UPS employees in Grand Theft Grand Theft Auto IV
If you're taking a sick day tomorrow in order to properly spend the Grand Theft Auto IV launch in an orgiastic reverie of virtual crime, you may not want to bank on your pre-order being delivered on-time... or at all. According to Ars Technica, three UPS drivers have been fired in the last 24 hours for stealing copies of GTAIV from customers... with a number of interviews of other drivers that will likely take place today and are also expected to end in termination.
I'd usually assume this was some sort of marketing stunt, but Ars Technica's source is a UPS employee himself, who claims that the thefts aren't for eBay:
"They're not selling them, these people are stealing one copy," he told me—all of the thefts seem to be for personal use. It seems many people think stealing a game a few days before release is worth it, and this is far from the perfect crime.
The situation is apparently novel to UPS, which I'm sure will tickle the cockles of Jack Thompson's ichorous heart, although" Grand Theft Auto IV corrupts stupid adults in brown delivery shorts" doesn't really have a lot of cache in the court of public opinions.
Grand Theft UPS: copies of GTA stolen en route to retailers [Ars Technica]
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It isn't the brown shorts. It's the brown shirts, and you know who else had a group of Brownshirts that did his bidding...
You just know that when Grand Theft Auto V comes out, there's going to be a mission where you hijack a delivery truck full of brand new video games.
Given how detailed UPS'es internal tracking system is, you'd think their employees would realize that the exact date, time, and location that a specific package disappeared would be available immediately to everyone in the world.
But I guess that's giving the thievers too much credit!
Apparently they're stealing one copy out of a larger shipment. Contents may settle during shipping?
25 years ago our company UPS guy got busted for selling drugs on his route - and he just got a suspension. Fired for stealing a single game? Glad to know UPS has their priorities straight (not kidding).
UPS probably wanted to can these clowns for just being stupid. Seriously, UPS drivers who don't realize this stuff is tracked down to the millimeter? They finally just got caught doing something they could be justifiably fired for.
It's almost certainly not the $70k/yr drivers stealing the games; they wouldn't even have access to them until the shift that they are to be delivered. It's probably the "package handlers" who work in the hubs 15-20 hours a week starting at around $8/hr who would be stealing them. It would also be much harder to track it back to an individual loader/unloader in many of the older (less automated) hubs.
This makes the gamestop delivery disclaimer warning on pre-orders ('not liable for stolen delivery trucks') seem a bit less humorous and more apropos
Theft for personal use. That's a new one.