I was reading though a backlog of Digg and Gizmodo stories when an item I read about in the beginning of the month popped back up: How Not to Steal a Sidekick.  At first I thought this was an interesting tale of stolen property, egos and red tape.  Upon further reflection I found that this story shows how the Internet will be keeping everyone, connected or not, honest.

If you have not yet read the story I would suggest taking 30 minutes and giving her a quick glance.  To sum it up, a woman about to be married left her Sidekick in a Taxi.  Someone then picked up the Sidekick and began using it.  When the original owner got a new Sidekick she noticed that the old one was still in use (keep in mind that Sidekick info is kept on T-Mobile servers, so when you get a new unit all of your old settings are auto-downloaded).  The original owner asked for it back, and the party with her phone refused.  In the end this caused problems in getting a relative into the US for the wedding as well as put her out about $450.00.  We have an honest party and a dishonest party.  Nothing out of the ordinary as this happens thousands of times every day.  People lie, cheat and steal all the time with no one to watchguard over them.

Enter the Internet.  The original owners fought back and posted their story online along with the pictures and AIM address of the thief (hey, the thief was dumb enough to add this to the stolen sidekick, which the original owners could now access via T-Mobile).  The posted site gained popularity quickly getting hit on Digg, Slashdot and Gizmodo.  Updates were posted hourly and users started trying to help the original owners track down their Sidekick and bring the thieves to justice.  After a couple of weeks the thief was arrested, the Sidekick returned and all was well.  How interesting this entire situation is.  The online community helped bring the thief to justice, and without this community it's doubtful that the original owner would have ever gotten their Sidekick back.

I got to wondering how often this happens.  The Dan Rather incident comes to mind where the Blogosphere basically disproved evidence that CBS tried to use in a story.  CBS then later had to give an apology.  How many more lies, cheats and thieves has the Internet helped bring to justice?  How many more are to come?  We're living in a new age where everything can be checked instantly.  Facts and data are so easy to get to that anyone can question just about anything now.  When someone tries to lie their way out of a situation it seems that the online community will bring them down.

I think in the long run the Internet will impact society more than technology itself.  Now we all have to watch what we say and do since anyone can bring us down, even if we are not online ourselves.  This will either be the best thing to happen to society, or the worst.  I think that most people are honest or at least intend to do good, so for 99% of us this really won't do any harm at all.  The last 1% makes their living lying or stealing from the other 99%, and now we have a checking system for them.  I believe these people should be very, very scared as their days are numbered.

What do you think?  Is this just a fad, or will we continue to see the online community bring people to justice?  Will this help us or hurt us in the long run?  What happens if the online community destroys a life of someone who was innocent?  What do you think the big picture is?