The problem with calling bloggers journalist are that it makes everyone a journalist.

I am beginning to think that this was a sting on Gizmodo to stop other Bloggers from offering a bounty on Apple IP. It was a risky move by Apple if true. I hope Apple was working with The Authorities if and when they did this.

Nonsense!

I post shitload of articles on my blog, and often post on different forum, did that make me a journalist too? And also grant me permission for doing anything???

I call it bullshit!

Blogger != Journalist

It would have been a lot more interesting if the giz story was about a mole inside Apple.

Engadget were offered the same deal but their legal advice was not to touch it with a barge pole.

3. I need more potion Getafix!

I’m also wondering if the guy receiving the $5000 is going to report it as income.

This case has had people citing the law that makes property stolen even if lost, if a just effort to return it to the rightful owner isn’t made, along with the finder using the item for personal enrichment. If these guys had simply paid the $5000 for the phone and just turned it over to Apple, I think they probably wouldn’t have been served with search warrants. What they did was disassemble the thing (I believe the penal code section that says “appropriates such property to his own use” would apply here), and admit to what they did publicly.

Splashing Apple’s stolen prototype all over the internet isn’t news, and it’s not journalism.

Apparently the people over at Gawker Media like to pretend they’re a lot of things they’re not. Technology websites are not part of the Press, Bloggers are not Journalists, and CEOs are not DAs.

1. I’ve stolen it out of his pocket
2. I just found it on a chair

the lines are so blurred today with facts being so obfuscated in the name of entertainment
and personal opinion ,where is the standard?
just because I write op-ed does it allow me to commit a felony?
what is the definition?

just the facts ma’am!

The police just need to proceed without trampling on the shield law.

I am absolutely, 100% sure this is a publicity stunt. Just look at what’s going on with this. Of all the times Steve has generated tons and tons of incalculable free exposure for his gadgets, this is the biggest winner of them all.

He might not have known exactly how it would play out, but he’s behind it ALL – the grand master of the baton controlling the every movement of his vast orchestra.

People now have the impression that this phone is so special that it deserves all this intrigue and police action. Many who never considered buying one will now have to have one. Sales of the new phone will surpass all previous totals.

My memory could be off here but didn’t the government claim the Pentagon Papers belonged to them?
Not great examples, but you get the idea.

GAH. I have been very clear on this, but I’ll repeat it…
I did not say that I thought this was a publicity stunt.
I said, first and foremost, that the original Gizmodo story was bullshit. In postulating what the real story might be, one of the possibilities was a publicity stunt, one was a sting on Giz, and there have been others. I do not know which is correct.

But let me stress this one more time – MY PRIMARY POSITION ON THIS was disbelief of the “Gray Loses Phone In Bar” story as written by Giz. I still don’t believe it. Other readers a quick to assume that means I think it was X, Y, or Z. This is incorrect. I DO NOT KNOW what the real story is, nor do I pretend to. SOme interesting theories have come up, and I have a few, but I’m not assuming any one of them is correct.

The original finder may have a slim, but possibly plausible (if corroborated) excuse for not returning the phone to the bar owner. Being (allegedly) drunk, he thought he returned it to its rightful owner and his story ends right there. However, this ‘friend’ who received it and proceeded to sell it has much less solid legal ground to stand on.

As for Gizmodo, their legal ground is pretty much quicksand.

If he paid $5,000 for a device that you can buy for $600 (an iPhone without contract) he knew something was very special about this phone. If he paid $600, he didn’t know it was anything other than just an ordinary iPhone. He paid $5,000.

Stolen or “lost property”? Has anyone in the history of mankind ever paid a high sum of money for a lost item they had zero connection with, photographed it, took it apart, then reported it as the revolutionary new device that only we have access to – and claimed then they didn’t know it was not a stolen device? No. Has anyone in the history of mankind ever paid a high sum of money for a device they knew damn good as well they were not supposed to have so they could get a scoop and make money off of it, then tried to lie their way out of it so as to not get into trouble for doing what the knew beyond a shadow of a doubt they should not be doing? Hell yes. Too many time to count.

Justify it any way you want. They are wrong and they knew it the whole time. I hope this “reporter” rots in jail for years as an example of what happens to people that commit felonies and then lie about it.

Hey, you need a journalistic intern?

Gizmodo.com, in its blindness to be “the first” to get their hands on a non public prototype device, committed a crime by

1) Purchasing a STOLEN device.
2) Publishing a report on a NON PUBLIC prototype device.

I also feel that the editor(s) should be treated as criminals, have a criminal record, and be put in jail for no less then 3 months AND the web site shut down during that time as well.

Reporting on RUMORS and speculation is one thing, but when someone commits a crime to get their hands on a prototype device AND publish a full page report about it HAS to be dealt with swiftly and quickly.

It seems to me that if you take money for something, you have claimed ownership of it. If the Finder had given the money to Gray or Apple it might be another situation. But the Finder KEPT THE MONEY. This (to me anyway) implies taking ownership of the phone and exchanging value for value. I don’t know how that’s not theft.

ok, so that might only be recalled by the older folks who frequent this site…

Yes.
As long as they are informing the general public and not just their grandmother. (I don’t think of my kids as journalists)

Does the Calif Shield Law apply here. As much as I don’t like Gizmodo, I have to say I don’t know.

Being dumb enough to tell the world you did it? Priceless.