there anything really different between this and any other NDA? I have done many betas of games and the NDA I blissfully click away without a read all promise to take my children if I even post on some general interest message board about having seen one. Not to mention the EULA on every piece of software we are all running.
What’s the fuss about this?
…but they don’t. The agreement is visible to anyone who goes through the first few steps of the iPhone developer process. The “license is so secret we had to make NASA violate it just to see it” stuff is just the usual spin from the organization that wrote the misleading article that started this dumb meme.
FWIW (I’m an Apple developer, and I hope this won’t get me banned 
– Apple is borderline notorious for the tight reign they keep on their intellectual property. I probably sign a new Developer’s Agreement (they pop up online whenever Apple feels like delivering a new one) every month.
I suspect that obtaining it via FOIA request allows the EFF to publish it without worrying about being sued by Apple. Otherwise, it would have been all over the net already.