dmonkyking

April 30, 2010 at 8:40am

I think their only crime was their stupidity in paying $5000 for an Apple product.  No bias there from Gizmodo.

naxself

April 29, 2010 at 9:13am

And Steve Jobs's dream of an Apple-dominated police state comes closer to fruition!

ajax344

April 29, 2010 at 7:40am

Sue the bastards, if apple claimed ownership and they didn't give it up THEN its stolen property. If i lose somthing, and  dont claim to have lost anything and someone finds it, and I dont claim its mine, its not their fault.

punditguy

April 29, 2010 at 6:44am

I think the more interesting question is whether or not this incident will inhibit Gizmodo's reflexive fellating of Apple at every opportunity. Since I only visit the site with the "not:Apple" tag, I may never find out.

___________________________________________

Preferred boot, but will give this Maximum PC thing a try.

optionboy16

April 29, 2010 at 6:44am

So, initially I was on the "You KNOWINGLY bought stolen property boat" but after reading this arcticle from Wired, I changed my mind....

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/04/iphone-raid/

bart3385

April 29, 2010 at 6:21am

Gizmodo should sue the police. The police should be made to pay the highest possible penalty/damages possible allowed by law. And publish a public apology on all broadsheets.

 

Also, Jobs should be investigated. He's going nuts doing all this. He may need professional help.

yammerpickle2

April 28, 2010 at 8:58pm

I work with prototypes.  To be brief there are several security protocols for staff and equipment that would make it basically impossible to remove a prototype from secured areas.  This can be waived, but not without several high level people signing off in person to authorize the release.  Apple as an organization had to know the prototype was in the wild.  If you work with prototypes you know anytime they are let loose into the wild there are risks.  Where I work we have protocols for managing these risks during the rare times prototypes do leave secured areas, and they do not involve hanging out in a crowed bar to grab a drink.  I suspect Apple is upset that their publicity stunt was too transparent and may hurt current iPhone sales and needs to save face and blame somebody outside of the organization to make it look unintentional.  . 

Reede

April 28, 2010 at 7:37pm

but I have a doubt they will win. The fact of the matter is they broke the law. It is illegal to buy stolen property. If you ask my opinion on what this will do to online journalism I would probably say, not much. This is a case where Gizmodo is severely in the wrong. I mean, I don't like Apple, but that doesn't give someone the right to steal their hardware. As for Gizmodo, I have to doubt they didn't willingly buy it knowing it shouldn't have been going to them. I mean this is a company where employee's have committed suicide for similar problems. Sorry Gizmodo, but you guys really should have seen this coming. 

quickone

April 28, 2010 at 6:28pm

I'm not into law but it seems that it wouldn't apply here because the
reason for the search was to determine if they broke the law, not to
get information that the journalist acquired about a crime which is what
I
believe the shield law is about.  

Seems like Gizmogo is going
to have to prove the person who found the phone didn't steal it and he
and them made a legit effort to return it.  

 

~~The difference between insanity and genius is merely succes~~

Thursday

April 28, 2010 at 6:21pm

Freedom of the press is important, in not only the US and Canada, but in any truly transparent democracy. Even if Gizmodo did cross the line for buying "stolen" property, the case still needs to be vigorously defended. When corporations and governments can selectively use the law to silence or penalize the press it is just another form of censorship.

And let’s be honest here…how are they going to prove anything? You cannot make a journalist give up their sources for something as petty as stolen property. To top it off, the only way shield law doesn’t apply is if the person being prosecuted was involved in the crime. All this particular editor did was craft the story. Some dude from his parent company paid for the phone. And as soon as Apply requested it back they returned it. This wasn’t corporate espionage. This isn’t Mission Impossible style, rappelling down a rope into a secure building to steal the prototype. Grey Powell (the Apple software engineer) goes to a bar to show off the new phone (probably trying to impress the ladies…or dudes, whatever) and he lost it. The guy who found it didn’t reach into his pocket to steal it. He even said he inadvertently left it at the bar. The fact that the police and the DA are involved in this is amazing. The fact that a journalist’s office was raided and his personal records confiscated is outrageous. They should be ashamed of themselves, and I hope they are reprimanded to avoid this becoming a bad precedent.

Havok

April 28, 2010 at 6:16pm

 Yeah, they 'stole' a prototype 'iPhone' for 5000 bucks. On a more humorous note, Rooster Teeth has made a couple of awesome gags about this. Worth looking into. And as for online journalism, Walt Mosspuppet put it nicely, "Hey, I sent you a link, oh good! I'll send you a link also. Hey!, look-it that! We're online journalists!"

 

 

YES! This post made it through the Spam Filter!

JohnP

April 28, 2010 at 5:59pm

 The phone was bought knowing that it belonged to a particular person. No contact with the owner or his permission was made before the purchase. That is called buying stolen goods.