It seems to be a recurring theme over the past couple of years: thieves who go out of their way to steal Apple equipment, and only Apple equipment, often passing up scads of "perfectly good" Wintel dreck in the process. We've heard about it again and again-- burglars who take the time to pick one more lock to get at the Macs when the PCs are right there and ready to be ripped off. Heck, it even happened to us once. Our beloved PowerBook Duo was stolen from a Los Angeles physics lab, while the Wintel laptop sitting right next to it remained untouched. Sure, a potentially higher theft rate may be a hidden disadvantage of Mac ownership, but isn't it great to know that if your Mac gets grabbed, it becomes Stolen Goods For The Rest Of Us™?

These days, though, we've got a whole new breed of Mac thieves running around, and these guys are selective. Unsurprisingly, when it comes to sticky-fingered felons, these days the Apple-branded prey of choice is none other than the translucent rubber-and-plastic portable known as the iBook. Think about it; almost everything about the iBook makes it an attractive target. First of all, if the sales numbers can be believed, it's extremely popular-- especially among the consumer crowd, which would make it easy to fence. It's a relatively scarce commodity, too; not so very long ago, brand new factory-sealed iBooks were selling for hundreds of dollars over list price on eBay. That translates into a high resale value for the thief. At under seven pounds, the iBook is very portable-- and very takeable. Heck, there's even a handle for the ultimate in convenient and easy-to-carry larceny. Plus iBooks look like candy so thieves can satisfy that whole "candy from a baby" urge.

So keep one eye on your iBook at all times. And if you're an Apple reseller, get yourself a trusty watchdog to protect your valuable iBook stock, or you'll wind up like ImagiQ of San Antonio, TX. According to O'Grady's PowerPage, those poor folks suffered a break-in a few weeks back, and the only things taken from the whole Mac-only store were three Blueberry iBooks-- two factory-sealed, and one demo model. Looks like there'll be a few more iBooks available on the holiday black market. So if you're walking down the street and a shady-looking character quietly tries to interest you in a cheap iBook, do the ImagiQ folks a favor and give them a call. Police sketch artists are standing by.