I agree, that Gizmodo acted wrong and should be punished. They bought stolen goods, period.
The problem is that them hiding behind a shield law isn't totally nuts. What if someone leaked them something that was actually in the public interest--something important for people to know, but that could still be considered a trade secret. We certainly don't want the courts deciding what's "important" news and what isn't, do we? If not then how do we protect one without the other?
We already protect one and not the other. If the seller had only provided Gizmodo with the information they published (photos, teardowns, etc.) instead of the phone itself, Gizmodo probably wouldn't be in any legal trouble and the seller's identity would likely be protected by the shield laws.
Yeah I think they were pretty dumb to disclose all of the details of the story, they should have just taken it apart, taken their pictures, given it back to the seller and washed their hands of it. Telling everyone how they got it, who it came from, how much they paid etc is only going to get them into trouble.
On the other hand, with the police knocking down his door, at least it's totally clear it wasn't a fake
Wasn't that the whole point to disclose this story in such an extent? The drama -and clicks- generated by exposing where the phone came from, how they obtained it, how much they paid, the engineer's full name and all other small details were the reason why this story got so much attention.
No amount of "leaked pictures by an anonymous source" posts could compete with laying down a perfect controversy as Gizmodo did with this story.
California law says that if you find lost goods and appropriate them for your own use (e.g. selling it to a news site for five grand), it's theft. The proper response would have been to make an honest effort to get ahold of Apple and/or Gray Powell directly (e.g. call the company switchboard), and, failing that, turn it in to the police.
Instead, he sold it for a profit to a company (Gizmodo) who believed that it was real. Misappropriation = theft.
It is interesting that everyone always points to this california law, and the key word thrown around is misappropriation, though, according to wikipedia, misappropriation is meant to mean something like:
"failure to care for property you were entrusted with"
If the phone was returned, in order, to Apple - maybe it was in a contract he signed with Gizmodo, I don't think misappropriation occurred here as the found phone was eventually returned.
I'm not saying that Gizmodo is in perfect legal standing, but if this case wasn't so high profile, it would have already been dropped by now.
Very true... but most HN posters at least have some sort of identity that they like to protect. And karma helps too... With wikipedia you can never be sure that someone doesn't have an axe to grind. At least it's usually obvious here. :)
The problem is that them hiding behind a shield law isn't totally nuts. What if someone leaked them something that was actually in the public interest--something important for people to know, but that could still be considered a trade secret. We certainly don't want the courts deciding what's "important" news and what isn't, do we? If not then how do we protect one without the other?