Crazy Apple News Site

Every now and again we answer really, really inFrequently Asked Questions to help those of you with no moral compasses deal with the zephyr-like and ephemeral changes in Basic Decency.

Q: So, I found this guy, and he found this thing, right? And it’s kinda not a thing that people are supposed to see yet, okay?

A: Give it back to the rightful owner.

Q: But, well, you see, I feel like I have a duty to the faceless crowds of people who visit my site on a daily basis. I mean, they deserve to know what’s coming, right?

A: Do you get paid per click?

Q: Well, kinda per pageview.

A: Give it back to the rightful owner, and give them all the money you made off of exploiting their trade secrets.

Q: Well, but what harm does it actually do? It’s not like anyone was surprised by what they saw, right? It’s kinda helping them in a way, be–because now people can plan for the future, and decide that they’ll want to buy the thing, when, you know, when it’s actually released.

A: Give it back, give them all the money you made, and apologize.

Q: What? Why? Why should I apologize for a mistake that someone on their side made? I mean, that guy, who found the thing? He tried to give it back!

A: Uh huh. But you sure didn’t.

Q: Well, we had to know if the thing belonged to…the company to whom we thought it might have belonged… Because, you know, maybe it didn’t.

A: Maybe. But you can sure get knock-off “things” a lot cheaper than $5,000-$10,000.

Q: Well, we thought it might have been real…

A: And instead of confirming it and giving it back to the original owner, you took it apart, put pictures of it all over the internet, drove unprecedented numbers of viewers to your site, made up flimsy cover stories for how you got the thing, possibly cost an engineer his job, and even if he stays employed you’ve disgraced him to his company.

Q: Well, we needed to tell the public–

A: No, you really didn’t. There’s all kinds of laws about that sort of thing, and even without the laws there are conventions, manners, social norms and basic human decency that should have told you that what you did is slimy and unpleasant.

Q: Look, it’s my job–

A: No, you look. This sort of thing is beyond the pale, alright? It’s things like this, and the people who take advantage of things like this, that give “new media” a bad name. I feel dirty just being an author of a HUMOR site about rumors about the company that made the thing. You could have played it cool. You could have reviewed the thing, taken your own internal pictures, learned a bit about it, quietly returned it, and have been really really accurate with your predictions on this one. You could have used it to take Gruber down a peg by being more right than him for a while. But now he looks like the good guy. And that annoys me. It annoys me enough to set you up as a straw man in an article where I actually used italics and bold typefaces without irony. Guessing what’s coming, finding “well placed sources” who give us tantalizing hints of what’s next, that’s what we do.¹ Paying for possibly stolen or lost property hoping that it is stolen or lost property? I call foul. That’s not just sneaking a peek at the secret stash of Christmas presents, that’s taking your webcam into the secret stash and posting what everyone’s getting on Facebook on November 30th.

Q:…

A: But it’s more than that. I thought you were some of the good guys. You do the best event coverage of any of the sites, and you have some of the best reviews on up and coming shiny toys out there. But you work for a slimeball and decided to play like slimeballs. That’s your choice, and I realize that refusal could have cost you your careers. I realize it’s insanely unlikely that I’ll ever be in the position you were put in when you were offered the shot at a once-in-a-lifetime news story. But if I am I hope nobody has cause to write an article like this about me.

1. well, it’s what the real rumors sites do. I just make fun of them [↩]