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Stolen Cell Phone Shares Thieves' Photos?
eastbayted writes "A man from Berkeley, Calif. had his cell phone swiped. Soon after, the ShoZu starting uploading pictures to his Flickr account taken by the thieves — for the world to see. There's one of an unidentified woman eating something chocolatey, and a couple of either a chihuahua or a large rat. Seems this guy had installed some software on his phone to automatically perform those photo uploads, and whoever took his phone didn't realize it That's his story, anyway ... some people doubt it. He's a Yahoo employee. Yahoo owns Flickr. This is all pretty good PR for the photo site, no? He claims: 'People assume I'm doing it for self-promotion, marketing, a hoax or something like that. I'm talking to you because I want it to be known that it's not a hoax. I'm just too ordinary. I'm just too unclever for that.'" Update: 09/02 05:48 GMT by Z : Made the quote more obvious.
Too bad flikr is down... ...scheduled maintenance my arse -- they were /.-ed...
We apologise for the fault in this post. Those responsible have been sacked. -- Signed RICHARD M. NIXON
Yeah, it requires a couple passes because the writing is bad. The different perspectives should have been seperated into paragraphs at least, perhaps with attributions on who said what.
I'm not seeing where it states it's a sprint phone. You can have the ESN of the phone disabled if and only if the phone is CDMA, that doesn't do a bit of good if the phone is GSM. In that case you just pop in a new SIM and away you go. Software loaded onto the internal flash still runs and the original owners account isn't used.
"...he is not seeking justice, revenge, or even his mobile phone. He would quite like his life back" Oh yes, a stolen phone ruined his whole life. Now he has to go live in a box in an alley wishing he could have his life back. Is it just me or does everyone think it's odd that he should have logically not told anyone about what was going on until the thief took a picture that would give enough evidence to get himself captured? If my phone got stolen (well okay, I don't own one and never have) I'd be kinda pissed and want revenge, especially if it was likely it would be handed to me as easily as having the offender take a picture of his car or house or something.
now stop reading and go play Dance Dance Revolution!
> 'I'm just too unclever for that.'
I wouldn't trust a guy who speaks newspeak and has a camera-phone, uploading pictures automatically. IMO he's thought-police..
"It's too bad that stupidity isn't painful." - Anton LaVey
Maybe he manually posted some photos since the event? It's not like uploading photos from your phone is the only way you can post on Flickr.
Ok I clicked on the dropdown to mod you troll, but decided that an eduction would be more useful to you than a loss of karma.
First, a quick definition, taken from dictionary.cambridge.org:
theft : (the act of) dishonestly taking something which belongs to someone else and keeping it:
Taking that phone was theft, pure and simple. Anyone who picks up a phone from a public space and fails to hand it to the nearest resonably responsible person is committing an act of theft. They are stealing the phone as surely as if they'd snatched it from the person's hand or broken into their home.
When the posters fear their moderators, there is tyranny; when the moderators fears the posters, there is liberty.
Lemme guess, you think home, medical, and auto insurance fall into the same category?
Insurance is basically a scam - it's meant to benefit the insurance company &
not the insured.
You should insure only when the loss will be unaffordable.
Home, Medical & auto insurance fall into this category.
(Auto because of lawsuits).
Even out that there, you should be choosing your deductibles
smartly to reduce your premium.
For an auto insurance, keep your deductibles as the maximum
you can afford to pay without becoming broke. Yes, you will
be hit a by a big deductible if you do have an accident.
However, over a long period, the reduction in premium would
automatically more than break even unless you are having
accidents very frequently. If you are having accidents
frequently, you probably shouldn't be driving.
Home insurance is basically unavoidable so long as you still have a mortgage. The bank wants its collateral protected. It's illegal in most states to drive without auto insurance (of course, you can get away with liability-only). Medical insurance is certainly a necessity, but nearly 40 million Americans are doing without.
So, yes, they're necessities. But you should practice self-insurance against non-catastrophic losses. Extended warranties and product replacement plans are usually bad deals. If you lose a $600 phone, do you really need to replace it with another $600 phone? Or can you get by with a $50 model? Or will a $300 model from another company provide what you need? Self-insurance lets you choose how you want to fix what's broken, avoids the hassle of dealing with the company, and avoids what often amounts to a 'stupid/scared user tax.'
If there is a risk out there that could collapse your finances like a house of cards, whether it be a medical illness, a fire, or a car accident, then you certainly should insure against it. If the loss of a $600 phone is such a risk for you, then yes you should insure against it, but the better solution is to not have such precarious finances in the first place.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
If his cell bill and service were canceled (i.e. he notified the carrier about the stolen phone) then how did it send the pictures.. eh eh?