3.24.2011

dumbass laptop thief vs. smart computer nerd: you know who wins

This is the story of two people. One extremely stupid thief who stole a laptop, then recorded himself dancing on the computer's built-in camera. And one clever laptop owner who used the video in question to identify and shame the dumbass thief: Why You Shouldn’t Steal Computers From Nerds.

The laptop belonged to a young entrepreneur named Mark Bao, who accessed the computer's backup storage cloud, found this embarrassing video of this fool dancing to "Make It Rain," and was able to identify Mr. Idiot Thief through Facebook:
The computer he recorded this video on belongs to a young entrepreneur named Mark Bao. (Belonged?) Bao was able to access the storage cloud to which the laptop was backing up; there, he found the video, as well as enough browser history to identify the thief through Facebook.

"[T]he guy turned the laptop to the police this morning," Bao posted on Reddit, "and he sent me a heartfelt message asking me to remove the video." (The message is below.) Bao says he's not going to take the video down, which seems kind of mean (it's just a laptop! The guy learned his lesson!) but, well, as Bao points out, the kid who stole the laptop is "not in a position to bargain."
That's geek justice! Funny, when the piece of technology you just stole turns around to bite you in the ass. Many lessons to learn from this, but I think Gawker's points out the biggest one: "never record yourself dancing, even on your own laptop, because it's just embarrassing. For more, Mark Bao's chronicle of the whole saga is on Reddit.

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