Is Apple Angry or Thrilled with iPhone 4.0 Leak?

image: Gizmodo.comFirst, let's get you up to speed if you missed all the excitement: Over the weekend engadget reported a prototype (or finished?) iPhone 4.0 has been found in the wild, apparently misplaced at a bar. Turns out those wily guys and gals at Gizmodo actually had the phone and posted all the details about it today.

Let's take this at face value for a minute: If Apple really did "lose" the phone, don't you think they could use things like the find my iPhone feature to locate the device, or have the person who lost it carefully re-trace their steps? (I'm sure Apple would've been happy to supply a few extra hands to look as well.) That person would've been summarily fired, unless it was Steve himself, or say Johnny Ive.

Once the phone was lost, what would the chances be of it finding its way to a tech blog, and another tech blog being tipped off within days of each other. (To clarify, Gizmodo says they've had the device about a week.) Perhaps once the phone made it Gizmodo, and nothing was posted (say, right before Microsoft's Windows 7 announcements) more info was "leaked" to Engadget to ensure the story ran.

So which is it? Is this truly an accidental leak that is showing off the great new features of the new phone and stealing the thunder from the competition, or was it a calculated leak to make sure everyone knew what was next from a company notoriously tight-lipped about future products?

Either way, the question remains, is Apple angry at the leak, or thrilled that everything is going according to plan?

Why Does Dvice Hate Apple?

There are two major tech blogs, Engadget and Gizmodo. Both have passionate fans, and both do quite well financiallly, especially compared to other blogs. So it's no wonder that awhile back, a third "major" blog came onto the scene: Dvice. Comprised partially of writers from other blogs, and financed by the Sci Fi Channel (Sorry, SyFy now) the blog generally tends to be a day late, and covers a fraction of the news of the other two. 

Both Engadget and Gizmodo do a solid job of covering the major Apple events. They both offer coverage that can be critical or praise-filled depending on Apple's news. That's not quite the same as objectivity, but it's what passes for it in the blogosphere. Which brings us back to Dvice. Yesterday, Dvice ran two stories on the iPhone 3.0, or just 50% more than they ran on an update to Microsoft's Surface. The Apple coverage included the headline "Apple introduces more ways to spend money on your iPhone," and from their other post, "Apple announced an update to the iPhone operating system at one of its love feasts in Cupertino today." I don't know, maybe it's just me, but when you promote and follow diligently Surface, which is in the hands of zero customers, and meanwhile neglect a device (when your name is Dvice) that's in the hands of millions of users, that seems like bad business. Perhaps that's why, despite the strong backing, Dvice is a very distant third to the other two blogs.