Whiny Entitlement Class Puke Schooled By Jobs

Ryan Tate: "But I really want porn and Flash!!!"

Paul Mitchell absolutely loves Apple. So in love with Apple is Paul Mitchell, that he never misses a chance to bash anything MacApple manufactures, produces, sells or supports. But, that's okay because Paul Mitchell is a capitalist and he understands that Apple is free to produce a product that consumers are free to consume, and Paul can purchase elsewhere from another manufacturer. This is called a free market system. Paul gets it.

Ryan Tate, does not. Ryan Tate happens to work for one of my absolute favorite media companies, Gawker Media. While at home, in between long homo-erotic porn sessions, Ryan Tate happened across an iPad ad that made him so angry that he spit cheetos all over his monitor. The iPad ad proclaimed something about a revolution, and apparently that's all it took for Sh!tfit Tate to unload on Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO, with both barrels. The astounding thing is that Jobs wrote back.

The article, as much as I hate Gawker Media, is pretty interesting and you should check it out. Okay, I take it back. The article sucks, but the screenshots of the email exchange are very interesting. If, however, you don't have the stomach for it, allow me to give you the paraphrased version:

Ryan Tate: iPad sucks cause I can't watch porn, and you're a jerk for not letting me have Adobe on it or my iPhone.

Steve Jobs: "...what have you done that's so great? Do you create anything, or just criticize others work and belittle their motivations?"

Good for Jobs. The ridiculousness of Tate's logic is as simple as getting pissed that the Italian Restaurant that you're visiting is forcing you to eat Italian. No one forced Tate to purchase, or use any Apple products. He's free to pick up an HP, any time he wants. And I'm sure that HP wont 'censor' his access to porn either.


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Karma's A B!%@#

The smile is CLASSIC!

Well, okay maybe Karma isn't a Bitch, but she can come unhinged sometimes. Karma's latest target? Jason Chen and Gizmodo. You have no idea how pleasing it is to read all of the background on this story. In case you are not up-to-speed, here is the short version:

Sometime within the last two weeks, Gizmodo purchased, from an unnamed source, a prototype of Apple's next generation iPhone. The phone was reportedly lost in a bar in Redwood City, CA and it was purchased for the sum of $5,000. Jason Chen, an editor at Gizmodo, then reviewed the device posting his thoughts, pictures and detailed information regarding the phone. Gizmodo then received a letter from Apple's lawyers claiming ownership and demanding the immediate return of the device. Gizmodo complied and returned the iPhone. Then on Friday of last week, California police executed a search warrant at Chen's residence, seizing four computers and two servers amongst other items. Gizmodo's parent company, Gawker Media then sprang into action demanding the return of items seized from Chen's home and citing California Penal and Evidence code in support of their claim.

Whew! You still with me? Since the issue and execution of the search warrant, debate has been raging across the interwebbynets on whether or not this was a legal search and whether Chen is, in fact, a journalist protected by the cited Penal and Evidence codes. Damn, that's a lot of pontificating. Surely there's a legal expert somewhere in that mess, right? No?! Well, let's get a legal expert. Eugene Volokh tells CNET:

Eugene Volokh, a professor at the University of California at Los Angeles who teaches First Amendment law, says that court decision--the case is called Rosato v. Superior Court--means that California's state shield law "wouldn't apply to subpoenas or searches for evidence of such criminal activity."

Translated: If Gizmodo editors are, in fact, a target of a criminal probe into the possession or purchase of stolen property, the search warrant served on editor Jason Chen on Friday appears valid. A blog post at NYTimes.com on Monday, citing unnamed law enforcement officials, said charges could be filed against the buyer of the prototype 4G phone--meaning Gizmodo.

Here's another little interesting tidbit in the CNET piece:

In the Fresno Bee case, the judges noted that the attorney-client privilege, the physician-patient privilege, and the psychotherapist-patient privilege are circumscribed during criminal investigations of lawyers, doctors, and therapists. Each of those privileges is stronger than the limited immunity that California extends to journalists.

Ruh Roh, Scooby Doo!

Orin Kerr posting at The Volokh Conspiracy gives a detailed clarification on the legality of the search warrant.

Gawker, which owns Gizmodo, has claimed that the search was unlawful. I thought I would offer some tentative thoughts on the legal issues we know so far.

1) Fourth Amendment. Based on the warrant form, and Chen’s report of how the warrant was executed, I don’t see any Fourth Amendment problems. Parts of the warrant are overly broad (such as the boilerplate paragraph 1 of attachment B), but others are not (such as paragraph 3 of attachment B). It doesn’t seem like the officers actually relied on the overly broad portions of the warrant, so the warrant and its execution will pass muster based on what we know so far. Note, though, that I don’t think we have the affidavit yet: The four corners of the affidavit have to articulate probable cause. I suspect that won’t be too hard given what we know of this case, but it’s too early to tell without actually seeing the affidavit.

2) Nighttime Execution. Gawker’s letter contends that the search was unlawful because it was executed at 9:45pm at night when the warrant does not permit nighttime entry. This argument doesn’t work because the California warrant statute makes the critical time 10pm. See California Penal Code 1533. (“Upon a showing of good cause, the magistrate may, in his or her discretion, insert a direction in a search warrant that it may be served at any time of the day or night. In the absence of such a direction, the warrant shall be served only between the hours of 7 a.m. and 10 p.m.”) You might not think that 9:45pm is daytime, but it is according to the California warrant statute.

3) California Reporter’s Shield. Here things get interesting, although it’s on a somewhat arcane matter of state law. The Gawker letter argues that reporters are exempt from search and seizure under the California Reporter’s Shield law. Specifically, California Penal Code 1524(g) states that no items described in the California reporter’s shield law can be the subject of a search warrant: “No warrant shall issue for any item or items described in Section 1070 of the Evidence Code.” This law was passed in response to Zurcher v. Stanford Daily, in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the Fourth Amendment allowed the government to obtain a warrant to search a news office for evidence of crime that the news source was gathering in the course of reporting the news.

It appears, at this point, that Gizmodo has some trouble coming their way. Now, as to why I've entitled the post 'Karma's a B!%@#', during the course of the revelation of the details of the next iPhone and how it came to be in Gizmodo's possession, the tech blog destroyed the guy who lost the phone. Gizmodo posted pictures of the Apple employee, his name and directly linked him to the phone. WAYYYY over the line. Why? Why did Gizmodo feel the need to out this guy? Why was it necessary to post the guy's name and pictures all over the internet? Did it enhance the story? No. Did it add to the intrigue? No. Did it serve any purpose at all? No.

Gizmodo is being paid back in a way that the Apple employee who lost the phone could never have done himself. Ergo, Karma is having her way with Jason Chen and Gizmodo. Bend over and grab those ankles!

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Now Back To Our Regularly Scheduled Program

Before we get too far into this post, all Gawker Media websites are sh*t. Yes Paul, even Deadspin. Below is a hit list of why, in my opinion, anything from Gawker Media should be printed on unrecycled bleached white paper, and used to cover the floor in your puppy training pen. Here are some of the greatest hits:

1. Alex Pareene is a Douche. A whiny, quitter of a douche at that. Alex apparently still wets his diaper over President Bush's election, and the events of 9/11/01. He thinks that reminding people of what happened that day resulted in a "vast national wave of jingoism, paranoia, dread, and fear." He criticizes the administration's handling of that day, the way the public reacted to that day, the way many liberal's lives were changed that day (some of whom proclaimed to become conservative after 9/11) and the resulting war and internment of war criminals, also known as terrorists.
   
   However, you'll be pleased to know that when Obama rode in on his white horse, the seas were calmed the storm subsided and now, "This is the first anniversary of that terrible day, though, that the Terrorists will not still be winning." Did you get that? He's saying that since Bush is no longer in the White House, the terrorists are no longer winning. So, either Bush was a terrorist... or reminding people of what happened that day and our actions as a nation after 9/11 were, in fact, terrorism. This passes for intelligent blog posting over at Gawker.
   
   *Editor's Note: What follows can be classified as righteous anger, please administer earmuffs.*
   
   ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?!??! HOW FUCKTARDED CAN YOU BE?! WHAT A GODDAM TWATWAFFLE!
   
   *Editor's Note: This concludes the righteous anger section of the blog, you may remove your earmuffs. Thank you.*
   
   Pareene then goes on to say that Glenn Beck is a terrorist for trying to recover the feeling that we had on 9/12. Glenn is of course referring to the unity that we felt as Americans, and how we all identified with New Yorkers and those in Washington DC that day. We weren't Democrats or Republicans, we were Americans first and foremost. Alex, however, is too fricking thick to understand that. He believes that Glenn is calling for all of us to be in the state of sheer panic which gripped the city itself that day and for a few days after. He sums up his post by stating:
   

   "Glenn Beck is an actual terrorist, and the people attending his rally in DC tomorrow are al-Qaeda in America."

   Hey Alex, stay assy!
   
   
2. MOMMY! They're showing that scary video again! Gabriel Snyder is a douche as well, but not nearly as obtuse as Alex. Gabriel thinks the worst way to memorialize September 11th is to show what actually happened that day. Why? Because it's hard to watch?! Boo-f*cking-hoo. This nation needs strong reminders of what it is that our enemy (who by the way is still at war with us, whether or not we are with him) is willing to do to attack and ultimately kill us. If you pussy libtards can't handle it, then I suggest you all take a vacation to France for the week and neck with some guy named Pierre who hasn't showered in a week.
   
   
3. Matt Hardigree rounds out our trifecta of douchebaggery. Conservative calls for the boycott of purchasing a product which is manufactured by a company which is primarily owned by the government is Un-American. Hardigree, a former Democratic staffer, thinks that the "Far Right Wing Hates America!" Hey asshat, wanna know what's Un-American?! Government takeover of private enterprise. It's called socialism, and it's distinctly Un-American. Conservatives calling for the support of a privately owned business versus doing business with a Government Enterprise is called Capitalism, and that is distinctively pro-American.
   

Have an alternative to a Gawker Media website? Post the link in the comments, and I'll permalink it in the sidebar. Please take the time to comment!