Another Apple employee loses an iPhone prototype in a bar. I smell a movie script. 

The bar at Cava22. Photo: James Martin/CNET

The tech press is never happier than when it's in hot pursuit of the next Apple (AAPL) iPhone. Almost any clue will do -- a purloined case design, a blurry factory photo, a leaked production estimate from a sketchy Asian news source.

That's what made last year's saga of the prototype iPhone 4 -- lost in a bar and sold to a Gizmodo editor whose house was raided and his computers seized -- so irresistible.

The story of the iPhone 5 that broke this week hasn't got those kind of legs, but it's not without its charms.

My favorite details:

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