Jon Stewart took a break from ragging on Goldman Sachs and Sarah Palin last night and did a lengthy bit on the recent iPhone hullabaloo that ended up with police breaking down Gizmodo editor Jason Chen’s door and raiding his house while he was out at dinner. (After the phone had been returned.)

In the clip below, Stewart asks the hard hitting questions, such as why the hell we can’t get a signal when we’re cruising down the West Side Highway here in New York:

I mean, if you wanna break down someone’s door, why don’t you start with AT&T, for Godsakes? They make your amazing phone unusable as a phone! I mean, seriously! How do you drop four calls in a one-mile stretch of the West Side Highway? There are no buildings around! What, does the open space confuse AT&T’s signal?

Heh. Heh, heh heh. Appholes.

Video: Jon Stewart rags on Apple for Gizmodo kerfuffle is a post from: The Inquisitr

Okay it’s not like we didn’t really expect this to happen but Gizmodo has just posted the news that one of their bloggers, Jason Chen, involved with the recent posting of Apple’s next generation iPhone has had the police seize his computers.

Apparently this happened last Friday night when California’s Rapid Enforcement Allied Computer Team entered his home while he wasn’t there and seized four computers and two servers. The warrant was issued by a Judge of Superior Court of San Mateo. Interestingly enough Gaby Darbyshire, COO of Gawker Media – owner of the Gizmodo blog, says that under California law the warrant is invalid.

Here are the first two pages of the warrant. You can view the whole set of papers at Gizmodo. I wonder how many people are rubbing their hands together in glee over this.

Gizmodo blogger has his computers seized by police is a post from: The Inquisitr

The internet has been buzzing this week since Gizmodo published a detailed report on a “stolen” iPhone 4G.

Along with worldwide media attention (there wasn’t a news outlet in Australia at least that didn’t report Gizmodo’s story) there’s been a pile up of hate directed at the Gawker Media gadget blog, with arguments that their activity was criminal, through to criticism of their decision to name the Apple employee who lost the phone to begin with.

Although Gizmodo is without doubt a good read, I’ve not always been a fan in the past. Their actions at CES last year in disrupting displays and presentations was a despicable low point for the blogging world as a whole, and they deserved the condemnation they received at the time.

On the publication of the iPhone 4G though, I’m with Gizmodo here.

Sure, they probably shouldn’t have exposed the details of the Apple employee who lost the phone to begin with. They may well end up in trouble legally for buying a phone that for all intents and purposes was stolen property (lost property not returned is deemed stolen under law.)

But seriously, can you blame them for publishing what they did?

It was, and will probably always be the scoop of a lifetime for Gizmodo. That Engadget passed on it says more about the corporate culture at AOL, and the fact that the once fiercely independent Weblogs Inc network is really just another extension now of an online media giant.

Blogs pushing boundaries are suppose to do things like Gizmodo has done here, and I’m not the only one to say that given the opportunity (and availability of cash) I would have made the same call, risks be damned.

If the iPhone 4G was a Government document or amazing picture of a celebrity, would we be having the same debate?

There’s a double standard when it comes to context: a good news organization is by its very nature tasked with providing unique news, with scoops being at the forefront of best in kind. That there may be corporate secrets laws for something like the iPhone 4G isn’t really that far removed from the secrets of Government documents; sure, you might argue that the public interest test may not apply to the latter, but public interest in itself is a subjective term.

If Gizmodo made a mistake, it was their over eagerness to prove the validity of the phone by exposing where the phone came from and how they came by it, and if they get into trouble legally, that will be the reason why. But likewise I understand why they’d want to prove that what they’d purchased and published was the real deal.

Congrats to the team at Gizmodo. Not everyone will have your back here, but some of us think you made the right call.

Why I’m Siding With Gizmodo Over The iPhone 4G is a post from: The Inquisitr

So, did you hear the one about a next generation Apple iPhone being left behind in a bar?

Probably, since the story has being running rampant in the tech blogosphere for a few days now and has even made it to mainstream media’s news cycle. Of course there is a whole bunch of different stories floating around about just how Gizmodo acquired the phone. Some reports have it down as buying it from someone who found it and others are being less kind saying that the gadget blog knowingly purchased stolen property.

It is this last one that has a bunch of blogger pontificating about how wrong Gizmodo was and that Apple should sue them or that they should be charged with being in procession of stolen property. Mind-numbingly though there are a bunch of bloggers who seem to think that Gizmodo was wrong for buying the next generation iPhone regardless of how it was obtained and compounded that lapse of ethics buy reporting on it extensively.

Just for the record anyone, blogger or journalist, who tries to frame this in some sort of journalistic ethics failure is a frikken idiot.Period.

The worst of these dribbling diatribes though has to be a post earlier today by Joe Wilcox over at Betanews. He starts his post off with this gem

Gizmodo was wrong to acquire a lost iPhone prototype — quite likely a nearly finished version 4 design — let alone pay to obtain it. Perhaps this marks the distinction between bloggers and journalists. I would have contacted Apple about returning a device so obviously stolen.

WTF?!? … Look any blogger or journalist who says that they wouldn’t write about some prototype gadget from any company, including Apple, that fell into their lap whether they had to pay for it or not is a liar. I would be willing that any blogger or journalist would give anything short of their first born and borrow whatever was needed if they didn’t have the money on hand in order to write about something like this – especially if it is an Apple prototype. To say otherwise is facetious and bullshit.

However Joe goes on to add – still in the first paragraph of his bang yer head against the wall post

There is grave difference between obtaining secret information for the public good and what Gizmodo did: Obtain property containing trade secrets belonging to a public company. Gizmodo has violated the public trust and broken the law. Free speech isn’t a right to pay freely for something clearly stolen.

Stop.Now.Get a fucking grip.

Do you not think that this was not run through some highly paid lawyers? Seriously. We are talking about Gizmodo here folks. The tech gadget blog owned by Gawker Media which is owned by Nick Denton. Do you seriously propose that publishing something as huge as this is wasn’t run through a gauntlet of lawyers?

Like I said get a grip.

To suggest that the New York Times or Washington Post or any other newspaper wouldn’t have done exactly the same thing if provided the opportunity is totally ridiculous. They would have done the same thing – run it through their lawyers, paid the money, and run with the story.

I’m not going to argue the belabored point of whether Gizmodo knew whether it was stolen or not that is for the law of where it happened to decide; but again I point to the fact that there is no way this happened without being vetted by Gawker lawyers. What I do find almost reprehensible is the framing of the old and tired argument that actions like this are the purview of those in their parent’s basement bloggers and that true journalists would never stoop this low.

Get off your high horse Joe.

Any journalist, or blogger, worth their salt would have run with this story – especially if if cleared by expensive lawyers. It is literally a story for the history books and if you tell me that any journalist or blogger – you included Joe – would pass on that opportunity then you are deluded.

image courtesy of Gizmodo

Blogs, Journalism, and Joe Wilcox’s dream world is a post from: The Inquisitr

Peter Rojas and Ryan Block, the guys behind AOL blog Engadget (Rojas also founded Gizmodo) have launched Gdgt…which is not surprisingly pronounced Gadget.

Gdgt isn’t what you’d expect from the talented pair though, because it’s not a blog. Indeed, the reason I’m writing this post now and not 6 hours ago is because I’m not sure either. Block and Rojas are pitching it as a social network for people who like gadgets, but it’s not at all like Facebook or similar sites. The closest description I can find is forum with some social elements.

The launch of the site has gained a huge amount of attention online, even taking Gdgt down at one stage, so it should start with strong prospects. However its success will come mostly off the back of Rojas and Block’s rightly deserved reputations and not anything the site offers. The problem with Gdgt is that in trying to be different, the site is really very similar to existing sites through its borrowed elements. The question then becomes one of social appeal: can the community be the selling point given you get the same doses of gadget loving elsewhere? If I was betting I’d say yes, but only because Peter Rojas and Ryan Block are running the show. Anyone else and I’d say this was not going to end well.

The explanation video (they needed one to explain the site) as follows:

Go Go Gdgt….Forum? is a post from: The Inquisitr

The company — responsible for such blog giants as Valleywag, Lifehacker, and Gizmodo — has dropped its Gawker.com per-pageview rate down to $5 per 1,000 views, Radar says. The rate was $7.50 at the start of the year, then fell to $6.50 in the second quarter, leading up to this week’s adjustment.

Radar indicates owner Nick Denton sent the staff a memo saying they’d “broken the site budget” — a phrase now referenced on Gawker’s front page (see below). The e-mail, the story says, goes on to note each writer will need to bring in “higher targets” and explains some calculations had suggested the rate should have gone as low as $4.15, so it’s “not as bad as it could have been.”

Gawker dropped three sites from its arsenal back in April: Wonkette, Gridskipper, and Idolator.

Gawker Issues Independence Day Paycuts is a post from: The Inquisitr