The Gizmodo iPhone saga flowchart

"Where do we end up?", you ask.

Looks like, wherever it is, It is not connected to ANY set of ETHICS.

Some bloggers may be journalists, but the Shield Law definitely should not apply here. This wasn't Watergate - Gizmodo wasn't exposing political fraud or something in the public interest, it was basically committing industrial espionage and then bragging about it for hits and ad revenue.

I'm all for taking down Big Corporations a notch or two now and then, too - but this was just bad form on Gizmodo's part. If they're trying to be taken seriously as journalists, they're doin' it wrong.

The bloggers have been making many hypes about leaks products. Why is there no rules established to ban leak products that isn't there's? This can prevent problems in the future.

Here my take: Apple prototype device unknown to the finder- could keep the device or drive to Police station to report lost device. Police take care of it and it wouldn't be in someone else's hand. What make that finder of the device contact three high tech blog but not to CNN? Where CNN may give him more money. The plan may have been in place to wake up bloggers from spreading leak of informations that can hurt companies.

I didn't think that journalists of any kind could escape buying stolen or lost property (CA law)?

There's the first flaw I see in this flowchart. After that I didn't bother looking for more.

There is nothing more contemptuous than a "journalist". All of them are hacks with marginal skills. Shield laws are way out of control.

The basic problem is information vs product. Had the phone remained in the possession of the finder right up till it was returned to Apple, and only access provided under finders supervision, then the "journalist" (blogger, gizmodo) would be safe under the "shield" laws as only the information about the phone would have been traded.

However that is not what happened, the finder went so far as to offer possession of the phone itself (the product). The moment he did that, the phone became officially and legally a stolen product, which means the "journalist" received stolen goods. This is illegal and no such protection is given under the "shield" laws.

This is why Wired refused to take the offer when they were offered it, they knew the difference. Gizmodo clearly does not, and are going to learn the difference the hard way.

The flat panel incident. The Hesus article that said His Steveness had less than a month to live and AAPL stock tumbled 10%. The purchase of stolen goods. Giz isn't a forum for journalist. It's a bunch of idiots. I'm fed up with these bozos and I hope someone goes to jail.

Journalism is not some ancient black art where a person must learn certain incantations before one can be called a journalist. In the strictest sense of the word a blogger is a journalist if he/she collects and disseminates info about current events. Many people who report news and do a good job of it did not train as journalists. But even if you don't consider bloggers to be journalists this case is still important about the role journalist and protected speech. I think the changing face of media means that we will have to address thorny issues like this to unravel the ethics of journalism whether it is professional, blogger or any other amateur attempt.

The idea that journalism is ever free of bias is something that needs to be put to rest. People have always gravitated toward one newspaper, magazine or tv station, in part, because it reflects a certain point of view. What is different now is that a lot of readers/viewers/listeners have stopped doing the work of weighing various view points--ah the cost of convenience.

Having said that I do think that Apple would benefit from just keeping things as quiet as possible. Not because Gizmodo was in the right but because people are always looking for a chink in Apples armor. From a PR stand point Apple would look best if they just shrugged it off.

This is all such BS. Gizmodo was approached by someone with a prototype iPhone. They aren't idiots. They knew it should have been returned to Apple. Not only did they accept it, they PAID for it. They didn't even remotely follow any decent standard of journalism. Did they find anyone to corroborate the finders story? No. A real journalist requires more than one jack-ass' word before they run with a story. This is why 99% of bloggers are not journalists. If they were real journalists they would have gone to Apple for comment before taking the damn thing apart.

Everyone is so damn worried about shield laws and all that crap. Shield laws don't protect journalists who accept stolen goods from sources. They protect the sources from being exposed. So great, the source is still safe, but the Gizmodo "journalist" is screwed for buying the stolen goods. And just because Apple hadn't reported it as stolen yet doesn't make it any less stolen. If my car is stolen from garage and the police catch the guy 5 minutes later before I realize the car is gone he still stole my damn car.

I have to say that this isn't terribly funny if they can't quite get their facts straight. It looks to be an attempt at humor over the whole situation, but Gizmodo outed the engineer who lost it unnecessarily and received what under California law is stolen goods.

At the same time, many are stating the police issued warrant is overbroad, and from what I've read it does appear they are allowed to seize a lot more than they should be allowed to.

Seems to me there is no humor in taking sides here. Now what's funny (and sad at the same time) would be to compare this to Rothlesberger or OJ. Someone commits a high profile crime, but the authorities mess up the investigation. There, make some satire out of that.