The person who sold the device to Gizmodo. The person who gained $5,000. The person who didn't hand it in at the bar, or even make an attempt to return it themselves to the rightful owner.
Says the fact pattern. Now if you have information that the "finder" actually lifted the phone from Gray Powell, thats another situation that we don't have the facts for.
But the OS wouldn't by itself indicate it was a prototype. It could have been JB or it could have had a dev build of OS4. The device was physically camouflaged to look like a 3GS. With the thousands of Blackberries in here in Waterloo, if I found one in a bar, I would in no way leap to the conclusion that it was a prototype, especially if it looked as good as a production unit. I am more than familiar with BB, but that doesn't mean I know enough to tell their production units from unreleased models, especially if I was drunk. For all we know, the finder was some janitor or car salesmen or factory worker and he was drunk. No reason to think he would be as familiar, as even an Apple fan would be, with the iPhone and the OS or cell phones in general. if I showed you an new Android based device from some random manufacturer, would you be able to tell immediately if the OS was stock, custom or beta? Would you be able to tell the device itself was an unreleased model or a knockoff?
You are right. We don't have all the details and 'reasonable', in many aspects, is in question. Some of what we do know sounds dodgy at best, illegal at worst. But most of what we have is speculation and interpretation.
I agree that this is something that we can never be definitive about, I'm just saying in my judgement and in the absence of detailed information about the personalities involved, you'd have to be an idiot not to know it was a prototype. The very fact that it was camouflaged and being carried by an Apple engineer is a giant clue. The 4.0 OS wasn't released at the time it was found even to devs, so it comes down to a guy finding a phone that looks like a 3Gs, but turns out to be camouflaged and running a more advanced version of the iPhone OS. Sure, technically, it's possible that it was an elaborate ruse by someone to make the guy *think* he had an iPhone prototype, but it isn't very likely. Again it's going to come down to that "reasonable person" clause, but I am far less optimistic than you are that anyone would consider it "reasonable" for the guy who found it to do what he did or even to believe it wasn't a prototype. My personal opinion is that you'd have to be an idiot not to know what this thing was and I expect a judge (if it ever comes to that) to decide similarly.
Sadly, I will be surprised if Apple actually takes them to court at all, but it would be a win for Apple if they did IMO.
Regardless of if it was an Apple prototype or not, they knew it did not belong to the seller.
It makes no difference who made the device or if it was a prototype. It could have been a box of chocolates for all I care. Giz know that the item was lost by someone, it did not belong to the person selling it, therefore it was not his to sell or their to buy. It is theft / buying stolen goods pure and simple. Apple device or not.
Theft requires a act of theft. The phone was lost, not stolen. Saying it over and over doesn't make it true.
Selling found property is probably not legal, until certain conditions are met. And yes, with certain conditions it is absolutely legal to sell found goods. Just look at the airport lost and found sales. Where those conditions met? Some perhaps, but it would appear that some were not. Not a lawyer, so I don't know. I do know that Gawkers lawyers believed they were in the clear, but I guess internet forum posters know more about California law that Californian lawyers.
No, there was some attempt. His documented and ignored calls to Apple informing them of the issue would count as an attempt. The question is whether this would count as a 'reasonable' attempt. I have an opinion on that, but that isn't important. What is important is how the law would interpret 'reasonable'.
I think reasonable would have been telling the bar owner that he had found the device.
The first thing you do if you lose something is go and ask where you think you lost it, which is just what the owner of the device did.
Reasonable (bearing in mind the importance of the device, which the finder seemed to know), would have been to report it to the local police.
What is NOT reasonable is after 1 month, selling the device for £5k to giz.
The finder knew what he had and what it was worth, I would like to see this evidence for attempting to return the phone. It is easy to have records for calling a number, that does not mean he said anything meaningful to the party at the other end. He might have simply said I have found an iPhone, would you expect Apple to do something about every iPhone reported lost to them (no that would be silly and impractical). Did he say I have found a very valuable iPhone prototype? Probably not!
I agree that this is something that we can never be definitive about, I'm just saying in my judgement and in the absence of detailed information about the personalities involved, you'd have to be an idiot not to know it was a prototype. The very fact that it was camouflaged and being carried by an Apple engineer is a giant clue. The 4.0 OS wasn't released at the time it was found even to devs, so it comes down to a guy finding a phone that looks like a 3Gs, but turns out to be camouflaged and running a more advanced version of the iPhone OS. Sure, technically, it's possible that it was an elaborate ruse by someone to make the guy *think* he had an iPhone prototype, but it isn't very likely. Again it's going to come down to that "reasonable person" clause, but I am far less optimistic than you are that anyone would consider it "reasonable" for the guy who found it to do what he did or even to believe it wasn't a prototype. My personal opinion is that you'd have to be an idiot not to know what this thing was and I expect a judge (if it ever comes to that) to decide similarly.
Sadly, I will be surprised if Apple actually takes them to court at all, but it would be a win for Apple if they did IMO.
You have to look at it from the standpoint of Gizmodo pre-all these stories. They have a guy coming to them with an item that he claims to have found on the ground in a bar. He claims that it is the next Apple prototype. Now, most of us dismissed this as a hoax as soon as it showed up on Engadget, even with the pictures. The didn't know for sure that it was a prototype until the actually took it apart. And I'm sure they didn't pay the guy until the confirmed.
IMO, Apple doesn't stand a snowball's chance in hell in court. That's the reason they won't sue.
Oh cry me a f**king river. It's incredible how so many people like you have rushed to climb onto your moral high horse just because this affects Apple. If the Washington Post had paid $5k to get hold of some senator's laptop that subsequently was found to contain information exposing a huge corruption scandal in the Whitehouse you'd be saying they should get a Pulitzer.
I'm a huge Apple fan, but Gizmodo were just doing their job as journalists.
Wait. You are honestly equating a scenario where the public has a RIGHT to know, to this scenario with Apple where everyone just WANTS to know?! The two are vastly different and any court or lawyer would tell you that. That is why we have privacy laws! And any SERIOUS journalist knows the difference as well. Gizmodo is putting readers simple curiosity over Apple's rights and the poor engineer's well being. Read Andy Ihnatko's take for how a REAL journalist would handle this.
I've seen wrong-headed posts full of bluster aplenty, but yours tops today's list.
Theft requires a act of theft. The phone was lost, not stolen. Saying it over and over doesn't make it true.
Selling found property is probably not legal, until certain conditions are met. And yes, with certain conditions it is absolutely legal to sell found goods. Just look at the airport lost and found sales. Where those conditions met? Some perhaps, but it would appear that some were not. Not a lawyer, so I don't know. I do know that Gawkers lawyers believed they were in the clear, but I guess internet forum posters know more about California law that Californian lawyers.
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.
I think reasonable would have been telling the bar owner that he had found the device.
The first thing you do if you lose something is go and ask where you think you lost it, which is just what the owner of the device did.
Reasonable (bearing in mind the importance of the device, which the finder seemed to know), would have been to report it to the local police.
What is NOT reasonable is after 1 month, selling the device for £5k to giz.
The finder knew what he had and what it was worth, I would like to see this evidence for attempting to return the phone. It is easy to have records for calling a number, that does not mean he said anything meaningful to the party at the other end. He might have simply said I have found an iPhone, would you expect Apple to do something about every iPhone reported lost to them (no that would be silly and impractical). Did he say I have found a very valuable iPhone prototype? Probably not!
First, if the finder had reported it to the police, he would have been in the same position as keeping it since the phone was NEVER reported lost to the police.
Well according to the reports, the finder did indicate over the phone to Apple that he had found what he thought to be a prototype. Apple probably treated him like we did when the first Engadget articles came out and assumed it was a Japanese/Chinese fake.
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.
Right. All this is Civil Code. Completely separate from the criminal code. This in no way means that our friends at Gawker committed any crime. The first law of criminal law is there must be a criminal law in order for there to be a crime.
Sorry. There's no law preventing you from paying for custody of lost goods. The fact is that as soon as Gizmodo purchased the phone, they intended to return it to Apple. That shows clear intent not to convert the iPhone. Your analysis is wrong on both the facts and the law.
They didn't "pay for custody of lost goods". They pay to make money out of lost goods, which is against the law. If they wanted to 'pay for custody of lost goods" then they would have returned the iPhone to Apple without publishing the story.
Hey, I've just bought a lost credit card from someone who found it on the sidewalk and I used it to pay for my groceries before returning it to the owner. So my ultimate goal was to "pay for custody of lost goods". I am sure someone used this in court before and didn't work.
Theft requires a act of theft. The phone was lost, not stolen. Saying it over and over doesn't make it true.
Selling found property is probably not legal, until certain conditions are met. And yes, with certain conditions it is absolutely legal to sell found goods. Just look at the airport lost and found sales. Where those conditions met? Some perhaps, but it would appear that some were not. Not a lawyer, so I don't know. I do know that Gawkers lawyers believed they were in the clear, but I guess internet forum posters know more about California law that Californian lawyers.
This seems clear to me :-
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.
It appear the 'finder' did not follow the laws of which you speak.
I agree that this is something that we can never be definitive about, I'm just saying in my judgement and in the absence of detailed information about the personalities involved, you'd have to be an idiot not to know it was a prototype. The very fact that it was camouflaged and being carried by an Apple engineer is a giant clue. The 4.0 OS wasn't released at the time it was found even to devs, so it comes down to a guy finding a phone that looks like a 3Gs, but turns out to be camouflaged and running a more advanced version of the iPhone OS. Sure, technically, it's possible that it was an elaborate ruse by someone to make the guy *think* he had an iPhone prototype, but it isn't very likely. Again it's going to come down to that "reasonable person" clause, but I am far less optimistic than you are that anyone would consider it "reasonable" for the guy who found it to do what he did or even to believe it wasn't a prototype. My personal opinion is that you'd have to be an idiot not to know what this thing was and I expect a judge (if it ever comes to that) to decide similarly.
Sadly, I will be surprised if Apple actually takes them to court at all, but it would be a win for Apple if they did IMO.
But, would you think it was reasonable for some random, drunk bar patron to recognize the OS as an advanced version? I am surprised he even recognized it wasn't the current version. And he didn't know it was owned by an Apple employee until he turned it on and checked facebook. I can't recall the exact timeline, but I thought that was after he got home.
I don't think any ruse was required. People that work with technology forget that normal people don't think along the same lines. they don't think 'prototype' or 'advanced OS'. If I saw a new Honda drive by that I hadn't seen, I wouldn't think prototype. I would think, 'hey, a new Honda'. I see RIM folk walking around every day with their BBs. I saw one with a touch screen model a couple years ago at Tim's before the Storm was released. I knew it was the storm (probably) because I had read about it on tech sites. I pointed it out to my wife and said "hey the new touch screen BB". She replied "what makes you say that? It looks like your iPhone." She is no idiot, but she doesn't work with technology much.
They didn't "pay for custody of lost goods". They pay to make money out of lost goods, which is against the law. If they wanted to 'pay for custody of lost goods" then they would have returned the iPhone to Apple without publishing the story.
Hey, I've just bought a lost credit card from someone who found it on the sidewalk and I used it to pay for my groceries before returning it to the owner. So my ultimate goal was to "pay for custody of lost goods". I am sure someone used this in court before and didn't work.
Using a credit card that is not yours is fraud itself. Completely different analogy. Show me a law where it is illegal to run a news piece about lost property.
Right. All this is Civil Code. Completely separate from the criminal code. This in no way means that our friends at Gawker committed any crime. The first law of criminal law is there must be a criminal law in order for there to be a crime.
They dismantled the phone! They had a duty of care.
They didn't know the owner. The code says they should hand it in to the police. Simple.
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.
It appear the 'finder' did not follow the laws of which you speak.
Civil Law. Meaning they can be sued for return of the property (which was already done). There still is no crime here.
I think reasonable would have been telling the bar owner that he had found the device.
The first thing you do if you lose something is go and ask where you think you lost it, which is just what the owner of the device did.
Reasonable (bearing in mind the importance of the device, which the finder seemed to know), would have been to report it to the local police.
What is NOT reasonable is after 1 month, selling the device for £5k to giz.
The finder knew what he had and what it was worth, I would like to see this evidence for attempting to return the phone. It is easy to have records for calling a number, that does not mean he said anything meaningful to the party at the other end. He might have simply said I have found an iPhone, would you expect Apple to do something about every iPhone reported lost to them (no that would be silly and impractical). Did he say I have found a very valuable iPhone prototype? Probably not!
Actually, an Apple call centre person has reported that yes he did. The person that answered assumed it was a hoax, gave a call ticket number and hung up.
You have to look at it from the standpoint of Gizmodo pre-all these stories. They have a guy coming to them with an item that he claims to have found on the ground in a bar. He claims that it is the next Apple prototype. Now, most of us dismissed this as a hoax as soon as it showed up on Engadget, even with the pictures. The didn't know for sure that it was a prototype until the actually took it apart. And I'm sure they didn't pay the guy until the confirmed.
IMO, Apple doesn't stand a snowball's chance in hell in court. That's the reason they won't sue.
So in your scenario, once they took it apart and and confirmed that it was indeed Apple's property. They then paid the guy and published the information on their website. That means they knowingly PAID for STOLEN property (it wasn't theirs, and they are buying it from someone who doesn't own it), and then PROFITED from the wrongly appropriated information. And this doesn't seem at all illegal? You really think a jury would give an automatic pass to that kind of behavior?
Comments
"Lost and Found"
Says who?
The person who sold the device to Gizmodo. The person who gained $5,000. The person who didn't hand it in at the bar, or even make an attempt to return it themselves to the rightful owner.
Says the fact pattern. Now if you have information that the "finder" actually lifted the phone from Gray Powell, thats another situation that we don't have the facts for.
But the OS wouldn't by itself indicate it was a prototype. It could have been JB or it could have had a dev build of OS4. The device was physically camouflaged to look like a 3GS. With the thousands of Blackberries in here in Waterloo, if I found one in a bar, I would in no way leap to the conclusion that it was a prototype, especially if it looked as good as a production unit. I am more than familiar with BB, but that doesn't mean I know enough to tell their production units from unreleased models, especially if I was drunk. For all we know, the finder was some janitor or car salesmen or factory worker and he was drunk. No reason to think he would be as familiar, as even an Apple fan would be, with the iPhone and the OS or cell phones in general. if I showed you an new Android based device from some random manufacturer, would you be able to tell immediately if the OS was stock, custom or beta? Would you be able to tell the device itself was an unreleased model or a knockoff?
You are right. We don't have all the details and 'reasonable', in many aspects, is in question. Some of what we do know sounds dodgy at best, illegal at worst. But most of what we have is speculation and interpretation.
I agree that this is something that we can never be definitive about, I'm just saying in my judgement and in the absence of detailed information about the personalities involved, you'd have to be an idiot not to know it was a prototype. The very fact that it was camouflaged and being carried by an Apple engineer is a giant clue. The 4.0 OS wasn't released at the time it was found even to devs, so it comes down to a guy finding a phone that looks like a 3Gs, but turns out to be camouflaged and running a more advanced version of the iPhone OS. Sure, technically, it's possible that it was an elaborate ruse by someone to make the guy *think* he had an iPhone prototype, but it isn't very likely. Again it's going to come down to that "reasonable person" clause, but I am far less optimistic than you are that anyone would consider it "reasonable" for the guy who found it to do what he did or even to believe it wasn't a prototype. My personal opinion is that you'd have to be an idiot not to know what this thing was and I expect a judge (if it ever comes to that) to decide similarly.
Sadly, I will be surprised if Apple actually takes them to court at all, but it would be a win for Apple if they did IMO.
Regardless of if it was an Apple prototype or not, they knew it did not belong to the seller.
It makes no difference who made the device or if it was a prototype. It could have been a box of chocolates for all I care. Giz know that the item was lost by someone, it did not belong to the person selling it, therefore it was not his to sell or their to buy. It is theft / buying stolen goods pure and simple. Apple device or not.
Theft requires a act of theft. The phone was lost, not stolen. Saying it over and over doesn't make it true.
Selling found property is probably not legal, until certain conditions are met. And yes, with certain conditions it is absolutely legal to sell found goods. Just look at the airport lost and found sales. Where those conditions met? Some perhaps, but it would appear that some were not. Not a lawyer, so I don't know. I do know that Gawkers lawyers believed they were in the clear, but I guess internet forum posters know more about California law that Californian lawyers.
No, there was some attempt. His documented and ignored calls to Apple informing them of the issue would count as an attempt. The question is whether this would count as a 'reasonable' attempt. I have an opinion on that, but that isn't important. What is important is how the law would interpret 'reasonable'.
I think reasonable would have been telling the bar owner that he had found the device.
The first thing you do if you lose something is go and ask where you think you lost it, which is just what the owner of the device did.
Reasonable (bearing in mind the importance of the device, which the finder seemed to know), would have been to report it to the local police.
What is NOT reasonable is after 1 month, selling the device for £5k to giz.
The finder knew what he had and what it was worth, I would like to see this evidence for attempting to return the phone. It is easy to have records for calling a number, that does not mean he said anything meaningful to the party at the other end. He might have simply said I have found an iPhone, would you expect Apple to do something about every iPhone reported lost to them (no that would be silly and impractical). Did he say I have found a very valuable iPhone prototype? Probably not!
Did you know? There are a lot of iPhone fakes out there. Many have Apple logos and the iPhone designation printed on them.
That's your fact for the day.
Are you telling Gizmodo paid $5000 for a device they thought it could be a fake one ?.
I agree that this is something that we can never be definitive about, I'm just saying in my judgement and in the absence of detailed information about the personalities involved, you'd have to be an idiot not to know it was a prototype. The very fact that it was camouflaged and being carried by an Apple engineer is a giant clue. The 4.0 OS wasn't released at the time it was found even to devs, so it comes down to a guy finding a phone that looks like a 3Gs, but turns out to be camouflaged and running a more advanced version of the iPhone OS. Sure, technically, it's possible that it was an elaborate ruse by someone to make the guy *think* he had an iPhone prototype, but it isn't very likely. Again it's going to come down to that "reasonable person" clause, but I am far less optimistic than you are that anyone would consider it "reasonable" for the guy who found it to do what he did or even to believe it wasn't a prototype. My personal opinion is that you'd have to be an idiot not to know what this thing was and I expect a judge (if it ever comes to that) to decide similarly.
Sadly, I will be surprised if Apple actually takes them to court at all, but it would be a win for Apple if they did IMO.
You have to look at it from the standpoint of Gizmodo pre-all these stories. They have a guy coming to them with an item that he claims to have found on the ground in a bar. He claims that it is the next Apple prototype. Now, most of us dismissed this as a hoax as soon as it showed up on Engadget, even with the pictures. The didn't know for sure that it was a prototype until the actually took it apart. And I'm sure they didn't pay the guy until the confirmed.
IMO, Apple doesn't stand a snowball's chance in hell in court. That's the reason they won't sue.
Are you telling Gizmodo paid $5000 for a device they thought it could be a fake one ?.
You think they paid before they confirmed that it was real?
Oh cry me a f**king river. It's incredible how so many people like you have rushed to climb onto your moral high horse just because this affects Apple. If the Washington Post had paid $5k to get hold of some senator's laptop that subsequently was found to contain information exposing a huge corruption scandal in the Whitehouse you'd be saying they should get a Pulitzer.
I'm a huge Apple fan, but Gizmodo were just doing their job as journalists.
Wait. You are honestly equating a scenario where the public has a RIGHT to know, to this scenario with Apple where everyone just WANTS to know?! The two are vastly different and any court or lawyer would tell you that. That is why we have privacy laws! And any SERIOUS journalist knows the difference as well. Gizmodo is putting readers simple curiosity over Apple's rights and the poor engineer's well being. Read Andy Ihnatko's take for how a REAL journalist would handle this.
I've seen wrong-headed posts full of bluster aplenty, but yours tops today's list.
Theft requires a act of theft. The phone was lost, not stolen. Saying it over and over doesn't make it true.
Selling found property is probably not legal, until certain conditions are met. And yes, with certain conditions it is absolutely legal to sell found goods. Just look at the airport lost and found sales. Where those conditions met? Some perhaps, but it would appear that some were not. Not a lawyer, so I don't know. I do know that Gawkers lawyers believed they were in the clear, but I guess internet forum posters know more about California law that Californian lawyers.
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.
I think reasonable would have been telling the bar owner that he had found the device.
The first thing you do if you lose something is go and ask where you think you lost it, which is just what the owner of the device did.
Reasonable (bearing in mind the importance of the device, which the finder seemed to know), would have been to report it to the local police.
What is NOT reasonable is after 1 month, selling the device for £5k to giz.
The finder knew what he had and what it was worth, I would like to see this evidence for attempting to return the phone. It is easy to have records for calling a number, that does not mean he said anything meaningful to the party at the other end. He might have simply said I have found an iPhone, would you expect Apple to do something about every iPhone reported lost to them (no that would be silly and impractical). Did he say I have found a very valuable iPhone prototype? Probably not!
First, if the finder had reported it to the police, he would have been in the same position as keeping it since the phone was NEVER reported lost to the police.
Well according to the reports, the finder did indicate over the phone to Apple that he had found what he thought to be a prototype. Apple probably treated him like we did when the first Engadget articles came out and assumed it was a Japanese/Chinese fake.
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.
Right. All this is Civil Code. Completely separate from the criminal code. This in no way means that our friends at Gawker committed any crime. The first law of criminal law is there must be a criminal law in order for there to be a crime.
Sorry. There's no law preventing you from paying for custody of lost goods. The fact is that as soon as Gizmodo purchased the phone, they intended to return it to Apple. That shows clear intent not to convert the iPhone. Your analysis is wrong on both the facts and the law.
They didn't "pay for custody of lost goods". They pay to make money out of lost goods, which is against the law. If they wanted to 'pay for custody of lost goods" then they would have returned the iPhone to Apple without publishing the story.
Hey, I've just bought a lost credit card from someone who found it on the sidewalk and I used it to pay for my groceries before returning it to the owner. So my ultimate goal was to "pay for custody of lost goods". I am sure someone used this in court before and didn't work.
Theft requires a act of theft. The phone was lost, not stolen. Saying it over and over doesn't make it true.
Selling found property is probably not legal, until certain conditions are met. And yes, with certain conditions it is absolutely legal to sell found goods. Just look at the airport lost and found sales. Where those conditions met? Some perhaps, but it would appear that some were not. Not a lawyer, so I don't know. I do know that Gawkers lawyers believed they were in the clear, but I guess internet forum posters know more about California law that Californian lawyers.
This seems clear to me :-
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.
It appear the 'finder' did not follow the laws of which you speak.
I agree that this is something that we can never be definitive about, I'm just saying in my judgement and in the absence of detailed information about the personalities involved, you'd have to be an idiot not to know it was a prototype. The very fact that it was camouflaged and being carried by an Apple engineer is a giant clue. The 4.0 OS wasn't released at the time it was found even to devs, so it comes down to a guy finding a phone that looks like a 3Gs, but turns out to be camouflaged and running a more advanced version of the iPhone OS. Sure, technically, it's possible that it was an elaborate ruse by someone to make the guy *think* he had an iPhone prototype, but it isn't very likely. Again it's going to come down to that "reasonable person" clause, but I am far less optimistic than you are that anyone would consider it "reasonable" for the guy who found it to do what he did or even to believe it wasn't a prototype. My personal opinion is that you'd have to be an idiot not to know what this thing was and I expect a judge (if it ever comes to that) to decide similarly.
Sadly, I will be surprised if Apple actually takes them to court at all, but it would be a win for Apple if they did IMO.
But, would you think it was reasonable for some random, drunk bar patron to recognize the OS as an advanced version? I am surprised he even recognized it wasn't the current version. And he didn't know it was owned by an Apple employee until he turned it on and checked facebook. I can't recall the exact timeline, but I thought that was after he got home.
I don't think any ruse was required. People that work with technology forget that normal people don't think along the same lines. they don't think 'prototype' or 'advanced OS'. If I saw a new Honda drive by that I hadn't seen, I wouldn't think prototype. I would think, 'hey, a new Honda'. I see RIM folk walking around every day with their BBs. I saw one with a touch screen model a couple years ago at Tim's before the Storm was released. I knew it was the storm (probably) because I had read about it on tech sites. I pointed it out to my wife and said "hey the new touch screen BB". She replied "what makes you say that? It looks like your iPhone." She is no idiot, but she doesn't work with technology much.
They didn't "pay for custody of lost goods". They pay to make money out of lost goods, which is against the law. If they wanted to 'pay for custody of lost goods" then they would have returned the iPhone to Apple without publishing the story.
Hey, I've just bought a lost credit card from someone who found it on the sidewalk and I used it to pay for my groceries before returning it to the owner. So my ultimate goal was to "pay for custody of lost goods". I am sure someone used this in court before and didn't work.
Using a credit card that is not yours is fraud itself. Completely different analogy. Show me a law where it is illegal to run a news piece about lost property.
Right. All this is Civil Code. Completely separate from the criminal code. This in no way means that our friends at Gawker committed any crime. The first law of criminal law is there must be a criminal law in order for there to be a crime.
They dismantled the phone! They had a duty of care.
They didn't know the owner. The code says they should hand it in to the police. Simple.
This seems clear to me :-
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.
It appear the 'finder' did not follow the laws of which you speak.
Civil Law. Meaning they can be sued for return of the property (which was already done). There still is no crime here.
I think reasonable would have been telling the bar owner that he had found the device.
The first thing you do if you lose something is go and ask where you think you lost it, which is just what the owner of the device did.
Reasonable (bearing in mind the importance of the device, which the finder seemed to know), would have been to report it to the local police.
What is NOT reasonable is after 1 month, selling the device for £5k to giz.
The finder knew what he had and what it was worth, I would like to see this evidence for attempting to return the phone. It is easy to have records for calling a number, that does not mean he said anything meaningful to the party at the other end. He might have simply said I have found an iPhone, would you expect Apple to do something about every iPhone reported lost to them (no that would be silly and impractical). Did he say I have found a very valuable iPhone prototype? Probably not!
Actually, an Apple call centre person has reported that yes he did. The person that answered assumed it was a hoax, gave a call ticket number and hung up.
You have to look at it from the standpoint of Gizmodo pre-all these stories. They have a guy coming to them with an item that he claims to have found on the ground in a bar. He claims that it is the next Apple prototype. Now, most of us dismissed this as a hoax as soon as it showed up on Engadget, even with the pictures. The didn't know for sure that it was a prototype until the actually took it apart. And I'm sure they didn't pay the guy until the confirmed.
IMO, Apple doesn't stand a snowball's chance in hell in court. That's the reason they won't sue.
So in your scenario, once they took it apart and and confirmed that it was indeed Apple's property. They then paid the guy and published the information on their website. That means they knowingly PAID for STOLEN property (it wasn't theirs, and they are buying it from someone who doesn't own it), and then PROFITED from the wrongly appropriated information. And this doesn't seem at all illegal? You really think a jury would give an automatic pass to that kind of behavior?