Citizen journalism lost some of its original luster after an anonymous goon known only as "Johntw" last Friday used CNN's iReport site to break the false news that Apple CEO Steve Jobs had suffered a heart attack. The rumor zipped across the Net like a free Radiohead track, and Apple's share price fell 10 percent before rebounding, reported Digital Media. Silicon Alley Insider posted the bogusness quickly ("We knew that our readers would want to know about the story and evaluate it for themselves") and called it "a big moment for citizen journalism"--but not long afterward admitted "citizen journalism...just failed its first significant test." Hey, everybody--Steve Jobs is fine!! (Probably.) Epicenter recalls that Apple's share price has been victimized by false rumors before.

But this is a big deal: the SEC (since it has nothing else to do these days) is investigating whether it was all about manipulating the stock price, reports Hardware 2.0, (which notes that "Apple stock seems to be particularly vulnerable to any bad news.") The stock panic proves Jobs is Apple's true heart, Palm Addict observes: "No matter how hard Apple tries to say about Steve Jobs' health is a private matter, it's not."

Apple actually is less private than ever. AppleInsider recalls the old days when Apple tried to subpoena it to discover the source of a leak about an audio device code-named Asteroid. But now Apple "has thrown in the towel on fighting leaks about forthcoming products," writes Nicholas Ciarelli (whose former Apple rumor site Think Secret was shut down by Apple) at The Daily Beast. He says pictures of the iPhone 3G and iPod Nanos were all over the Web prior to their launch.

Meanwhile Apple joined the rest of the stock market in losing serious ground Monday. And in a bit of happy Apple news (from The Unofficial Apple Weblog), the Swedish Foreign Minister has switched to Mac and is loving it.