Archive for September 4th, 2011
Apple Gestapo Impersonated Police to Find Lost iPhone 5 Prototype
The news of lost iPhone 5 prototype is all around now a days. Presumptively it was lost at a bar in San Francisco. CNET cited an unknown source while reporting this news.
This scandal got even more interesting when The San Francisco Weekly reported that there are no police records of this incident. Apple didn’t actually open any official investigation with the police and the interesting (and juicy) bit of news is that according to this report Apple security team illicitly personated police officers and carried out a search in a man’s house for the lost next generation iPhone prototype!
The San Francisco Weekly’s stated:
“A Bernal Heights man says that six officials claiming to be San Francisco Police officers questioned him and searched his family’s home in July for a lost iPhone 5 prototype they asserted had been traced to the residence using GPS technology.”
It is reported that a team of 6 Apple security personal faced who they thought to be the possessor of the iPhone 5 prototype. According to reports this prototype was left at a tequila bar named Cava 22 in the San Francisco area. San Francisco Police Department didn’t even know and the team of Apple security personal found the lost prototype in an apartment in Bernal Heights.
“Calderón said that at about 6 p.m. six people — four men and two women — wearing badges of some kind showed up at his door. “They said, ‘Hey, Sergio, we’re from the San Francisco Police Department.’” He said they asked him whether he had been at Cava 22 over the weekend (he had) and told him that they had traced a lost iPhone to his home using GPS.
At no point, he said, did any of the visitors say they were working on behalf of Apple or say they were looking for an iPhone 5 prototype.”
The San Francisco Police Department stated that it doesn’t have any records of an on-going investigation with Apple, or documentation that policemen were at Calderón’s apartment that day. Calderón said that the team was wearing badges of some kind and they claimed to be from the San Francisco Police Department.
“They made it seem like they were on the phone with the owner of the phone, and they said, ‘The person’s not pressing charges, they just want it back, and they’ll give you $300,’” he recalled.”
A man from the search team gave Calderón a phone number to contact if he decides to return the prototype. The man said his name was“Tony,” but the number he gave traces back to Anthony Colon, who was a former San Jose Police sergeant. Now the big question: Where is Mr. Colon now? Well the answer is simple, he works as a “senior investigator” at Apple!
via Apple Gestapo Impersonated Police to Find Lost iPhone 5 Prototype.
Ex-Board Member Says HP Is Committing ‘Corporate Suicide’ – Slashdot
“If Apple’s looking for a seamless transition, advises the NYT’s James B. Stewart, it definitely shouldn’t look to Hewlett Packard. In the year after HP CEO Mark Hurd was told to hit-the-road-Jack, HP — led by new CEO Leo Apotheker — has embarked on a stunning shift in strategy that has left many baffled and resulted in HP’s fall from Wall Street grace (its stock declined 49%). The apparent new focus on going head-to-head with SAP (Apotheker’s former employer) and Oracle (Hurd’s new employer) in enterprise software while ignoring the company’s traditional strengths, said a software exec, is ‘as if Alan Mulally left Boeing to join Ford as CEO, and announced six months later that Ford would be making airplanes.’ Former HP Director Tom Perkins said, ‘I didn’t know there was such a thing as corporate suicide, but now we know that there is.’”
via Ex-Board Member Says HP Is Committing ‘Corporate Suicide’ – Slashdot.
Saber Lal Melma, Ex-Gitmo Detainee, Killed In Afghanistan
KABUL, Afghanistan — NATO and Afghan forces have killed a former Guantanamo detainee who returned to Afghanistan to become a key al-Qaida ally, international officials said Saturday.
The militant’s death was a reminder of the risks of trying to end a controversial detention system without letting loose people who will launch attacks on Americans.
Sabar Lal Melma, who was released from Guantanamo in 2007, had been organizing attacks in eastern Kunar province and funding insurgent operations, NATO spokesman Capt. Justin Brockhoff said.
A NATO statement described Melma as a “key affiliate of the al-Qaida network” who was in contact with senior al-Qaida members in both Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Another former detainee who joined the al-Qaida franchise in Yemen was killed in a recent U.S. airstrike there.
Troops surrounded Melma’s house in Jalalabad city on Friday night and shot him dead when he emerged from the building holding an AK-47 assault rifle. Several other people were detained, NATO said.
via Saber Lal Melma, Ex-Gitmo Detainee, Killed In Afghanistan.
BBC News – Bournemouth Pier to Pier: Missing swimmers ‘went home’
A major sea search was mounted after a number of swimmers forgot to check in after a charity event in Dorset.
Three lifeboats and a helicopter were called out when nine swimmers were reported missing at the Bournemouth Pier to Pier swim at 14:00 on Sunday.
Emergency crews and an onshore search team spent two hours looking for the swimmers before the search was ended.
By then eight were confirmed to have gone home and the ninth was also believed to be safe.
via BBC News – Bournemouth Pier to Pier: Missing swimmers ‘went home’.
BBC News – ‘Fatty’ Arbuckle and Hollywood’s first scandal
Guests to San Francisco’s Westin St Francis Hotel still ask to see the room where an infamous bootleg-booze-soused party took place 90 years ago.
The management are happy to show visitors the suite, if it’s unoccupied, but they don’t know exactly what happened in there on Labor Day in 1921 – no-one does.
One thing is clear: In Room 1219 that afternoon, an actress by the name of Virginia Rappe was screaming in agony on a bed.
Later that week she was dead.
And the man charged with her death was Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle, Hollywood’s first one-million-dollar star.
via BBC News – ‘Fatty’ Arbuckle and Hollywood’s first scandal.
BBC News – Welsh Government seeks new masseurs for civil servants
The Welsh Government is looking for new massage and complementary therapists to “de-stress” workers.
Taxpayers’ money will not be used as workers have to pay for treatment costing about £6.
The Welsh Government, which employs about 5,500 staff at nine offices, said it was committed to their well-being.
An advert says it wants to continue to provide staff with complementary therapies in addition to occupational health and counselling services.
Private sector businesses also provide similar services for workers – some free – like the Admiral insurance company in Cardiff, which brings in sports therapists and provides other therapies as well as free fruit.
“If people are feeling relaxed they are more productive and that benefits everybody,” said spokeswoman Louisa Scadden.
via BBC News – Welsh Government seeks new masseurs for civil servants.
Meet The Guy Spending 10 Days In Jail For Overdue Library Books | The Smoking Gun
Meet Christopher Anspach.
The Iowa man, 28, was sentenced Wednesday to 10 days in jail for failing to return books and other items he checked out earlier this year from the local library.
When Anspach, pictured in the mug shot at right, did not respond to repeated attempts to contact him via telephone and certified mail, Newton Public Library officials turned the matter over to police and the city attorney, according to District Court records.
Anspach pleaded guilty August 31 to a misdemeanor theft count in connection with his failure to return 27 separate items (books and other media) that library brass valued at $770.67. Along with being ordered to pay restitution to the library, Anspach was fined $625.
Anspach, a Pizza Hut employee, is currently serving his sentence at the Jasper County jail.
via Meet The Guy Spending 10 Days In Jail For Overdue Library Books | The Smoking Gun.
Adults dig new Las Vegas playground | Adelaide Now
LAS Vegas has seen its share of heavy construction equipment as it bulldozed its way through one giant casino project after another. But with the recession having gutted the construction industry, excavators and bulldozers near the Strip are being put to use as toys for thrill-seeking visitors.
A business owner has created what amounts to a life-sized sandbox for adults who pay up to $US750 ($700) each to push around dirt, rock and huge tires with the earth-moving construction equipment. All it takes is a 10-minute classroom lesson and guidance from trainers through headsets.
“I thought it would be much clunkier, and the lighter you are with the controls, the easier it worked,” said Mary Fitzsimons, an emergency room doctor from Walnut Creek, Calif., who spent roughly two hours digging a trench, moving tires and using the machine’s bucket to scoop basketballs atop cones.
“I thought I wouldn’t pick it up, I thought I would totally futz it up,” Ms Fitzsimons said.
