I once bought a purse from a subway store that had a label on it (can't remember what it was - Gucci or something?) for $20. I was actually embarrassed at the label - but it was the only bag they had that was the perfect shade of dark red to go with my coat at the time. It didn't last all that long because it was a cheaply-made, and I beat the hell out of my purses and shoes. (I only ever have one purse at a time - I don't get women who like tons of different purses and bags.)

I've never understood the whole brand name culture. I'd rather go find a $20.00 hand bag or $6.00 pair of sunglasses somewhere, than ever pay designer price. But, you're right. What are the point of knock offs?

Here are some links to the world of counterfeit, knock-off goods:

The reasoning behind knock-off fashion.

Fashion Industry Copes with Designer Knockoffs

Knock-off Culture

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Originally posted by Michelle:
I don't really see the big deal, personally.

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If for whatever silly reason people are willing to pay hundreds of dollars for a pursue that someone created, why should they lose business and be under-cut by fake copies?

Granted, most people who bought the $20 copy never would have bought the $400 "real" pursue anyway - but if you create the design and name, you should control it.

Plus, what about people tricked into paying the authentic price for a fake copy?

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Plus, what about people tricked into paying the authentic price for a fake copy?

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Originally posted by Michelle:
Really, I don't care about intellectual copyright for people who starve children in third world factories and then sell their products for thousands of dollars to rich yuppies. Long live the counterfeit, I say. You want capitalism? Compete.

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Let's go back to the most superficial example - the counterfeit purse.

Who's more likely to "starve children in third world factories"? The "legitimate" producer or the illegal, under-the-radar, constantly evading the law counterfeiter?

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Originally posted by Free_Radical:

Oh really?

Let's go back to the most superficial example - the counterfeit purse.

Who's more likely to "starve children in third world factories"? The "legitimate" producer or the illegal, under-the-radar, constantly evading the law counterfeiter?

It's ludicrous to think that knock-offs are being made under conditions even remotely close to decent. The Star article explicitly states that a lot of counterfeit products are produced by organised crime - you can be sure they offer nice hourly salaries and 15-minute breaks

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Did anyone get stuck with the recently discovered poisoned Colgate toothpaste, Health Canada warning issued.

well yes, but there IS also an artist and creator's right to the fruits of one's labour, which is recognized explicitly in, for example, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (art. 27(2) )

anyways, since "pharmaceuticals" were mentioned above, that brings up a hair-raising investigative piece I saw on TV last Sunday evening -- Dateline NBC's look at the world of bogus pharmaceuticals:
http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/13137839/

very scary stuff;
I am usually pretty imperturbable and TV news reports of plane crashes, plagues, hurricanes, war, terrorism, etc, don't get me too stressed out

but this Dateline repeat (the original broadcast was in June 2006) had some shocking and unbelievable information about counterfeit pharmaceuticals, and the degree to which:
- the labs and makers of bogus drugs are more and more sophisticated technically;
- they are brazen and aggressive pushers;
- they are able to duplicate drugs so closely that even research teams at, say, Roche or Pfizer have trouble telling the real from the fakes;
- they couldn't care less about anyone's health, your kid's or your grandma's;
and finally,
- hold on to your hat, after growing in the Third World, they are coming onstream in a big way in the North American drug-distribution business.

These are drugs that are made with cheaper and/or non-effective chemical ingredients that sometimes may just have no effect -- ie, a heart drug that does nothing for your heart, because it does not have the active compounds needed -- but on the more dangerous end, they may be poisonous or aggressively bad for your body.
Dateline showed some tape of an underground lab in China that was using chemicals normally used, for example, in drywall sheets and yellow road paint as substitutes for the pharmaceutical agents used by real pill makers.

The nightmare scenario is a plague or virus that spreads quickly and can be countered by specific patented drugs, say Tamiflu for bird flu, but then this is already copied and neutralized by rogue drug makers.
There was a phone tape played on the NBC show of a sales guy saying "No problem, we can start shipping [fake Tamiflu] right away; our network is all ready."

Very very scary.
And coming soon to a pharmacy near you ....

[ 31 July 2007: Message edited by: Geneva ]

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they couldn't care less about anyone's health

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Speaking of health, pharmaceuticals, milk, counterfeits, etc ...

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U.S. beef is heavily contaminated with natural or synthetic sex hormones. When U.S. beef cattle enter feedlots, pellets of these hormones are implanted under the ear skin, a process repeated at the midpoint of their 100-day pre-slaughter fattening period. These hormones increase carcass weight, adding about $80 profit per animal.

Not surprisingly, but contrary to the claims of the FDA and USDA, residues of these hormones in meat are up to 20-fold higher than normal. Increased levels of sex hormones are linked to the escalating incidence of reproductive cancers in the U.S. since 1975, 36% for post-menopausal breast cancer, 50% for testicular cancer, and 88% for prostate cancer.

Based on these concerns, Europe banned imports of U.S. beef in 1989, and Japan followed up with its own ban in 2003. Before the ban, Japan was the most lucrative overseas market for American beef, importing more than $1.5 billion worth in 2003.

These concerns are not new. As evidenced in a series of General Accountability Office investigations and Congressional hearings, FDA registration and residue-tolerance programs and USDA inspections are in near total disarray, aggravated by brazen denials and cover-ups.

A January 1986 report, "Human Food Safety and the Regulation of Animal Drugs," unanimously approved by the House Committee on Government Operations, concluded that "the FDA has consistently disregarded its responsibility - has repeatedly put what it perceives are interests of veterinarians and the livestock industry ahead of its legal obligation to protect consumers - jeopardizing the health and safety of consumers of meat, milk and poultry."

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and so:
a drug company whose reputation and survival depends entirely on their pharmaceuticals WORKING

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thanks for the tip

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they are able to duplicate drugs so closely that even research teams at, say, Roche or Pfizer have trouble telling the real from the fakes

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And do doctors keep prescribing pharmaceuticals because they work?

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US spending on such advertising [direct to consumer] grew rapidly during the 1990s, reaching $2.47bn (£1650m) in 2000 ...

Patients' requests for medicines are a powerful driver of prescribing decisions. In most cases physicians prescribed requested medicines but were often ambivalent about the choice of treatment. If physicians prescribe requested drugs despite personal reservations, sales may increase but appropriateness of prescribing may suffer. Concerns about the value of opening up the regulatory environment to permit direct to consumer advertising in the EU and Canada seem well justified.

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And just how concerned are those big pharmas about human health, unlike, say, the guys in India selling on the black market:

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While Merck and Pfizer executives do not stop talking about bringing back Vioxx (voluntarily recalled by Merck after reports of as many as 50,000 deaths in the US alone and 140,000 personal injuries) and Bextra (FDA banned Bextra in April) despite conclusions that both drugs are too dangerous for arthritis patients, drug regulatory agencies worldwide are reconfirming that the side effects are just too serious to justify their prescriptions.

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Yeah, go have that aspirin. Take Bayer:

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Bayer CropScience, the multi-national agro-chemical and biotech corporation, has dropped its court action against Friends of the Earth. It had tried to prevent the environmental group from telling the public how to access safety data on pesticides - including a weedkiller for use on GM herbicide-tolerant crops in the UK, Glufosinate Ammonium.

Bayer started legal action when Friends of the Earth said it had legally obtained copies of safety data from the Swedish pesticide regulator KEMI and said it was going to tell the public how they could obtain the information in the same way. (emphasis added)

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[ 31 July 2007: Message edited by: Frustrated Mess ]

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David Graham, the FDA scientist who publicized problems with Vioxx long before it was recalled, argued that Avandia should be pulled from the shelves.

"If rosiglitazone increases the cardiovascular risks, a wrong decision will cost thousands of lives," Graham told the meeting of agency advisers in Maryland yesterday.

He argued that there's no proof that Avandia provides "major" health benefits.

But the joint panel of experts – convened after a May study in the New England Journal of Medicine found people who took the drug had as much as a 43 per cent higher risk of heart attacks – voted 22 to 1 to keep it on the market with warnings, saying the benefits outweighed the risks.

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Fake icewines being sold abroad

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When a friend complimented Niagara winemaker Allan Schmidt for successfully cracking the icewine market in mainland China, Schmidt dismissed it: He wasn't selling his wine in China, he said.

But the friend persisted. He said he was sure he'd seen Schmidt's Vineland Estates icewine for sale there.

"Again, I told him: `No, you must be mistaken,'" Schmidt recalls.

Then the friend gave him a link to a website.

Schmidt was stunned.

There, a Chinese company was selling a product called Vineland icewine, boasting of a joint venture with a Canadian partner and, to top it all off, using a panoramic view of Schmidt's own winery on its Web page.

"They'd taken it right off our website," Schmidt says in a telephone interview. "I was upset."

Four years on, and after spending $60,000 in legal fees trying to protect his trademark in China, he is still upset.

The Chinese promise him a hearing – but not until 2011.

"The whole experience has just left a really bad taste in my mouth," the winemaker says.

China is battling a flood of fakes, from medicines and vaccines to cellphone cards and even Olympic souvenirs.

But when ambitious Chinese counterfeiters fix their sights on foreign manufacturers, no one is safe – not Rolex, not Tag Heuer, and certainly not Canadian icewines.

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You can read the transcripts or watch/listen to the interviews

Good Pills, Bad Pills: Dr. Sidney Wolfe Condemns FDA Advisors For Backing the Sale of Vioxx, Celebrex and Bextra Despite Known Dangers

The FDA panel proposed that the drugs be sold with an FDA "black box" warning. Vioxx is now expected to return to the market even though nearly half the FDA panel voted against it being sold. Its manufacturer Merck voluntarily withdrew the painkiller drug in the fall. Studies have show as many as 55,000 people may have died from taking the drug

Click here for more details
Democracy Feb 22 2005

[ 21 August 2007: Message edited by: AfroHealer ]