How not to steal a Sidekick has been one of the most entertaining sagas on the web (not always in a good way). It started with a post that read: "The people in the pictures below have my friend's T-Mobile Sidekick. Instead of doing the honorable thing when finding someone's phone in a taxi, they instead kept it."
What started as an attempt to shame them into giving the Sidekick back turned into a media frenzy and eventually led to a 16-year-old girl from Corona, Queens, being apprehended by the NYPD -- which is not to suggest that the NYPD emerged with its reputation enhanced.
Evan Guttman, whose post kicked things off, decided to sell the recovered Sidekick on eBay, and T-Mobile offered to give the same amount as the selling price, up to $5,000, to charity. After 79 bids, it went for $3,600: hurray! But the story still doesn't have a happy ending. In Update #67 July 11th, 9:15 a.m., he writes:
Towards the end of the auction, I contacted the top bidder to confirm his identity. He lived in the UK, so I was a bit worried about a fake bidder. I called the phone number he had listed on ebay and he answered. He told me he would pay 1-2 days after the auction ended by credit card. I saw him make multiple bids overtaking others. In the end, he won. I sent him an invoice and waited for the transaction....and waited...and waited. On Monday (yesterday), I called the number again. When I asked for the person's name, I was told that no one lived by that name there. So, I hung up, and tried again. Again I was told that that person wasn't there, and asked if I was a male escort they were waiting for a phone call from. There were multiple voices in the background... I waited about 20 min, and tried one more time. This time, when I called and asked for the person, I was asked if I was a pedophile... When I replied no, the man on the phone told me this person was a 14 year old boy (his son). I told him I was tired of the games... He said that since it was his son making the auction, he was not responsible. He then cursed me out, told me he would sue me for harassment if I called again, and hung up.
Big mistake. I have already contacted Ebay. Once they won the auction, they are in a BINDING contract with me. Even if it was his son, the father is responsible for the bid. This morning I have received email from the top bidder. Now he has a new story. He said he lives in a flat with multiple roommates and he left his computer on, and someone must have bid. That's too bad. Now it will be his responsibility to find out who.
Comment: You have to wonder what sort of person uses an eBay ID such as mr_1337, even as a joke. And if they really were "leet", why they (a) couldn't protect thier own eBay identity and/or (b) wouldn't have drawn the obvious conclusions from the New York part of the story, which resulted in a family being identified and publicly humiliated on a global basis.
From the feedback, a couple of dozen eBayers have already completed successful and satisfactory deals with mr_1337 and may have an address and perhaps other contact details. There's also eBay. Is the company going to take the chance to enhance its reputation, as T-Mobile did in the USA, or look the other way?
