Geez, what is it with the UK's apparent fascination with Apple-related crime? A few months back we noted that an article about muggers targeting iPod owners had appeared in the Evening Standard of London, and it painted a dire picture of a grim urban landscape in which the very act of wearing white earbuds in public condemned oneself to an uncertain fate in a dark alley at the tip of some 'Pod-hungry thug's shiv. Frightening stuff, right? You're probably still having nightmares and jumping at shadows. But will they let you find any peace? Nooooooo. Because now the British are playing up the dangers of Mac ownership as well; Macworld UK is jumping in with an article about how much more likely Macs are to be stolen than their Wintel counterparts. Great. Like we weren't living in enough fear already.

The story itself is actually pretty positive, truth be told; its title is "Hero Mac dealer foils theft bid," so you know it has a happy ending. It seems that four nogoodniks broke into Gordon Harwood Computers after hours and started loading up their car with all the Macs they could get their hands on; unfortunately, these geniuses didn't bother to make sure that all the staff had left yet; the store had closed at 5:30, and for whatever reason (be it chemical, biological, or just plain stupid), none of these four fellows thought there might conceivably still be a staff member or two rattling around just forty-five minutes after closing. So a couple of store personnel noticed that these guys were kindasorta relocating all the Macs into their car, and then "approached the intruders."

Now, this is the point at which it becomes clear that the story is set in England; in the U.S., the next step would obviously be an exchange of gunfire and possibly a few grenades and light artillery rounds. The British are a bit more civilized, though, apparently, because all that resulted from the confrontation is that the four thieves "attempted to drive off"; however, one of the store staff managed to "get into the car and remove the key from the ignition" (!), at which point there's still no gunfire, and the thwarted crooks "then left the premises on foot." Pretty mellow, all told. Police are now "pursuing enquiries."

So yeah, theft interrupted, nobody hurt, happy ending all 'round. The scary bit, though, is the store director's belief that "the increased popularity of Apple and better brand awareness has lead to a greater demand for Macs on the black market." And on what does he base this conclusion? How about the fact that his same exact store was burglarized less than a year ago by two guys who made off with a couple of Macs? And then there's the "recent theft at London-based PR agency Bite Communications," which "runs both Macs and PCs, yet only Macs were stolen." In other words, just by owning a Mac instead of a Wintel, you're increasing your chances of a home invasion. Time to panic?

Probably not, since this scenario isn't exactly new. As we've mentioned before, we here at the AtAT compound have fallen victim to this syndrome ourselves; Jack's beloved PowerBook Duo 230 was swiped from a hospital laboratory in Los Angeles, while a Wintel notebook sitting right next to it had been left behind. These were laptops, remember; there's no reason the thief couldn't have strolled out with both of them stuffed down his pants or whatever. (The Duo, weighing almost half a pound less than a current PowerBook G4, was positively svelte for its day.) We still have no idea who the jerk was who stole our first ever portable, but at the very least we know that he had taste-- or just knew he could fence the Mac for a bigger wad of cash.

This all happened about eight years ago, so we're a little doubtful that Mac owners (or dealers) are suddenly a lot more at risk-- at least here in the U.S. Maybe in the UK Macs are just starting to gain a bunch more popular acceptance, and that's leading to an uptick in crime; still, there's no need to panic. That is, until some UK publication informs us that people who use Final Cut Pro are 80% more likely to become victims of human black market kidney harvesting.