what about copycats?

fishface5

fishface5

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Feb 3, 2001
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I am wondering about the views of custom knuts, and makers, on this subject. It makes sense for a new maker to learn their chops by practicing on respected designs, trying to duplicate the work of experienced custom makers. Buit sometimes I see new maker(s) who copy and sell the designs of an established maker, over & over. It especially irks me to see maker A consistently copy maker B, selling maker B's multiple designs at less than maker B charges, without giving (1) attribution or (2) royalties. Personally, I would be ashamed to do that if I were a new maker. Practicing is one thing, unauthrized selling is another. With all the complaints about chinese knockoffs, this seems the same to me. But others seem to tolerate it. Is this an issue in the custom community? If so, where to draw the line? I'm Curious that fewer are furious.
 
Some people have no shame, nor will they be truthful with themselves about the subject.
 
Fish, you are asking your question coming from a position of principles and ethics. These people dont understand those concepts.
There are new makers who have begged for equipment to make knives because they are so "broke", then turn around and sell the gift equipment. They are given breaks on prices because they sell such a good sob story, then turn around and spit on those who were kind. They take and take and take, then ask for some more. They will never understand pride and dignity, they are dogs.
As Tom said, they delude themselves.
 
What I find amazing is the maker who posts what is clearly a copied knife built by another maker and insists he/she is only inspired by said maker and many agree with this!!

I am talking of the 'cloned' knife, that made that is so damn close that the only thing that seperates who made what is through the Maker's markings.

The Maker who copied insists it is just an inspired knife like those that are inspired by Moran or loveless when in reality it's a 'spitting image' and justifies what he has done because there is 'just so many ways to make a knife".

A cloned knife is a COUNTERFEIT!!!!
 
There are many newer Makers who practice this approach. I am against it, even if the Maker is not concerned or even endorses the Copy Cats knives. I was tempted and succombed to one such Copy Cat Maker. He studied with and made exact copies of a famous Makers knives. I had three knives by this Famous Maker but since he had such a long wait time I thought I would be satisfied with a "copy".

I was very disappointed, not only with the Maker himself (his conduct during the project, non-existant communication, rediculous delays with vague reasoning, etc) but also with the final product.

When I received the knife it was indeed very similiar in appearance to the Famous Makers works, but the copying Maker was not true to the original makers concepts nor my specifications. The Fit and handling of the knife were far inferior to the Original. I did not do cutting tests with the knife for fear that it would not perform at all up to my standards, I quickly returned the knife to the Maker and demanded a full refund. Ended up having to cancel the Charge on my CC because the CopyCat Maker refused to refund my money.

This was one of my only truely BAD experiences in my years of buying Custom knives and since then I have never been tempted by another Copy Cat. It just isn't worth the time or the investment of your hard earned cash IMO. My advice, if you are a serious knife enthusiast get the real thing, you deserve it.
 
I'm assmuing that this is a current issue, could someone send a link or pic to my email, or post it here if you like of the maker in question. Thanks - Charles
 
I would also like to know what has brought this subject back into the spotlight. This comes up quite often when a well thought of maker is having one or more of his designs knocked off by another maker.

If it is sanctioned by the original maker then I have no problem with look alike knives. Some of the knives of Bill Burke or Audra Draper come to mind They look very similar to Ed Fowlers knives, but he has no problem with that. If the original maker has not sanctioned these look alikes then I do have a problem with the makers that do this. I consider it theft of intellectual property.

Many people bring up the fact that people don't seem to be bothered by all the copies of makers like Scagel, Bo Randall, Bob Loveless or Bill Moran. To me this is different. You are not financially hurting any of these makers and I have heard no complaints from the ones that are still with us or from RMK about the practice of copying their knives. I think Bill Moran and Bob Loveless take it as a compliment that people like their knives enough to copy them.

Recently I have many knives that look like those of Neil Blackwood. Not exactly the same, but close enough that I immediately think of one of Neil's knives. Remembering how Neil reacted to the copy ing of his credit card knife, I doubt that he considers these look-alikes as compliments. Could be wrong though. Maybe he has no problem with them at all.

Anyway, I sure would like to know what knives and what makers are being referred to in the original post by fishface5.
 
I have commisioned a custom maker to make a knife that had characteristics of an existing factory knife which was designed by a custom maker. I think it's difficult to make a knife that somebody else hasn't made one at least similar to. That said an outright copy of someone else's work is wrong.
 
dabbling with someone else's design ideas is one thing, near-identical copying as the basis for your work is something else. Keep an eye on the Gallery to see this issue pop up on occasion.
 
This topic comes up every time a new Maker copies the style of an established maker, then denies it's a copy.

He/she clais it's merely an 'inspiration', claims the maker he/she copied also copied the style of another and then solicits remarks from others.

Nathan Place is the perfect example. His justification for what he did is based on a claim that neil did a repro of Bob Loveless 15-20 years ago and a Repro of a Harley Bowie at some point. I don't think we are talking authorized reproductions or authorized copies, this is about cloning without the blessings.

And I wonder if those Makers that endorse this would be as supportive if a New Maker cloned them and then set up a table at at big show and sold said copies at hundreds less than theirs.

There are only so mmany ways to make a knife but MILIONS of ways to design them. Influence is great, duplication sucks....
 
It's kind of sad and funny at the same time. If Nathan had spent as much time at the drawing board as he did researching me here, this would all probably be a moot point!!:)

As best as I can tell, the big "Whacker" knife he is refering to was made about 15-20 years ago. I did get the idea from seeing one of Larry Harley's Battle Bowies. I'm not exactly sure when he made the first ones. If he made them earlier, then I made my knife earlier!! All I know is that it was made a long time ago when I still lived in NY. Let me add, it doesn't look exactly like a Battle Bowie, just the same size with a very complex grippy handle. I don't think the knife has ever been shown on the forums. It still hangs in my garage and is used for cutting back the Florida foliage around my yard.

The Loveless Drop Point was a dead on repro. I made the knife for myself mainly to practice doing guards. As you can see, I got away from doing them:p A few years ago I GAVE the Loveless Repro to a customer as a GIFT.

I just posted a reply in the latest Nathan thread in the Gallery section. I'm sincerely hoping it's the last one of that nature.
 
I remember my first day at "knife school". A friend offered to teach me how to make knives and I readily accepted his offer. The one thing he did that I now think was a really smart move on his part was before anything else he made me sit down and draw out a knife that I could make (with his help). For at least two hours I drew and redrew my knife only to have it come out very similar each time to a knife he made that I really liked. He kept telling me it looks too much like his knife and each time I kept creeping back to that design. Finally he grabbed his knife blank to point out the similarities to me. Then he sketched the basic lines of what he thought would be an easy first knife and from that I created a design. It was butt ugly (not in my mind then though) but it worked for a first knife and it didn't look like anything he was doing or would do.

After completing that knife and starting up my own shop it took me about a year to get a design which had no influence of that original design that I did on my first day. Each time I tried to make a knife there was always some element of my original design. This was something I wasn't seeing at the time, rather I saw it after I had broken this cycle.

I can't say for sure why I kept doing that but I think it was lack of confidence in myself. The irony there is that it was only through designing truly different knives did the confidence grow.

So what the hell am I saying???? :confused:

Oh ya! Speaking for myself if my friend had let me use one of his designs to start I would have been stuck making similar knives to his for quite some time, maybe longer than I was stuck with my original design. I was forced to start (thankfully) at a point all on my own. In this way I wasn't copying anyone but myself.

Now I'm absolutely not saying that it's the teachers fault here if a design is copied! That's totally not what I am trying to get at. I think that in some cases the new knife maker has a hard time breaking away from what they started with. If they start with a design from their teacher then it may be difficult to find something they can truly call their own at least for a little while.

Of course all of what I said can only be applied to a new knife maker that is seeking to carve out his/her own place in the knife making world. If they are happy with not growing as a knife maker or are less than ethical then a cycle of design copying and frustration for others may very well be easy for them to fall into.

Anyhow I'm not defending design theft in any way, I think it is wrong. I am merely pointing out that for a new knife maker influence can occur without them even knowing it until much later.
 
Originally posted by Dr.Lathe

As best as I can tell, the big "Whacker" knife he is refering to was made about 15-20 years ago. I did get the idea from seeing one of Larry Harley's Battle Bowies. I'm not exactly sure when he made the first ones. If he made them earlier, then I made my knife earlier!! All I know is that it was made a long time ago when I still lived in NY. Let me add, it doesn't look exactly like a Battle Bowie, just the same size with a very complex grippy handle. I don't think the knife has ever been shown on the forums. It still hangs in my garage and is used for cutting back the Florida foliage around my yard.
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Not the one with about a hundred diseases on the edge is it?:)
 
Just a small point for you to mull over. Not all human cultures view copying ideas, designs, etc. as bad. In many "eastern" cultures, teaching and sharing is viewed as paramount, getting upset about your "design" being used by someone else may be considered rude.

Even western cultures with long histories of patent law, allow patents to expire, so that everyone can use the ideas. If your product is truly good, relish in the copies, because the original should be better.

I think those that get upset about copying designs are more upset about money. They have too little inspiration or too much greed to work out varied designs. They'd rather settle on some "great designs" and crank 'em out for the big bucks. The only thing that changes in their "basic" line may be handle material. For these types of knifemakers, they believe that imitators infringe on their ability to maximize profit. However, they are mistaken. Don't forget, lot's of people copy Randall knives, but Randall still sells some of the original patterns and has a 4 year wait. These types of knifemakers behave more like production companies than craftsmen.

There are other knifemakers who pride themselves on never repeating even their own work. To them, a replica by another knifemaker is meaningless, except as flattery.
 
Originally posted by SkarpKniv
Not the one with about a hundred diseases on the edge is it?:)
Click to expand...

YES!! That's the one!! To be even touched by the blade would cause a slow and painful death. Similar to being bitten my a Komodo Dragon :) "the blood stays on the blade" from the Gangs of New York.........that includes rust and HOG and FISH blood. The knife is also used once in a while for chopping hog quarters and big fish heads :) I remember posting that but where??? Did I post a picture of the ugly booger???:confused:
 
Im pretty sure somewhere in the blackwood gallery you have on the other forum.:D post number 282 to be exact!I love ADSL
 
Quick check of my GPS and the newspaper and sure enough I live in San Diego. My culture here in So. Cal. Odd as it is, really loses patience quickly when it comes to disrespect.

YMMV

Mike
 
I can understand a maker that learned from a more experienced maker being strongly influenced by that maker's designs for the reasons that smo18 addressed.

However, that is not the same as outright copying and then denying it.

Many a maker will proudly acknowledge the influence and help another maker provided and I do believe that they can honor their teacher by doing so.

It is usually easy to tell the dishonest ones because they try to deny what they are doing.
 
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