Simon Owens | November 9, 2010 | 508 views | Add a Comment
Categorized under Gawker, Gawker Media, Jason Chen, Nick Denton
This is a guest post by Simon Owens, a social media consultant and online journalist. You can read more about him on his blog at Bloggasm.com and follow him on Twitter at @simonowens.
It seems that every time a blog under the Gawker Media banner breaks a major, internet-consuming story — whether it’s an iPhone prototype, nude pictures of Brett Favre, or a first-person account of a 25-year-old’s sleepover with Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell — there’s a certain subset of media critics who focus on Gawker-owner Nick Denton’s payment for the scoop. This despite the fact that paying for stories is a rather common business decision made by dozens of news outlets, including tabloid magazines and even major TV news networks (who pay exorbitant “licensing fees” to gain access to exclusive photos, which almost always result in an exclusive interview as well).
Amit Chowdhry | April 27, 2010 | 764 views | Add a Comment
Categorized under Apple Inc., Gizmodo, Gray Powell, Jason Chen, Nick Denton
Here’s a breakdown of what happened at Gizmodo within the last month.
1. Apple engineer Gray Powell left iPhone prototype at the bar on his 27th birthday night.
2. Drunk guy tells another anonymous guy that he left his iPhone behind and gave it to him.
3. Anonymous guy takes the phone home and turns on the device, notices errors with the camera. When anonymous guy tried to turn on the iPhone the next day, it was bricked through MobileMe–someone killed the iPhone remotely.
4. Anonymous guy opens the iPhone 3GS and inside he finds an iPhone that is supposed to be released in the future.
5. Anonymous guy attempted to call Apple HQ and return the device, but kept getting blown off.
6. Gizmodo gets their hands on the device at the cost of $5,000.
7. Gizmodo writes a few posts about the new device (resulting in millions of extra website hits), then sends the device back to Apple.
8. Police raid the home of Gizmodo editor Jason Chen. The police took his computers, two servers, an iPad, an iPhone, hard drives, and several other devices.
Was the device confiscation legal? That question can be answered if “bloggers” can be considered “journalists” according to the law
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