The guy bought something that was obviously stolen. This was willful behavior. He spent $5,000. Come on! This article was written as if he saw it sitting on a table in a bar and took pictures of it.
Say apple was the chinese government, and the iPhone was a disgruntled official who was involved in the "let's hack google" thing...the new your times pays the disgruntled official for an inside scoop.
Is that the same? Better? Worse?
Does my logic make sense? Let's raid someone's house just to be sure. Nobody would call that over-REACT-ing.
And even so, would it have made a difference to you if it was on Wikileaks instead? Be careful what you're choosing to condemn in your support of Apple.
Would anyone have cared at all or defended this if this was a lost OpenMoko or something equally irellevant?
I once left my wallet on top of a gas pump while filling up my car. I drove away, realized my mistake, and was back within a couple of minutes. My wallet was predictably gone. Is that 'finders keepers'? Nope, it's a stolen wallet.
Same thing.
Is it still stolen?
You're right that the finder did the most wrong thing here, by selling the lost phone (at which point, IMO but IANAL, the phone was stolen because the finder no longer had any intention of making any further effort to return the lost phone to the rightful owner). However, Gizmodo/Gawker/Chen are not blameless as buying stolen goods is itself a crime.