Apple iPhone 4G loser’s identity revealed

The man who lost his fourth-generation iPhone prototype in a bar 20 miles from the Apple HQ in Silicon Valley has been outed - and he's still working for Steve Jobs.

Photos of the new iPhone were posted all over the internet at the weekend after technology blog Engadget got hold of photographs.
Meanwhile, another technology site, Gizmodo, reportedly paid the finder up to $10,000 for the handset itself, and - doubtless keen to get their money's worth - has now revealed the full story.

The 4G iPhone was actually lost a month ago, on March 18, in the Gourmet Haus Staudt, a bar specialising in German beer. A man labelled by Gizmodo as the "Random Really Drunk Guy" pointed to an iPhone on the bar next to the lucky finder and said: "Hey man, is that your iPhone?"

When the finder said it wasn't his, the RRDG said: "Ooooh, I guess it's your friend's then. Here, take it. You don't want to lose it." RRDG then left the bar.

The finder asked around the bar, but nobody claimed the iPhone - a feat which in itself seems unbelievable to anyone not living in Silicon Valley - so he took it home. The next day, the iPhone was dead - remotely disabled using Apple's MobileMe software.

The finder had initially assumed the iPhone was the widely available 3GS, but he soon realised the exterior was fake and when he cracked it open, he found an entirely new iPhone inside. He tried to contact Apple, but nobody took him seriously. A month later, Gizmodo got hold of the device.

Gizmodo now says the unlucky Apple employee is 27-year-old software engineer Gray Powell. After contacting him at work, they report he is "tired and broken. But at least he's alive". They say the final entry in his Facebook page on March 18 was: "I underestimated how good German beer is."

Despite Apple's paranoid security measures, which include prototypes bolted to worktops and armoured doors with keycodes that change every few minutes, it does seem odd that an employee was allowed to take a next generation prototype iPhone on a drinking session. "Controlled leaks" are, after all, standard marketing practice at Apple, according to at least one former employee.

Yes, new iPhones need to be tested "in the field", but is it possible that Random Really Drunk Guy, the man who all but insisted the finder take the 'lost' iPhone, was in fact an Apple employee too? ·