Originally Posted by
TimothyH
People are free to do whatever they want but using counterfeit products is stealing from the company which makes the actual product. That's the bottom line for me.
Calling it "stealing" is oversimplifying. That assumes that, if the person hadn't found the knockoff for $40, they would have bought the real thing at retail instead. That's hardly ever the case.
Lawyers tried to make the same argument 20 years ago, as if every 12 year-old kid who discovered Napster was just about to drop $15 for the new Metallica CD, but downloaded it for free instead. Neither do knockoff purses sold at flea markets represent a huge loss of sales for Louis Vuitton.
Counterfeiting is controlled by organized crime which is pretty much institutionalized in China. The people who make this stuff aren't nice guys. I prefer not to have anything to do with it. Buying legit products is a small price for a clean conscience.
-Tim-
I won't argue with that, though. I don't buy knockoffs either, for a bunch of reasons.