Hey, Coachella has your keys and cellphone

Coachella music festival promoter Goldenvoice has been trying since April to repatriate hundreds of wallets, cellphones, car keys and other items with the fans who left them behind in the desert. They really work hard to find the owners, according to this KCRW story by Evan George. Excerpt:

Who is the company’s Good Samaritan? An employee who goes by the moniker “Psychic Friend” (she’s also their marketing manager, Dani Lindstrom). This year saw a record number of lost belongings, according to the company, so she’s been busy. In some cases, she’s tracked people down via Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. She’s returned wallets with cash. The owner of one lost backpack even got a phone call at work after the team located a pay stub and did some detective work.

Not every one is traceable of course. You’ve got 5 weeks to get your Hello Kitty key chain back. Goldenvoice says it waits 3 months before donating it all to charity.

For the rest of us the site is still pretty fascinating. It’s a kind of catalog of casualties to a weekend of hard partying; a rare chance to root around people’s pockets without them knowing....

Another trend that the diligent Goldenvoice staffers point out is that this year was especially hard for them to track down the owners of this or that Samsung or iPhone with the smashed screen. Why? They write, “We’re discovering most of you are locking your phones making it near impossible to find you via calling you, texting you or a friend, etc. But we are trying. We’ve been charging the phones and making detailed notes about the background photo that pops up.” Now that’s service. That $349 ticket buys you a helpful team that will charge up your crappy phone and try to track you down by your avatar profile pic.

Follow the thread: Before Coachella there was Woodstock. On Tuesday, a few miles from Coachella, Jefferson Airplane drummer Joey Covington died in a car crash. The video is of Grace Slick leading Jefferson Airplane at Woodstock in August, 1969.