Proof That Nice People Still Exist


The worst feeling in the world is when you know that you’ve lost one of your best gadgets. That sinking feeling as you realise what’s on it, who might have access to it, and how much you might have to pay to get it back. Thankfully, we’ve just been shown here at Gizmodo first-hand how nice people can really be. This is the tale of how our own Elly Hart lost and found her precious iPod Touch thanks to one kind-hearted stranger.

For those of you who don’t know, Elly is our fearless night editor who works out of the Great White North (Canada for those playing at home) in the wee hours to keep your site fresh and full of content for when you wake up — or when you need to continue procrastinating at 3am.

It was 6pm in Canada when Elly left the Caffe Artigiano on Hornby Street in downtown Vancouver. Minutes after that her Facebook and Twitter feeds started behaving strangely. Someone was using it in the third person.

Back in Australia, we went into panic mode. What if this person stole all of her details? What if they were in our CMS? What if they took down her passwords and extorted the device back to them?

Thankfully, this wonderful stranger wasn’t the arsehole that we’d been worried that he/she might have been. They kept updating Elly’s Facebook with where she could recover her iPod from, and as quickly as the whole affair had started, the stranger slipped back into the void, not asking for any reward or thanks.

If you’re reading this, anonymous stranger, I’d like to thank you for being a lovely human being.

So the next time you find a gadget in the back of a cab, on a coffee table or on the ground, make every effort to return that piece of tech to whoever’s it is. You’ll feel all warm and fuzzy inside, I promise.

What’s your best Good Samaritan gadget story?