You people

[RX-79G]

^ Spot on, Maven! :thumbup:

It's mind boggling, the counterfeiting that goes on around the World. Companies can only do so much to combat this enormous problem, & in many instances, unfortunately it's more cost effective for these companies to simply ignore this problem & look the other way.

When I was living abroad over in the PI, practically everywhere you went, there were vendor's selling counterfeit goods; everything from high end watches, cell phones, clothing, music, movies Viagra, Cialis...you name it! My all-time favorite (I wish that I'd saved the picture I took), was a tube of Crest toothpaste. The box looked identical! The only difference being: instead of the word "CREST," being written on the box, it was replaced by the word, 'CRUST." It was one of the funniest counterfeit item's I've seen.
Needless to say, I didn't care enough to say the 50 pesos, & start brushing my teeth with an improvised Chinese formula of toothpaste.








^ Excellent information! :thumbup:

Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, regarding this subject. I for one, have zero respect, for a person who buys a blatant counterfeit knockoff of any maker/company, & then have the audacity to brag about it!

A year or two ago, there were a couple of incendiary thread's that popped up here. A few member's even posted pictures of their counterfeit Hinderer's, & a couple of other brands, then bragged about the quality, & the money they saved. Just like here in this thread, emotions started running high.

Fortunately, the Mod's shut those offensively stupid thread's down. :thumbup:

So are we talking about companies like Ganzo, or are we talking about counterfeiters? Entirely different animals.

 

[craytab]

So are we talking about companies like Ganzo, or are we talking about counterfeiters? Entirely different animals.

In your opinion.

Saying Ganzo is not counterfeit spits right in the face of Benchmade. Simple. Simple. Simple.

 

[RX-79G]

In your opinion.

Saying Ganzo is not counterfeit spits right in the face of Benchmade. Simple. Simple. Simple.

Are you talking about Benchmade's US only patent, or does Ganzo produce knives that say "Benchmade" on them?


The term for the first thing would be "patent infringement", not "counterfeit". And it would be infringement, if Ganzo was a US company or responsible for importing to the US.

 

[craytab]

Are you talking about Benchmade's US only patent, or does Ganzo produce knives that say "Benchmade" on them?


The term for the first thing would be "patent infringement", not "counterfeit". And it would be infringement, if Ganzo was a US company or responsible for importing to the US.

Go ahead and legitimize it any way you want. I'm not going to argue with you over it...

 

[RX-79G]

Go ahead and legitimize it any way you want. I'm not going to argue with you over it...

"Legitimize".

You own linerlock knives that Walker never got any money for. But you want to vilify a company that also produces perfectly legal lock copies using legal terms that don't apply.


I am not the one who is being a hypocrite.



The OP quickly got disgusted with feeling like he was some sort of immoral person because he wasn't "stealing" Cold Steel, Walker, Moran, Reeve and Emerson designs (which we're okay with), and was buying knives that have an identical legal and moral status. His outburst was not cool, but the emotion in the face of the irrational stuff posted here was understandable.


We don't need a "counterfeit is okay" board, but it would be nice if folks here understood just how normal "design influence" and patent limitations are to how the world, and especially the knife world, functions.


Right now some of our amazing custom members are facing legal action from Cold Steel about an inapplicable trademark dispute for the term "san mai":
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/1390292-san-mai-copyright
Cold Steel has no legal leg to stand on, but maybe you'll want to take their side anyway.

 

[Maven]

Every company puts out a product that they expect to be copied! Did you ever fly in a non-Wright Brothers brand airplane, take a generic drug or play a home video game that didn't say "Atari" on it.

Every company? Did the Wrights or Bushnell expect that others would make and market nigh indistinguishable copies of their product, perhaps even labeled as the original?

Walker invented the liner lock - we now have liner locks everywhere. Bill Moran invents "damascus" style pattern welded steel, got that everywhere. Sal comes up with pocket clips, Chris makes the frame lock.

Though I dont think Chris Reeve had any intention to keep the frame lock to himself, I doubt he appreciates that one can purchase a "Sebenza" for $45 or that companies copy his product even down to the manufacturing remnants of his frames and market them with his names.

And you might be one of the many people sitting at home flipping your Kershaw damascus frame lock with pocket clip as you congratulate yourself on how moral you are, even though every single exciting feature of your knife is "stolen". But it isn't stolen, it is just the way technology works.

I never once brought up an individual, or yourself, posed conjecture about your habits, or questioned anyones moral compass.... Why are you?

You are also welcome to claim that a knife that says "Ganzo" on it and looks a little like some as a knife costing 5 times more is "hurting" the original - but no one can post a single study demonstrating that. In fact, it may be the opposite:
http://freakonomics.com/2012/09/05/why-knockoffs-can-help-a-strong-brand/

I made no such claims, in support or opposition of that opinion.

I will tell you that CRK has probably sold more Sebenzas because of the Sanrenmu 7010 than lost sales. They simply aren't competitors, and maintaining this fiction that they are is hard when United Cutlery clones of Cold Steel products are being sold by forum sponsors.


I need an Anacin.

I offered no information to suggest I opined that Sanrenmu was a CRK competitor. I presented no fictions in my post. Excedrin may be needed.

 

[RX-79G]

Every company? Did the Wrights or Bushnell expect that others would make and market nigh indistinguishable copies of their product, perhaps even labeled as the original?



Though I dont think Chris Reeve had any intention to keep the frame lock to himself, I doubt he appreciates that one can purchase a "Sebenza" for $45 or that companies copy his product even down to the manufacturing remnants of his frames and market them with his names.



I never once brought up an individual, or yourself, posed conjecture about your habits, or questioned anyones moral compass.... Why are you?



I made no such claims, in support or opposition of that opinion.



I offered no information to suggest I opined that Sanrenmu was a CRK competitor. I presented no fictions in my post. Excedrin may be needed.

And I did not say that you made those claims or were that person sitting at home. I said "you may". This isn't personal, please don't take it like that.


Counterfeit is "made in exact imitation of something valuable or important with the intention to deceive or defraud." That is not what this topic is about, since Sanrenmu and Ganzo don't do that.

Patent infringement is "the commission of a prohibited act with respect to a patented invention without permission from the patent holder." US patents only prohibit US acts.


And to answer your first question, the Wrights so expected to be copied that they set the WWI war effort back defending their patent. They had the protection of a patent and attempted to get everything they could out of it while it was active because they understood that their invention would be copied everywhere when the patent ended. That's the way it works. They didn't keep trying to sue everyone after the patent died - it was now public domain.


All of the things that some of you guys hate are simply public domain. Emerson's Wave and Benchmark's Axis aren't public domain in the US, but outside the US Axis locks are no different than slipjoints. They are also no different than a United Cutlery copy of a CS Tai Pan or a Schrade LB7 copy of a Buck, or a liner lock.

The line that is being drawn doesn't match reality. Public domain is public domain, whether you speak Chinese or not.

 

[Gizmoman]

Rev-Devil--Esav--
SPOT ON...
Find another place to rant bud.....
See ya..

 

[craytab]

Rev-Devil--Esav--
SPOT ON...
Find another place to rant bud.....
See ya..

Yup indeed!

 

[Esav Benyamin]

The worst part of these counterfeit - clone - copy threads are the carefully crafted / carefully mistaken references. A great New Yorker said, "Everyone is entitled to his own opinion. No one is entitled to his own facts."

Ironically, this parallels the copycats themselves. They regularly push the idea that copies on whatever level do no harm. They even pat themselves on the back, that their cheap copies do a service, by introducing poor hobbyists to these better designs.

Tell that to the buyer who sends his bargain copy in for warrenty work.
Tell that to the buyer whose supposedly name brand knife falls apart, and won't buy that brand again.

Of course legal recourse is expensive, ineffective, and frustrating. "Crust" toothpaste sounds funny. No one was laughing recently in Latin America when cheap toothpaste used toxic fillers, killing cnildren.

Caveat emptor ... only the good die young.

 

[RX-79G]

The worst part of these counterfeit - clone - copy threads are the carefully crafted / carefully mistaken references. A great New Yorker said, "Everyone is entitled to his own opinion. No one is entitled to his own facts."

That is saying alot, without saying anything at all. Writing this implies that I have my facts wrong, which I do not. The laws I put in my posts are accurate, and the use of words like "counterfeit"sprinkled through this thread are not.

As a mod you can certainly appear to be doling out wisdom and common sense from on high, but if I am actually wrong about the law or history public domain, intellectual property, patent limitations or the definition of counterfeit, you should come out and say it. Please actually level your accusation instead of implying it.


Whether it is the word "ricasso" or "counterfeit", those words have real meanings, and not just whatever people want them to mean when it suits their prejudices. If you believe your own advise about "his own facts", please make this about facts.

 

[Maven]

Patent infringement is "the commission of a prohibited act with respect to a patented invention without permission from the patent holder." US patents only prohibit US acts.

The line that is being drawn doesn't match reality. Public domain is public domain, whether you speak Chinese or not.

"uses in commerce any word, term, name, symbol, or device, or any combination thereof, or any false designation of origin, false or misleading description of fact, or false or misleading representation of fact, which is likely to cause confusion, or to cause mistake, or to deceive as to the affiliation, connection, or association of such person with another person, or as to the origin, sponsorship, or approval of his or her goods, services, or commercial activities by another person, shall be liable in a civil action by any person who believes that he or she is or is likely to be damaged by such act."

" the owner of a famous mark that is distinctive, inherently or through acquired distinctiveness, shall be entitled to an injunction against another person who, at any time after the owner’s mark has become famous, commences use of a mark or trade name in commerce that is likely to cause dilution by blurring or dilution by tarnishment of the famous mark, regardless of the presence or absence of actual or likely confusion, of competition, or of actual economic injury."

This is the verbage of the laws intended to protect makers from illicit copies/clones/homages/replicas/whathaveyou. There need not be a patent, or a registered trademark involved, there is no delineation between American made copies and Chinese copies, it doesnt matter if EVERYONE knows what a Sebenza or a Delica, or a 110 looks like it doesnt make them public domain, companies have a legal right to protect their product from (even PERCEIVED) damages. And to touch on the public domain thing even a tiny bit further, just because say a clip, or frame lock, or Carson flipper, whatever, is public domain still does not mean that you can copy in whole a product that uses a public domain component

 

[RX-79G]

"uses in commerce any word, term, name, symbol, or device, or any combination thereof, or any false designation of origin, false or misleading description of fact, or false or misleading representation of fact, which is likely to cause confusion, or to cause mistake, or to deceive as to the affiliation, connection, or association of such person with another person, or as to the origin, sponsorship, or approval of his or her goods, services, or commercial activities by another person, shall be liable in a civil action by any person who believes that he or she is or is likely to be damaged by such act."

" the owner of a famous mark that is distinctive, inherently or through acquired distinctiveness, shall be entitled to an injunction against another person who, at any time after the owner’s mark has become famous, commences use of a mark or trade name in commerce that is likely to cause dilution by blurring or dilution by tarnishment of the famous mark, regardless of the presence or absence of actual or likely confusion, of competition, or of actual economic injury."

This is the verbage of the laws intended to protect makers from illicit copies/clones/homages/replicas/whathaveyou. There need not be a patent, or a registered trademark involved, there is no delineation between American made copies and Chinese copies, it doesnt matter if EVERYONE knows what a Sebenza or a Delica, or a 110 looks like it doesnt make them public domain, companies have a legal right to protect their product from (even PERCEIVED) damages. And to touch on the public domain thing even a tiny bit further, just because say a clip, or frame lock, or drop point, whatever, is public domain still does not mean that you can copy in whole a product that uses a public domain component

None of that applies to the shape of a knife, a car or a sweater. You can't trademark a style, you can't patent a look.

Those laws protect against people selling things that falsely appear to be made by an entirely different company. Those items will have a false "Trade Mark".

What you're talking about is Reeces being able to sue anybody else that makes a peanut butter cup for "counterfeit". If the Newman's peanut butter cup didn't come wrapped in an orange Reeces wrapper, it isn't counterfeit, trademark infringement or anything else. It is two peanut butter cups.

 

[Esav Benyamin]

Earth to RX-79G: I make an effort to say exactly what I mean, and I am capable of directing my rematks to a specific person when I mean to. In this case, I was clearly referring to the entire class of threads, not even so much the people participating.

YOU are the one who habitually says a lot and leaves us wondering what it's all about. Let me clue you in. Just like now, no matter how hard you try to make it so, it is not all about you.

That is saying alot, without saying anything at all. Writing this implies that I have my facts wrong, which I do not. The laws I put in my posts are accurate, and the use of words like "counterfeit"sprinkled through this thread are not.

As a mod you can certainly appear to be doling out wisdom and common sense from on high, but if I am actually wrong about the law or history public domain, intellectual property, patent limitations or the definition of counterfeit, you should come out and say it. Please actually level your accusation instead of implying it.


Whether it is the word "ricasso" or "counterfeit", those words have real meanings, and not just whatever people want them to mean when it suits their prejudices. If you believe your own advise about "his own facts", please make this about facts.

 

[Maven]

None of that applies to the shape of a knife, a car or a sweater. You can't trademark a style, you can't patent a look.

Those laws protect against people selling things that falsely appear to be made by an entirely different company. Those items will have a false "Trade Mark".

What you're talking about is Reeces being able to sue anybody else that makes a peanut butter cup for "counterfeit". If the Newman's peanut butter cup didn't come wrapped in an orange Reeces wrapper, it isn't counterfeit, trademark infringement or anything else. It is two peanut butter cups.

Automobile manufacturers register their vehicle designs virtually ALL THE TIME.

I mentioned before "trade dress" the way an item looks. Its not a patent, its a variation of the trademark. You keep using the term patent when I havent, and when patent is not what applies in most cases to whats being discussed. These companies are making clones of products that are identical or so close to the original that a normal person cant distinguish them. This practice is illegal in the United States, its actually illegal to even import items that infringe upon the design, look, distinctiveness or "trade dress" of a product.

If you manufacture and market a round peanut butter filled chocolate cup with angled sides and ridges around the circumference I guarantee Hersheys will have lawyers beating down your door to stop copying the Reeses cup design/look.

 

[Gizmoman]

Earth to RX-79G: I make an effort to say exactly what I mean, and I am capable of directing my rematks to a specific person when I mean to. In this case, I was clearly referring to the entire class of threads, not even so much the people participating.

YOU are the one who habitually says a lot and leaves us wondering what it's all about. Let me clue you in. Just like now, no matter how hard you try to make it so, it is not all about you.

This AMAZINGLY Accurate...see the forest thru the trees yet?????????

 

[RX-79G]

Automobile manufacturers register their vehicle designs virtually ALL THE TIME.

I mentioned before "trade dress" the way an item looks. Its not a patent, its a variation of the trademark. You keep using the term patent when I havent, and when patent is not what applies in most cases to whats being discussed. These companies are making clones of products that are identical or so close to the original that a normal person cant distinguish them. This practice is illegal in the United States, its actually illegal to even import items that infringe upon the design, look, distinctiveness or "trade dress" of a product.

If you manufacture and market a round peanut butter filled chocolate cup with angled sides and ridges around the circumference I guarantee Hersheys will have lawyers beating down your door to stop copying the Reeses cup design/look.

A normal person can distinguish the difference between the word "Benchmark" and the word "Ganzo", as both knives are clearly marked as such.

Patents are the things that make it illegal to bring an Axis lock copy into the US. This is what Craytab called "counterfeit", but is an un-infringed patent.

You can't patent OR trademark OR copyright a simple shape. That's why Chrysler is not the only minivan maker.



I get why some people don't like some Chinese brands, just as their parents hated Japanese brands. But you are misunderstanding the laws AND the practices of intellectual property to make a claim that the copies you don't like are different and worse than the copies you do like. The OP found this behavior so vexing he split. I find it so off putting that I attempt to educate in my obnoxious manner.

When SOG started selling a copy of the Vietnam bowie, they did not "counterfeit" anything. Neither did Blackjack or CS. This "dress trade" stuff has not been filed by any of the knife companies involved, and probably couldn't be because Dress Trade only applies to non-functional attributes. Knives are almost all functional, but you could probably register some special color pattern, just not the parts that do anything.

http://www.inta.org/TrademarkBasics/FactSheets/Pages/Trade-Dress.aspx

 

[RevDevil]

Earth to RX-79G: I make an effort to say exactly what I mean, and I am capable of directing my rematks to a specific person when I mean to. In this case, I was clearly referring to the entire class of threads, not even so much the people participating.

YOU are the one who habitually says a lot and leaves us wondering what it's all about. Let me clue you in. Just like now, no matter how hard you try to make it so, it is not all about you.

It's getting might frigging old and tiresome too. I am starting to think that the original hiatus was not nearly long enough.
Some folks like to argue, just to argue, and when that happens and becomes the clear intent that is when the value of that person's contributions and even presence dries up. The funniest part is that as a wise man once said, those who know the least, know it the loudest. It could not be more evident here. Just because you state your position and sound of your voice gets louder, doesn't make your words truer, volume and repetition does not share a causal relationship with truth. Most get it, a few special ones never will.

 

[sideways]

A wise man once told me...

This cantankerous old fart doesn't care. Turn down your volume and get off my lawn.

It wasn't polite but it was effective.

Now my hearing aid has already been adjusted, so no skin off my nose either way, but I'm putting that out there.

 

[Maven]

A normal person can distinguish the difference between the word "Benchmark" and the word "Ganzo", as both knives are clearly marked as such.

You can't patent OR trademark OR copyright a simple shape. That's why Chrysler is not the only minivan maker.

Yes a normal person can read, but the average person cant distinguish between this $45 knife:

And this $445 knife:

And thats the point, even if it doesnt call itself a Sebenza (which in fact this one does) its clearly intended to be an exact copy of one. This is illegal.

You cant register a simple shape, correct, but a Honda Odyssey doesnt look like a Dodge Caravan because Honda would be sued, because the SHAPE or design of the entire vehicle is protected. The design of a car, truck, motorcycle, boat, knife isnt a simple shape. People buy knives and cars, and shoes becasue of the way they look. this look is protected. All you need to do is google "design patent" and youll see the myriad objects and products of so called "simple" shapes that are protected.

The Sebenza shape is capable of being protected under trade dress law. Their are distinctive features that are not essential to its function. A Sebenza would still function and perform the same if its finger notches were a different shape or if the handle was a different shape, or if the production holes were filled in.