Think tank pins Apple's iPod as possible culprit for increase in violent crime
By Darren Murph 
posted Mar 5th 2008 12:58PM
posted Mar 5th 2008 12:58PM
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Man, I can't wait for GTAIV.
Engadget GTA!
http://www.bobsakamano.com/photos/uncategorized/2008
/03/05/engadget_2.png
it didnt work maybe this one will
http://www.bobsakamano.com/photos/uncategorized/2008/03/05/engadget_2.png
I really love Engadget pictures nowadays, hilarious!
Let's not blame the parents. No, that would be too easy!
Bad parenting? Pfft. Thugs want iPods!
Well, if they blamed the zune, we'd know they were really out of whack!
Well, if they blamed the zune, we'd know they were really out of whack!
Was funnier the first time. They are never getting mine: http://hideapod.com/
OK, as a rule I hate everything...
But the hide-a-pod thing is VERY funny.
LOL, that hide-a-pod just really made my day! XD
According to Jack Thompson, none of this would have happened if Apple hadn't included a Breakout-style game on their iPods.
What is the assumption here? That future victims just had $400 sitting under the mattress, waiting for the iPod to come out, so that they could then buy one and be robbed? It seems to me like the kind of person who would walk around with a $400 PMP in their pocket, would be walking around with just as many expensive toys if the PMP had never been invented.
About as far as you could extend the blame is by saying that white earphones are a dead giveaway, but.. that's pretty weak.
Hrm, Why steal someones iPod when you could steal their money and buy one in the color that matches your phat new Reeboks... Wow, thieves are stupid.
"they do say consumers should demand technologies that would render stolen gadgets useless.
Apple—which has explored anti-theft locks in patent filings—had no comment." This could worst than DRM "Hey listen to this new track on my ipod (ipod disables self not recognizing its owners moist, soft touch)...aw crap its bricked"
edit:"could be"
As a consumer, I demand throwing thieves in prison, not arbitrary limits on how to use the device I paid money for :)
Pfft indeed !
I'm sorry officer, iPod made me do it!
Seems to me The Urban Institute's think tank is empty.
I hope these guys were are not seen as a reputable source by any member of government.
I actually agree with them. They are several hundred dollar devices that are small, easy to hide, and very easy to spot someone using.
Before iPods, how else would you know somebody had something valuable on them? Sure, you can grab a laptop, but its bigger and more obvious. iPods could originally be recognized by the headphones, but now almost everybody uses a pmp rather than a cd player/radio. That means that anybody with headphones probably has something valuable + small on them.
I personally can see a correlation here.
You just contradicted yourself.
"easy to hide, and very easy to spot someone using."
If they're so easy to hide, then you shouldn't be able to "spot someone using it" now should you?
I think that it is very pitiful that anyone would try and pin this on the popularity of Apple iPods. Like someone else already said, if everyone wasn't walking around with PMP's, they'd be walking around with some other expensive toy.
So, while we're blaming the influx of crime on technology, why not blame the cell phone!! It's equally small.. so I suppose that, now that the iPhone's out, crime rates will become even worse right?.. BS. Thats just rediculous. Be true Americans, blame it on Bush or something?
If your using a pmp, is easy to spot.
If you just stole an ipod, and stuck it in your pocket, its not easy to spot.
Not a contradiction. Also, I'm saying its pmp's in general. I agree that their blaming apple specifically.
Problem with "other expensive toys" is: if its not a pmp, its usually something more interactive. (sure many people have psp's, but you don't see huge masses of people walking around gaming). You use pmps while doing other things. (walking, reading, etc.) unlike most other toys.
It is a lot like my 32 caliber pistol.
Very easy to hide, but it is pretty easy to spot me when I am using it.
What else can we blame on apple? Nuclear proliferation?
Not quite nuclear proliferation, but Apple's clearly setting a precedent.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5jEYbWLl60
The thugs want the safety on their guns to say {SLIDE TO FIRE}
that's why I walk around with a ZEN stone :)
seriously though, WTF?
what you can't blame economic disparity?
kids need $#!% to do to to keep them from doing $#!%, we need youth centers that show kids positive role models, teach valuable work skills and proper ethics.
no one in our so called first world countries should be forced to live in poverty while working 14-hour days
And I guess you think tax dollars should be paying for these? We already have tax-sponsored daycares, they're called public schools.
Also, speaking of public schools, I'd be interested to see how many of those impoverished people who are working 14-hour days you are speaking of have high school diplomas. Entitlement spending should be limited to those adults that have high school diplomas (or equivalent); I already invested my tax dollars in you and if you can't even get a free diploma, you've just proven that you're a bad investment and no further money should be wasted on you.
@Josh L
so tax dollars spent on PMCs is preferable, WAR is a good investment right, banks always make money off of war.
so would you prefer just to get rid of the undesirables, since you take the fascist stance.
@Josh L: Your comment represents nothing more than thinly veiled racism. "Daycare"? Public schools exist for the education of children and future citizens, to the subsequent benefit of the public at large--which, like it or not, includes you. Or do you also consider the paved road leading to your house-- not to mention the police and fire departments that protect that PRIVATE investment-- an entitlement program? White flight and the subsequent refusal of suburbanites to subsidize urban (read "black") schools is at the heart of the problem. Tired of paying taxes? As people like you love to say, "America: love it or leave it."
m,
Try going to Maryland, where money is distributed based on how poorly schools do. That is, funding is "rewarded" to poorly-performing schools and subsequently taken away from schools that perform well. What you'll find is a bunch of schools with top-of-the-line equipment and faculty with high drop-out rates while the schools with high graduation rates and standardized test performance have schools that are literally falling apart.
At a certain point, it stops being about the money and becomes the responsibility of the parents and the individual. Studies like this one by the "Urban Institute" (in DC, with a huge black population) only serve to strengthen the self-fulfilling prophecies and learned helplessness of blacks. Instead of saying "the individual is responsible for crime," the Urban Institute says, "the iPod is responsible for crime." Now criminals (black or white) will say to themselves, "I wouldn't be doing this if iPods weren't so valuable," and attempt to rationalize the crime to the point of where it doesn't seem like a crime anymore, only a balancing of the unjust scales in our economy.
P.S., if you think my comment is racist, please research the situation further.
Unlike Josh's, your comment is not racist. And, having worked in public education, I am well aware of the problems. I don't think we can fully blame the parents, however, when they are products of the same broken system, one that has for generations placed so little value on its students. The kids deserve top-notch equipment and facilities, and I'm glad MD provides that. Paying their teachers what they deserve would be the next step--computers in the classroom do nothing by themselves. And we won't have the best people going into education until they can make a decent living at it. Those useless tests also have to go--education is about learning how to think, not mastering standardized test taking skills.
John, I would like to add that you didn't address my complaint with Josh: education is not an entitlement program. It is an investment in the competitiveness and prosperity of our economy, and the preparation of our citizens for full participation in what is (officially at least) still a democratic nation. Why should ANY of our schools be either low-performing, or falling apart? Is it a contest, in which only some schools can win? Do bad students make their schools perform poorly?
Anybody who thinks race has nothing to do with the formation of public policy is as selfish as they are deluded.
http://pubdb3.census.gov/macro/032007/pov/new01_000.htm
http://www.bls.census.gov/cps/pub/wkyeng_2q96.htm
Well I can agree that walking around with up to $400 in your pocket and a white beacon to it hang on your head would make you a target for sure. Obviously it's not all Apple though, cell phones and other pmps are just as good of targets.
"Obviously it's not all Apple though, cell phones and other pmps are just as good of targets."
"Think tank pins PMPs as possible culprit for increase in violent crime" isnt post worthy. Gotta Apple up that headline to pass muster.
first thing i did when i got my ipod touch, was get black corded headphones
steeling someones ipod may be the reasoning behind a violent crime, but it's the violent criminals who are responsible for their crimes.
Any time I talk to an iPod fan, I want to punch him in the face. Does that count?
Why yes, it does. It shows that these kinds of crimes are usually committed by psychotic, fanboyish idiots who take someone's choice of PMP as a personal insult.
I'd say that qualifies as a phenomenon unto itself.
Hmm, I bet your an iPod fan. Come here a minute.
Why don't you go ahead and blow Gates and leave the iPod owners alone?
BillGates: "Why don't you go ahead and blow Gates and leave the iPod owners alone?"
Uh, is that a come-on?
Guns don't kill people: Nanos do?
http://generallordisimo.files.wordpress.com/2007/11/global-warming.jpg
i'm not sure why, but it irritates me that you use your name as the title of your comment.
...but i like the graph.
Nice. Pastafarianism FTW!
wait, does that mean that I can bring my boom box back onto the stoop? Cool.....
now if I just had some cardboard....
Interestingly this happened with Nike some time ago. Their name became negatively associated with crime because people would steel the shoes and sell them because of their value.
Not quite the same though, these crimes were happening on a massive scale and even resulted in many youth deaths in urban cities. In fact there is an entire market dedicated to selling knock offs....that means mafia involvement, none the less......Because of IPOD's style attraction to say, ummmm pop fans, I don't believe it will escalate to the level of crime that Nike shoes directly saw in the 90's.
Realistically...
The article is narrow minded and a pile of horse crap....
Muggings and robbery have increased because the gulf between those who have money and those who do not has widened to such a point...
To make matters worse the wonderful world of advertising and media make it appealing to own the gadgets... (might i add that gadgets have become more common and available for the public to buy)
Previously, say 10 years ago, the only portable thing being carried around was a walkman... and a bulky phone based on a CDMA network...
Now....
Ipod,
Nice sexy phone....
Camera...
UMPCs...
to compound the fact that gadget geeks tend to be wimps.... They become easy pickings for violent criminals to bitch slap them and take their toys away....
MUHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH
:)
"Muggings and robbery have increased because the gulf between those who have money and those who do not has widened to such a point..."
i absolutely agree.
(...but the rest of your comment was a little pointless.)
There's always some stupid scapegoat, it's never the huge obvious problem.
LOL....agreed, well at least the first part. But there is something to be said about how much the media plays (or preys :)) on the human psyche. Although, most would love to say, "I'm to smart for that"......well will discuss how problematic that thinking is a century, for right now though, the problem is that your neighbor is not.....so either help protect his little brain, or suffer the consequences of what his little brain can computer.
*UPDATE* A new study has concluded that puppies and kittens cause cancer. Discuss!
And dammit, if we'd stop making that "money" stuff, then people would stop stealing it, too! Certainly, the introduction of "dollars" into our society has lead to an increase in muggings and other crimes!
BAN IT! THE SKY IS FALLING! BAN THE SKY, TOO!
funny funny
Correlation does not equal causality.
ding
we have a winner!
In order for there to be think tanks one has to think.
Then I guess the US-mint is responsible for bank robberies, connivence store hold-ups, and school-yard bullies because they make something small and valuable.
Um, it's not just that iPods are targets for stealing, people with earphones in are easy targets as they don't hear people coming up behind them.
I from Nigeria. You send all you're hot IPOD me and me give you $5000 surely.
Gimme your iPod, Mort!
I would have thought Apple itself would have been a major cause for the recent increase in highway robbery...
So if you can't protect yourself on the streets, get a Zune. Practically thief repellent!
funny funny
I don't know about VIOLENT crimes, but in LA there has been a significant rise in thefts of Sidekicks, especially in affluent neighborhoods. It happens even in broad daylight. Most of the time it's a simple grab 'n go, snatched out of the hand right during a call, but occasionally, there have been muggings.
I've known at least 4 separate cases of Sidekick thefts personally, and I can only imagine how desireable the iPhone must be. But to go to the extent of threatening and actually using violence to grab an iPod?? That's a little extreme, don't ya think?
You know what this is, right?
the only way anyone would have ever heard of this study, let alone this ridiculous think tank, is by attaching some silly statement to Apple. It's like the free-press golden ticket. (especially when it's negative, double-especially when it's either totally inaccurate or logically fatally flawed.)
I think this "think tank" just wanted their 15 seconds in the limelight.
An iPod is just a fat wad of cash in your pocket. Duh!!
That's Washington as in the D.C. variety. A glorious place where many, many people have too much time on their hands and agendas to fill.
has anyone seen my starter jacket?
Private think-tanks tend to make conclusions base on their own biases and opinions based on their own studies. Whereas with proper academic research, findings are based on empirical evidence such as previous peer-reviewed articles and research on specific narrowed down areas, such as locations, population minorities, sex etc. Therefore research must also be falsifiable or able to be challenged.
Oxford:
"Falsifiability n. In the philosophy of science, the property of a hypothesis or theory of being capable of refutation by empirical evidence, with the implication that a hypothesis lacking this property does not belong to science."
For all the think tanks or media groups in the world that publish brash generalized statements based on one study, they sure know how to sensationalize the B.S. In the academic research world, biased and generalized statements like this fall under the iDontgiveash%1 category. How do like them Apples?
You wrote that the Urban Institute is in Washington. I don't think there's some tiny software firm up in Redmond who's a competitor to Apple with cash to burn? Oh wait...
Washington DC, the capital not the state, the other side of the country....Fail
What happened to the fact the economy is terrible?
I wonder what the goals of this think tank were- to get the emphasis put on anything other than the most obvious cause?
iPods are garbage anyways. Who would want to steal one of those over glamorized mp3 players with aweful software to boot. I guess it shows how much marketing make people brainwashed.
agreed, pwned.
You're right, the software is "aweful" ;P
My MP3 player (zen vision m) is filled with Beatles music, which instantly makes it invulnerable to gangsta burglars.
Many of these think tank people are idiots. They ought to be pounding the pavement looking for real jobs!
the results for 2007-2008 would be interesting... because there's now the ipod and the iphone.
Why does this sound so crazy? To these street thugs, carrying an iPod around is like carry around a brick of gold.
Not in the past 50 years have we carried such easily snatchable and resaleable items. This sounds perfectly reasonable to me.
It couldn't have anything to do with Bush destroying the economy and making people more desperate?
No, that's too convenient. There isn't enough mention of 'terror' and 'freedom' in that explanation to make it plausible.
George Bush stole my ipod.
Dick Cheney shot me.
It was a pretty violent crime.
In some way i agree, i am in high school, and a $400 device is more then often too much for the high school budget. consequently a black market has spawned to provide stolen iPods for $100 or less. Why iPods? Because everyone trusts the brand. In general, higher technology prices and inflation are driving crime rate up, (remember the PS3 robbery events?) along with increasing gas prices which strain low wage workers. I myself stopped working, its an endless cycle; to get a good job you have to travel far, but that costs more gas, but you don't have the money for a fuel efficient car, but a low wage job only covers for your insurance bills and the gas. So you basically work to be able to work, spending all you money on gas and insurance. The most i had left was enough to go watch a few movies. Something had to give, gas wasn't going to so technology did. This last year we had a number of robberies in school, which happened when the marching band was out during rehearsal. They entered the locker rooms and went iPod raiding. Now we have to lock up the band room and keep a close eye when it is open.
I'm wondering how they even got their evidence. What if iPods were the second or third thing these guys found on the victims? I could just see some guy not even listening to his iPod which is stored in his coat, gets mugged for his Mr. T bling chain and bracelet, but they happen to find an iPod too. There are too many factors that can explain a muggers motivation to steal. It's too broad a topic to make any conclusions. It confirms itself too much. It would be hilariously ironic if it turned out the think tank was doing the mugging or hiring thugs to boost their numbers hehe.
Whenever I see an owner of an Apple product oozing an ill deserved aura of superiority I also want to beat the living crap out of them, then grab them and shake them violently while screaming "OH FOR GODS SAKE GET A LIFE YOU ANNOYING TWAT!"...hmmm...maybe there is something to this think tank's conclusions...maybe I need a little lie down...yes, maybe I do...perhaps I should listen to some calming music on my iPod...NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!! (insert long camera pullback)
ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha........ ARE YOU F***ING KIDDING ME!!!
Cars......Laptops........lots of thing m0ar valuable then friggin lamePods
engadget.. you do realize you're fanning the fanboy wars with this article, right? not that doing anything other than saying the word "apple" isn't enough to have physical violence threatened from all the goons and haters that post here regularly. i mean, the audacity to use different products than others do!
This is why you should never be too successful in America: instead of being proud that their countrymen and smart and hard working, all other Americans instantly hate the most successful and start blaming everything on them.
Germans don't blame their problems on Mercedes Benz -- and Koreans don't make everything Qualcomm's fault. Only in America does doing something well provoke widespread jealous rage...
[..all other Americans instantly hate the most successful and start blaming everything on them.]
False. Some maybe... but the complainers are the ones anybody ever hears about because the vast majority of us just go about our lives. :-)
When I was younger, some dude got killed around where I live for a Starter jacket and 50 cents. So, as to any previous comments I've posted you can replace the Apple products mentioned with anything else. It's irrelevant as to what brand it is, because the issue is that muggings and think tanks suck.
You guys make it sound like they are confident it was iPods that caused a rise in crime. I guess you didn't read these parts:
In other words, there might have been an iCrime wave, but it would be hard to be sure. After all, robberies also jumped in pre-iPod 2001.
It's also curious that while iPod thefts on subways and other crowded urban settings provide the best anecdotal evidence, the 2005-06 crime increases were highest in small and midsized cities—places with less-dense pedestrian traffic, let alone teeming subways.
"I guess I could sort of understand and buy that in a very narrow place, in a short period of time—a short spike for a few months," he said. "But to suggest that that's driving the crime numbers in any major way, I don't think so."
Following this logic we can blame the US recession on the introduction of the iPhone.
just a heads up, but this is the same think tank that said we'll be out of iraq three weeks after going in.