Every time a prominent site gets hacked, someone always goes through the trouble to analyze the passwords contained in the data leak, usually to my own comic amusement. With sites from the Gawker network, especially sites like Gizmodo and Lifehacker, where users commonly claim to be among the web’s most savvy users, you would expect the passwords to be a little better.

Numbers one, two, and three? 123456, password, and 12345678. The full list is even funnier, though, and contains things like “letmein,” “princess,” and “starwars.” Well done, nerds of the internet.

You can find more entries, along with some graphical analysis of the passwords included at the Wall Street Journal.

Tomorrow marks yet another Apple WWDC. Another day surrounded by the anticipation of a new iPhone. I expect this year is more than a landmark hardware launch, though. This will likely be the year Apple makes a serious attempt at the cloud, an area of the market where Apple is starting to fall seriously behind Google and the Android OS.

First off, the new iPhone is a big deal, not just for us but for Apple as well. The phone leak was so big to Apple, in fact, that it refused to invite Gizmodo to the event in light of the investigation. The newest iteration of the iPhone will be the most advanced phone to market. Though we don’t know specifics, it looks as though the phone will support video conferencing, capture HD video, offer a faster processor, more memory, and of course, iPhone OS 4.

It’s OS 4 that will help Apple catch up to Android. The latest Android updates include support for streaming music from your desktop to your phone. It also allows you to push websites, applications, and maps and directions straight to your phone. Apple and the iPhone are way behind in cloud support. The best you have there is MobileMe, which requires a subscription and really only allows you to find your phone if you lose it. Apple’s Lala acquisition could mean good things here.

The one thing you shouldn’t expect tomorrow is a Verizon iPhone. Though we’ve heard rumors since the iPhone launched, it’s unlikely we’ll see anything this year, or even next. I was wholly convinced that we’d get a Verizon phone around the time my 3GS contract expired but recent Verizon comments have made it clear we won’t see one soon.

On the whole, tomorrow is Apple’s chance to position itself in the market. When the 3GS launched it was clearly the best phone on the market. Things aren’t so clear anymore, and the Android devices coming in the near future hold a lot of advantages for tech-savvy buyers. It’s going to take a lot for Apple to outperform the latest version of Android. We’ll see if they have it when Jobs takes the stage for the keynote at 10 PST tomorrow.

Photo Credit: Adam Jackson / Flickr

By now the Gizmodo/iPhone prototype story has been done and redone, blown sky-high with speculation. One thing is for sure, though. Apple is pissed. Really, really pissed. Gizmodo hasn’t been invited to the Apple keynote on Monday.

The blog is still planning to run its own liveblog, so it’s posting for attendees to help with the event. I, for one, am pretty bummed out. Gizmodo was my go to spot for liveblogging. There are other quality options out there, but Gizmodo tended to be the fastest and among the most reliable.

It is interesting, though, that Apple would be willing to shut out Gizmodo. The blog has given Jobs & Co. as much coverage as they could possibly desire, and breaking the iPhone quite possibly gave Apple and the new phone more hype than could ever have been generated organically.

Who’s that guy with the iPhone 4G? That’s Jason Chen, one of the editors at Gizmodo and the guy being held responsible for the recent iPhone 4G leak. I say being held responsible because it appears California law enforcement raided his home looking for the prototype phone he leaked last week, confiscating computers, cameras, and servers in the process.

Gawker Media COO Gaby Darbyshire issued a response to law enforcement officials stating that they had an invalid warrant because of Chen’s status as a journalist under California law. Legal details aside, you can see Jason’s account of the story at Gizmodo. Whatever the decision, this seems like some fairly extreme action on the part of Cali law. First there has to be proof that the phone was stolen, rather than left in the bar. Secondly, that journalism thing makes it pretty hard to prosecute a guy who works from home as the editor of one of the most prominent tech blogs in the world on the grounds that he’s not a journalist.

Whatever the outcome, this is a big win for Apple. The buzz around the new iPhone is as hot as it has ever been thanks to the leak. This only turns up the heat.

There’s been a lot of hullabaloo around the recent iPhone 4G leak, if only because leaks like this are so rare from Apple. Everyone expected Gray Powell, the engineer responsible for leaving his prototype iPhone in a bar where it could be picked up by just anyone, to experience the full wrath of Steve Jobs. He’s still employed though, and as the Woz has it, Powell hopefully won’t be going anywhere.

Wozniak dropped by Gizmodo to offer his thoughts on Apple security, leak prevention, and employee termination. Woz was recently up close and personal with an employee term, after a retail associate showed him the iPad after midnight on launch day, apparently enough of a no-no to get himself canned.

Maybe the best quote from the whole thing is this: “Product secrecy is good for Apple and should be strictly enforced, but maybe 10% of niceness and 90% of strictness is OK too.”

You can find the full post at Gizmodo.