The 4G iPhone's Finder Reportedly Located 404
CNET is reporting that investigators have interviewed the person who found the unreleased Apple iPhone and began all the trouble. Wired reports that last week people "identifying themselves as representing Apple last week visited and sought permission to search the Silicon Valley address of the college-age man who came into possession of a next-generation iPhone prototype." "'Someone came to [the finder's] house and knocked on his door,' the source told Wired.com, speaking on condition of anonymity because the case is under investigation by the police. A roommate answered, but wouldn't let them in. ... News of Apple's lost iPhone prototype hit the Web like a bombshell, but it was apparently an open secret for weeks amongst the finder's roommates and neighbors, where the device was shown around mostly as a curiosity. ... 'There was no effort to keep it secret,' the source said. 'There were a bunch of people who knew.' ... Wired.com received an e-mail March 28 offering access to the device, but did not follow up on the exchange after the tipster made a thinly veiled request for money."
Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:5, Insightful)
Agreed. Apparently, this guy thought when people say they're selling speakers that "fell off the back of a truck," it was a valid legal argument.
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Only idiots would buy speakers that "fell off the back of a truck", though I did once buy a truck that detached itself from speakers.
Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:5, Interesting)
The guy is an idiot. Instead of stealing the phone, he could have just taken lots of photos, including the insides.
He could then promptly return it to Apple, and openly auction off the photos. Apple would still scream blue murder and harass him with search warrants, but he would not be a criminal.
Heck, according to US government precedent, you could have sent it back in pieces.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viktor_Belenko [wikipedia.org]
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Very much so, considering he's already been lying to press and police about trying to sell it.
" "The idea wasn't to find out who was going to pay the most, it was, 'Who's going to confirm this?'"
BUSTED
If this goes to court they have a great case against the finder of the iPhone and Gizmodo. Can't sa
Apple can't obtain or act on search warrants (Score:4, Insightful)
"Apple would still scream blue murder and harass him with search warrants, but he would not be a criminal."
Apple can't obtain or act on search warrants. Apple can't charge or prosecute anyone for a crime.
The lack of even the most basic knowledge of how our system of justice works is just appalling. Do they put you kids through a civics course in school anymore?
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You kidding? Jason Chen at Gizmodo did nothing wrong. He notified Apple and promptly returned the phone. That did not stop Apple form getting the police to harass him by seizing his computers.
When you are as rich as Apple, cops and magistrates come easily.
Do they put you kids through a civics course in school anymore?
What is "civics"? My kids have something called "society and environment", but they learn sadly little about law and government in their own country, let along foreign ones.
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Apparently your kids are not going to learn from you either since you believe "Jason Chen did nothing wrong". The accounts written by the people accused of the crime do not even agree with the story you presented here. They did not notify Apple and promptly return it. They disassembled it , posted it on their web site and then demanded written communication they could also post on their web site before they were willing to return it.
Re:Apple can't obtain or act on search warrants (Score:5, Insightful)
Jason Chen at Gizmodo did nothing wrong. He notified Apple and promptly returned the phone.
Gizmodo: "Hi, Apple customer service? I think I have a new model of your iPhone here."
Apple: "Sorry, we don't know anything about that."
Gizmodo: "No? Okay, well I thought I'd try."
Gizmodo: "Here are the Facebook pics of the guy who lost the phone. Did we mention we paid $5000 to some dude to purchase this?"
Gizmodo: "We tried contacting Apple, but they wouldn't say anything."
Gizmodo: "See this information about the phone owner in Facebook? Haha. It's a public profile. What a shame there's no means to contact him from his Facebook profile."
Gizmodo: "Hey, we did nothing wrong. Totally good faith attempt on our part to contact Apple in order to return this."
Gizmodo: "Check this out. We took the fucking thing apart and here are detailed photos of what's inside it."
Gizmodo: "We have the utmost respect for whoever lost this as it's their personal property and we hope to return it shortly."
Gizmodo: "Damn, look at the design on this baby. Let's see if we can put it back together again and not have broken it."
Gizmodo: "We finally stalled enough that we coerced Apple legal into sending us a letter asking for its return. Cha-ching baby! We're fucking awesome. Did I mention we paid some dude $5000 after he claimed he 'found' it in a bar? We so fucking rock!"
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He paid someone for an item that he knew didn't belong to the person selling it.
'Nuff said.
Re:Apple can't obtain or act on search warrants (Score:5, Funny)
Apple can't obtain or act on search warrants. Apple can't charge or prosecute anyone for a crime. The lack of even the most basic knowledge of how our system of justice works is just appalling. Do they put you kids through a civics course in school anymore?
It must be nice to be that naive.
"Mr. Jobs draws a lot of water in this town, Doe. You don't draw shit. We got a nice quiet $50+ billion dollar company here, and I aim to keep it nice and quiet. So let me make something plain. I don't like you sucking around trying to sell our stolen prototypes, Doe. I don't like your jerk-off name, I don't like your jerk-off face, I don't like your jerk- off behavior, and I don't like you, jerk-off --do I make myself clear?"
But no, you're right, I'm sure the cops around there don't say "Heil" when Apple says "Sieg," or anything.
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If you find something on private property and then remove that item from the private property, you have stolen the item. Yes, a bar is private property. The proper course of action is to turn the item over to the owner of the property. If the owner of the property is not the owner of the item, they can hold it for the rightful owner or turn it over to the police. If the rightful owner does not claim their item within a certain time period then it can legally go to the finder, but that's after quite a lo
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There are 34 companies that have representatives on that committee. The assistant DA who requested the warrant said he didn't even know Apple was one of them.
Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:4, Insightful)
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I bet. They must be sooo angry about all this mysterious free hype and viral press coverage.
Conspiracy theory or not, leaving a partially crippled prototype of a near release ready product in a silicon valley bar and letting the internet take care of the rest comes across as good business one way or another.
I think apple and ATT are going to pull through this mess, I think their investors are going to do just fine regardless of what happens to this young journalist.
Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:5, Insightful)
I bet. They must be sooo angry about all this mysterious free hype and viral press coverage.
Press coverage does nothing for Apple when it's months away from anybody being able to buy it. Meanwhile, their competitors now have many months during which they can start cloning the design and/or features. Then, when Jobs launches the iPhone, everyone will say "Okay, but we knew that already. Nothing new here, folks." People won't be blown away by stuff they already knew.
What does that translate to? I'm guessing $50 million in lost opportunity cost. All the coverage is doing is potentially cannibalizing current iPhone sales if someone who was considering getting one now wants to wait. Additionally, their competitors now have an unfair advantage and will design their products not by guessing what Apple will be doing (as they normally do) but knowing what Apple will be doing. As a result, their competitors will save millions of dollars by not going down a course that they are now able to prevent. Further, all that wasted press coverage now means less when it actually launches. The hype and virality will be done by then. Oh, I'm sure it'll have some unexpected things... but the reduction will mean many more millions of dollars in free press that they won't get when it matters: when people can buy/preorder it.
The leg up that their competitors will receive from this information will have a ripple effect for years to come. That extra however many percent market share they are able to squeeze out by proactively countering (or sabotaging, even) Apple's strategy in a several billion dollar market is a huge cost to Apple.
Yeah, Jobs isn't going to be collecting food stamps and eating nothing but ramen noodles but this has a significant financial cost to Apple.
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How about making the next guy think twice before selling an Apple prototype for a couple grand?
I bet that's worth quite a bit of money to Apple.
Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:5, Insightful)
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It looks like Wired and several other periodicals may end up getting brought into court on this case to provide testimony.
This is turning into a big story for the media.
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Yeah, Wired won't pay you to give them somebody else's property, but they'll gladly accept it for free.
Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:5, Informative)
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Is it stolen if you lose it?
Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:4, Interesting)
with this mindset, you may find yourself trying to justify people getting beaten with baseball bats when they tried to jailbreak an iphone in 4-5 years in future.
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Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, in California selling lost property is equivalent to selling stolen property under certain conditions, mostly depending on whether the person who found it made reasonable efforts to return it to the owner first.
Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:5, Insightful)
So if someone finds your wallet at a bar, you're ok with them selling it? After all, in your view, it's only "lost property" and people "do this all the time" ... be careful what you wish for.
The correct, and easiest, course of action would have been for the person who "found it" to immediately hand it over to the barkeep.
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last i read, he tried to contact apple to return it and they denied it was theirs.
That fact alone is probably going to be the key to what legal actions get taken where. (hope he recorded the call or something of the like)
If the actual owner of the item denies it's theirs, that makes it impossible to return to the owner, which would seem to satisfy the requirements before taking ownership of lost property?
Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:4, Insightful)
That fact alone is probably going to be the key to what legal actions get taken where. (hope he recorded the call or something of the like)
The law even specifically states you do not have to even attempt to return it to the owner. There are provisions for protecting you if you are in posession of the stolen property WHILE trying to return it to the owner, but the only requirement is turning the property into the police.
Gizmodo is NOT the police, so he didn't obide by the law.
Hint: Returning it to the owner is not part of what makes it legal or not.
If the actual owner of the item denies it's theirs, that makes it impossible to return to the owner, which would seem to satisfy the requirements before taking ownership of lost property?
He tried returning it to Apple, but it is not Apples phone anyway, it's Gray Powell's phone.
So not only did you show he did not even try to return it to the owner, but instead tried to return it to the company that made the product, but on top of that, neither of those two actions make what he did legal or illegal.
Not giving it to the police is what made it illegal.
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No, it's Apple's phone. When companies allow (or ask) people to test pre-release units for them they do not become property of the tester - particularly when the tester in question is an employee. I regularly beta test hardware for several companies and it's always very clear that I don't own it (otherwise I could simply sell it to Gizmodo myself), but usually on completion of the testing they will give me one of the
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I completely agree that the obvious thing to do as the innocent finder is to assume it's a normal phone and that it's owned by the person carrying it (an aside: I carry a blackberry every day which is owned by my employer). However it's also obvious that the finder in this case at some point realized what it really was, and moreover, he claims he had no way of contacting the tester. Under those circumstances, trying to return it to Apple actually seems very reasonable to me.
If I were to find someone's brief
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He tried returning it to Apple, but it is not Apples phone anyway, it's Gray Powell's phone.
So you consider a prototype, that an engineer for a company is using for testing and development purposes to not belong to the company? Even though I would guarantee it was ISSUED to him, for testing purposes? I doubt if it was GIVEN to him for his own personal use, and to keep as his own property. IMO the phone was being used by Gray, but belonged to Apple. Just like your computer at work is the property of the company, but is issued to you for your use.
Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:5, Insightful)
He claims (or rather Gizmodo claimed) that he called Apple's tech support line, which is staffed by people who don't work for Apple directly, and in call centres nowhere near the headquarters. They're not going to know about a prototype, and would either assume it was a prank call, or say they cannot help him, but to call Apple directly.
Apple's PR number is listed on their site right next to the tech support one, and that one actually *is* staffed by Apple employees in the HQ in California.
Either way, his next step should have been handing it to the police and signing an affidavit stating when and where he found the property (California law) if he didn't know who to return it to (and seriously, come on - do you buy the idea that he would believe Apple wouldn't want their prototype back if he had bothered to try to get through to someone actually at Apple HQ, for example, their PR department rather than their tech support). If no one claims it after a certain time, he can then keep it (and sell it on).
He could also have walked around the corner to Apple's HQ and said "hey guys, is this your lost iPhone prototype?"
Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:5, Insightful)
People keep posting that, but I just find it so disingenuous.
It just sounds like he didn't make any real effort. Even ignoring the California "take it to the police" forfeiture law, it just doesn't sound like an ethical thing to do. If he took that to Apple headquarters, my guess is he could have received an award. He might have gotten a tour of Apple, some money, a chance to meet The Great Steve, a promise of a free iPhone 4G on launch day (or many be a free iPad). He couldn't have been a small hero.
I would even accept selling pictures of the thing to Giz (or someone else) and then turning it back in. At least he turned it back in.
Instead, he went for a payday. Then Giz got it and took 3 weeks to decide it was real and notify Apple, after cracking it open and posting all sorts of stuff about it. Then they named the poor guy who lost it and posted pics of his Facebook profile, which seems like rubbing salt in a wound.
Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:4, Insightful)
Are you kidding? This guy contacted at least three major media outlets before Gizmodo bought it! This guy made tons of effort (to sell stolen property).
Has anyone pointed out he thought it was a 3GS and still stole it? Hello? If you find a phone in a bar, do you:
a) take it home and take it apart
b) turn it in to the bartender
Forgetting the fact that it was the new "4G" this guy is still a huge creep. I wouldn't be surprised if he has a criminal background
I dunno.... I get a lot of what happened, really . (Score:3, Interesting)
First off, people keep saying the finder should have "returned the phone to the bar/bartender". That's insanity! Most bars I've been to, I *hardly* trust the bartender or other staff not to just lie to me, promising they'll "try to get it back to the rightful owner" and then just turn around and sell it themselves! Especially in a part of the country where a large portion of the clientele are fairly "tech savvy"? How can you be remotely confident the people working there wouldn't have some personal inte
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Did anyone else read TFA? He didn't sell it, he sold exclusivity to a news story regarding it. Extremely different.
Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:5, Insightful)
Even IF the seller had gone to every effort to find and return the item to it's owner and failed*, it would only become his legal possession after 90 days. Selling something you don't own without the permission of the owner is an act of theft. What part are you not understanding?
* (Not that he did go to any reasonable effort at all. There were plenty of avenues to return the phone to Apple or the engineer or the police, all but perhaps one of which were not taken.)
Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:4, Informative)
The part about having to wait 90 days. You don't have to do that. The asshole lost it.
No you don't have to do that. Mind you if it's more than a few hundred bucks you have to give it to the cops for 90 days so they can run an ad in the paper looking for the owner, or they'll arrest you for theft. But no, you don't have to do it. They also don't have to let you out of a small cell after you're convicted of grand theft either.
Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:5, Informative)
Wrong.
California law regulates what you can do when you find lost property in the state. Section 2080 of the Civil Code provides that any person who finds and takes charge of a lost item acts as "a depositary for the owner." If the true owner is known, the finder must notify him/her/it within a reasonable time and "make restitution without compensation, except a reasonable charge for saving and taking care of the property." Id. 2080. If the true owner is not known and the item is worth more than $100, then the finder has a duty to turn it over to the local police department within a reasonable time. Id. 2080.1. The owner then has 90 days to claim the property. Id. 2080.2. If the true owner fails to do so and the property is worth more than $250, then the police publish a notice, and 7 days after that ownership of the property vests in the person who found it, with certain exceptions. Id. 2080.3.
http://www.citmedialaw.org/blog/2010/lost-and-found-california-law-and-next-generation-iphone [citmedialaw.org]
Well given his job title, I'd say he's a very intelligent engineer, not an ignorant jerk like yourself.
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But Section 2080 of the Civil Code is not the Penal Code. He can't be jailed for violatin
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That is the civil code
Lost property is dealt with under both civil and criminal statutes in California. Gizmodo and the original finder may be in violation of California's civil code, but that has absolutely nothing to do with the criminal code, and whether what they did is illegal (in the felonious sense). The criminal code only requires a 'reasonable and just' effort be made. Violating the civil code might open up Giz and the finder to a lawsuit, but given that the property has already been returned that
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The part about having to wait 90 days. You don't have to do that. The asshole lost it.
California law states you are incorrect.
There is no such thing as 'lost' property to the law. If it is lost, the law calls that stolen.
There is also an entire checklist of things one can do to avoid 'being in possession of stolen property' while he had possession of the lost phone, and did not do them.
Sure some people say he might have tried returning it to Apple, but the laws don't list trying to return it as a condition of the lost property to not be considered stolen. So who cares?
I understand you don'
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It most certainly does not. California Penal Code 485 states in full:
Right
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His argument is irrelevant. Criminals ALWAYS have an argument. His actions of taking $5000 in exchange for a phone that didn't belong to him are what is relevant.
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"Finders keepers, losers weepers" is not an adequate foundation for a civilized legal architecture.
Socrates said that, or Confucius or someone like that. Chuck Norris, maybe.
Re:Sold Stolen Property to Highest Bidder (Score:5, Funny)
Why the hell do so many people think he did something evil?
It made Steven Jobs angry. So naturally all his flying monkeys are going to swirl around with fury. Also, this is apple.slashdot.org not the real Slashdot, so this stuff is to be expected.
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I've cited the evidence that you are wrong as an answer to another thread.
Remember he only has the obligation because he picked the item up. If he couldn't be bothered locating the owner and returning the item, he should have left it where it was or handed it the the barman.
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RTFA- or maybe any of the last dozen or so:
http://codes.lp.findlaw.com/cacode/PEN/3/1/13/5/s485 [findlaw.com]
One who finds lost property under circumstances which give him knowledge of or means of inquiry as to the true owner, and who appropriates such property to his own use, or to the use of another person not entitled thereto, without first making reasonable and just efforts to find the owner and to restore the property to him, is guilty of theft.
Thats not radical or unique to CA- and its common fucking sense.
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didn't he say he tried to call apple and they denied it was theirs?
If that's the case, wouldn't it make that entire snippet of code irrelevant?
Makes me wonder what the legal status of an object is if it's abandoned in the public, and the owner denies being the owner? Doesn't it then at that instant become nobody's property, and "finders keepers"?
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IANAL so I don't know how it'll all shake out, but-
The 'finder' certainly knew one thing about its ownership: it wasn't his.
He sold it for $5000.
Upstream is CA code for found items worth more than $250, and he certainly didn't follow them.
Bottom line- if you don't want to be responsible for what the last guy left sitting on the stool- don't take it!
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He called one of what 10,000+ apple employees and asked if they lost a phone. What did he do call the local apple retail store? WHO at Apple did he talk to.
I dare you pick up the phone right now and call any major corporation and try talking to them about returning stolen property. Unless you knew who lost the phone and called him at his home would you stand any chance of actually returning it.
I can practically guarantee the guy never called the apple employee, and never once tried to find him in the pho
Knock Knock (Score:4, Funny)
Not a land shark [wikipedia.org]
Who?
Oh, for Christ sake, it's Steve F'ing Jobs. Give me my phone back or I'll send the Steve Balmer Chair Delivery Service to wreck the place!
Obligatory YouTube Link... (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't Talk to the Police [youtube.com]
Re:Obligatory YouTube Link... (Score:5, Insightful)
This isn't a troll. It is a law school professor explaining why that interacting with the police can lead to trouble for you down the road, even if you're innocent, and even if you say only things that would point towards you being innocent. Cops have absolutely no requirement to quote you in context, and out-of-context quotes can make a completely innocent statement sound strange. Furthermore, while cops can use anything you say AGAINST you in a court of law, if you ask them to repeat something you said that would help your case, that would be heresay, and therefore can not help you.
The cop's followup to the law school professor's talk is less interesting, but the very least it validates most of what the law school professor said.
So, indeed, do not talk to cops when you can avoid doing so.
IANAL, but I did watch the video in its entirety and you should at least watch the first half too.
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I agree that the video is good, however be careful not to have a false sense of knowledge just because you watched it. The video shows that there is too much for a common person to understand and thus they should let the lawyers help them make decisions in legal matters. Your statement:
"Furthermore, while cops can use anything you say AGAINST you in a court of law, if you ask them to repeat something you said that would help your case, that would be heresay, and therefore can not help you."
shows that while
funny headline (Score:5, Funny)
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You can run Mini vMac on it:
http://aoc.3lavie.com/2009/02/mac-os-classic-on-iphone.html [3lavie.com]
Re:funny headline (Score:4, Insightful)
Ah, you mean the OS that Steve Jobs' company made, not the one made by Steve Jobs' company!
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Mmmhmm, because OS X is literally byte for byte identical to NextStep.
No sir, no work done on that.
You'll also note that there are a fair few Next employees at Apple at the moment, including the CEO - maybe you've heard of him?
Sympathy? (Score:2)
Far more interesting (Score:3, Interesting)
Police broke into and searched Gizmodo journalist Jason Chen's home, seizing basically every piece of technology in his home, under an apparently illegal warrant:
Check it out [gizmodo.com].
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apparently illegal warrant
Yes, let's trust the legal opinion of the lawyer who apparently thought it was a great idea for a newspaper to buy stolen property and announce it all over the internet.
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They took a box of business cards, too (first item in the inventory). I'm still trying to figure that one out.
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Perhaps the "finder" had one of he business cards in his possession. It would provide evidence to connect the two of them.
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But a box (as opposed to one)? And besides, if the finder (or thief depending on who you believe) had one in his possession it has the information on it to point to whoever it refers to (generally being the point of a business card, I think). It just sounds odd, though you are probably right.
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Um... yeah. Because apparently someone working for Gizmodo committed a felony.
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The warrant is still interesting though; in these electronic times, the police will take all your computers, hard drives, phones, cameras, and routers, because there "might" be relevant data secreted on them. Yea
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Re:Far more interesting (Score:4, Insightful)
...under an apparently illegal warrant...
Well sure, if you believe gizmodo's claims and their somewhat stretched interpretation of the journalist protection laws.
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eff believes it.
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The EFF believes that if Jason Chen is not charged with a crime, then the search is illegal. If he is charged with a crime, then his protection as a journalist goes out the window. They can't act on a warrant, impound materials that implicate his source, then let him go. He has to be the target of the investigation for this to be legal. Journalists don't get a free pass to commit crimes just because they write about the crimes they've committed.
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How on earth is it "somewhat stretched"? He is employed as a full time journalist by a multi-outlet publishing organization, and California law clearly recognizes that internet journalists/bloggers are covered under shield laws. Regardless of the rights or wrongs of their handling of the phone itself, it's pretty obvious that the police royally screwed up [eff.org] this part of the investigation.
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What causes you to say it was an illegal warrant?
The state started a criminal trial (Keep in mind no one has to ask them to do this, they do it on their own. Even if you specifically DON'T want them pressing criminal charges against someone that did a crime to you, they can NOT stop the charges at your request)
The thing to do between when charges are brought, and no evidence is in hand, is to get a warrant to search for said evidence.
100% of the conditions for a warrant are in place and OK.
So where is the
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How about the EFF [eff.org]? As has been explained on a whole host of articles about this, if you want evidence from a journalist covered under shield laws you use a subpoena - NOT a search warrant. That allows the proper process to be followed to ensure that sources aren't improperly identified and journalistic freedom, public interest, etc are protected. While it may not matter in this case, journalistic freedom IS important to help protect society and that's why the
Gizmodo warrant? (Score:2, Interesting)
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The EFF fights for the right cause but is not automatically right. Just being a journalist does not mean you're allowed to deal with stolen goods.
By the way, the Gawker/Gizmodo guys obviously don't think they're journalists themselves:
"We don’t seek to do good,” says Denton, wearing a purplish shirt, jeans and a beard that resembles a three-day growth. “We may inadvertently do good. We may inadvertently commit journalism. That is not the institutional intention." [washingtonpost.com]
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The take away from that is that you can't trust the opinion of the EFF. They're so wrong, it shows them to be incompetent. Journalists have no protection from the law if they are under investigation for a felony. The felony being purchasing stolen goods.
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I'm no lawyer, but lets assume that EFF is right and the warrant is invalid. Wouldn't this only protect Gizmodo and not the iPhone seller? Gizmodo could get damages or something if the warrant was invalid, but any evidence found against the seller can still be used in court.
Either way, they probably have other sources who can verify the identity of the seller.
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If they only found the seller because of information that they recovered due to the warrant, then it all goes out the window. Don't you watch CSI:Miami?
Re:Gizmodo warrant? - Nope (Score:2)
I wonder if they found him using the Gizmodo journalist's computer, which according to the EFF, was an illegal warrant.
The answer to your question is "no". Read this quote form the DA in the San Jose Business Journal:
“I told (Gizmodo) we will hold off and not do any investigation into the computer itself while we resolve this issue,” he said, adding that if attorneys 'come to the conclusion that Chen is not protected, Gizmodo may seek an injunction preventing investigators from moving forward and examining the computers.'
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<rant>
Not totally related to parent, butI know it is very popular right now to say, "Apple = bad, Google/open source = good," right now on slashdot. This is really
Dilbert's take on this all (Score:3, Interesting)
Seen on the blog:
http://dilbert.com/blog/entry/thatlost4gphone/ [dilbert.com]
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You're not the only person who has been thinking that, but your company is surely getting thinner every day.
Re: (Score:3)
If Apple pursues this Gizmodo should do discovery on Apple's emails to confirm it wasn't a publicity stunt.
The most annoying thing about this whole thing is the free press Apple is getting out of it. Fuck them.
I don't know if I like Apple but I do surely know now that I don't like Gizmodo. Or people selling stuff found in a bar without asking the bartender about the owner.
Apple wouldn't do a stunt like this (Score:2)
Apple have nothing to gain by leaking the iPhone 4.0, they wouldn't attempt viral marketing like this.
When the iPhone 4.0 is launched at its conference and Steve Jobs proudly declares they have "innovated" by inventing Video Phone Calls, Optical Zoom and multi-tasking to receive a standing ovation, that's all the viral marketing they need.
Someone jumping the gun on them only ruins that shock and awe ceremony.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Apple isn't going after gizmodo.
The People of California are investigating a company who paid for stolen goods, disassembled said goods, and talked with everyone but the apple employee who lost the phone.
if this case goes to trial it won't be a civilian case, but a criminal one. Apple can't touch gizmodo for this. California however can try him for dealing with stolen goods.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
They knew where the phone was when they bricked it using the "Find my iPhone" feature. Makes you wonder why did not ring the doorbell earlier.
Finding doesn't work with 4.0 beta yet (but bricking works).
Re: (Score:2)
Please no Finder on iPhone! My god, you guys on slashdot complain about its shoddy software already. It doesn't need the added burden of the Finder!
(also, Apple, please rewrite Finder - it's a pain in the ass)
Re:So this is STILL not evil on the side of Apple (Score:4, Insightful)
last story, there were people who were defending apple and maintained that no linkage of evil could be established about the prosecution regarding the iphone dismantlers. it turns out that 'representatives' of apple went out to a private citizen's quarters, and intending to search the premises.
Yeah and if I lost a valuable phone and the anti-theft feature told my boss where it was, he might send people to ask the owner of the house if they could come in and find it too. How is that evil? Mind you the home owner has every right to refuse and make them call the cops who will get a warrant to come in and look for it.
so, a private corporation sends 'representatives' to search people's homes ... will there be anyone that would come up and defend this, i wonder ...
If they have reason to believe their stolen property is in someone's home, they have every right to go ask if they can come in and look for it. If you lost your phone and location tracked it to a house would it be evil for you to ask the residents if you can come in and look for it?
Stealing the phone someone lost at the bar is unethical. Selling it to the highest bidder is unethical. Looking for your lost property... not unethical.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah and if I lost a valuable phone and the anti-theft feature told my boss where it was, he might send people to ask the owner of the house if they could come in and find it too. How is that evil? Mind you the home owner has every right to refuse and make them call the cops who will get a warrant to come in and look for it.
it is evil, because individual citizens are NOT police and the executors of justice. its a step away from thuggery.
If they have reason to believe their stolen property is in someone's home, they have every right to go ask if they can come in and look for it. If you lost your phone and location tracked it to a house would it be evil for you to ask the residents if you can come in and look for it?
Stealing the phone someone lost at the bar is unethical. Selling it to the highest bidder is unethical. Looking for your lost property... not unethical.
no, they dont have any right to conduct vigilante justice or search anyone's home even with permission. there is a reason why private investigators have to obtain licenses, and it is precisely to prevent the above from happening.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:So this is STILL not evil on the side of Apple (Score:3, Insightful)
What did Apple do here? The prosecutor's office (or investigating detective) decided to look into this. A judge decided that the search was reasonable. The police executed it.
I don't see Apple anywhere in there. The only thing Apple has to do with any of this is that they were hurt (through revealing of the device, and loss of their property) and have probably filed a report to the police to that effect.
If this happened to Garmin, don't you think they'd talk to the police and say "hey that's ours"? Dell w
Re: (Score:2)
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/04/dude-apple/ [wired.com]
SOME PEOPLE saying that they were REPRESENTING APPLE came to the guy's apartment asked to search the apartment. not prosecutor's office or investigating detective.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
It's a free country. You are allowed to go to someone's door and ask them a question, and ask to come in. They can say no. If you keep it up, they can call the cops and have you arrested for trespassing/harassment. But asking "can I come in to talk to
Re:Nothing to see here, move along. (Score:5, Funny)
As an Apple shareholder my friend keeps reminding me that they're in fact doing good.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
You have not read any of the articles. It was bricked in under 24 hours.