Hows Your Ethics On Fake Montblancs?

[kidde]

I'd rather buy a Kaigelu or Jinhao. I would gladly pay that craftsmen $16ea for five of his MB like pens. I would not want the MB emblem or that name on it. What? He doesn't offer them for that price? It would only be fair since his "statement" is meant to imply that MB charges way too much money. He should be more than willing to sell these at his reasonably stated price.

These arguments have no value. At some point there is deception, because they wouldn't need to steal a trademark to just sell a pen. It is at the very least a stolen trademark. The "I could never buy a real one, so this is the next best thing" comment tells you it's hoped someone will think it is real, even if just in passing.

How would you feel if somebody who looked similar went around pretending to be you? Went to places you worked or shopped and acted in ways you wouldn't. Ran up charges and allowed these places to think it was you? These counterfeits assume the identity of authentic items. Justify if you like, we all know the truth.

 

Paul

[Bo Bo Olson]

German is not the US, when it comes to cost of labor. Even sales clerks have three years training, if they are full time, and expect to go places.

In the metal branch the Unions are strong.

I would expect the warehouse forklift drivers to be making €1,300/$2,000 a month clear after high taxes and 15% health insurance. The wages are pre-tax, so high.

You do not take overtime in you are taxed 50% for over time....cheaper to get a part time job in McDonalds, if you need the money.

 

Those folks inside the factory at MB have done apprenticeships...low paid and are journeymen (fair wages), some must be masters to teach. At master level you are talking big money.

The Unions are strong in the 'metal' working branch...where because of the nib and machinery MB falls. I don't know but would expect €18/$23 an hour (and I believe that is low...in I worked in sales) not metal, an hour average for non Masters.

 

Then you have your design department....your nib masters....the ones who do repair, must be skilled too.

Six weeks vacation, the automatic Christmas 'bonus' (the tax bite on that is 50%) which is a months' wages, vacation money for the summer, 1/2 a months salary. 12-13 days of holiday. Good Friday is a holiday.

Virtually unlimited sick leave...after 6 weeks in a row, picked up differently.

 

It takes real high taxes to pay for a semi-socialistic state...but you get what you pay for. Low paid is 35% plus 15% full medical coverage, no sell your house because you got laid off and have cancer or an operation.

[richardandtracy]

In a majority of Western Countries if you knowingly buy a fake, you are committing a criminal act.

If you unknowingly buy a fake, you are the victim of a criminal act, should report it and seek redress through appropriate channels.

 

I will not knowingly buy fakes.

 

I am happy to buy 'lookalikes' (eg the £15 Kaigelu 316 instead of a £350 Parker Duofold) provided that they do not purport to be what they are not. In most of these cases, when I do this I am spending money that would not otherwise have gone to a pen manufacturer at all.

 

Regards,

 

Richard.

[Parker51]

There are reasons for Copywrites. Yes it is a Legal Fiction, and it does allow the holder to charge more for an item, but only if others perceive it to be of the value it is offered for. No one has to buy a Montblanc, or any other Pen, they chose to, and willingly pay the price asked, or they simply don't. All any of us really have to bring to any interaction is our reputation. If we do what we promise we maintain it, or expand it. If we fail to do what we promise we damage our reputation. Few interactions are predicated on not trusting the person that one is interacting with, be it a simple purchase when one expects to only pay what has been agreed on, and not additional hidden charges, nor a substitution of pretend currency for ones change, or a major purchase such as a house, car, or business.

Those that produce Counterfeit items are trading on someone else's reputation. They are profiting by it. They are propagating chaos and an end to the very basic concept needed for a civilization, ones reputatation.

[Charles Rice]

Rationalize all you like - knowingly buying a fake is the same as theft.

[redisburning]

Rationalize all you like - knowingly buying a fake is the same as theft.

 

no it's not...

 

it's buying a fake. similarly criminal/sleezy, but definitionally not the same.

[Wahl]

I will not buy any fake/counterfeit/copy !

[Pickwick]

It is the buyer's responsibility to determine whether an item being sold is the genuine article. If one is buying a Montblanc lookalike for $15 then it's obvious. The op knew the pen he was buying was not genuine. It's not doing any harm to the makers of Montblanc.

[Charles Rice]

 

no it's not...

 

it's buying a fake. similarly criminal/sleezy, but definitionally not the same.

So you are saying that buying a pirated copy of MS Windows or a fake Green Day CD is not theft??? The buyer of stolen merchandise is just as guilty as the seller.

[richardandtracy]

It is a criminal offence regardless of the wording on the charge sheet presented in court.

 

Regards,

 

Richard

[redisburning]

So you are saying that buying a pirated copy of MS Windows or a fake Green Day CD is not theft??? The buyer of stolen merchandise is just as guilty as the seller.

 

this is very simple.

 

piracy and counterfeiting make a copy of the original which may or may not be presented as an authentic. theft is the removal of the original from its owner.

 

you can stop being all offended, I'm not arguing any of these activities are ethical, but counterfeiting is not theft in the same way orange is not green.

[Dimitri]

I am of the opinion, specifically for Mont Blanc, that buying a fake is wrong.

 

But buying say fake Beats headphones is okay.

 

Reason being, Mont Blanc makes them at a high cost in a developed nations wages being appropriate for the job.

 

Beats outsources their entire production to China to make them as cheap as possible to increase corporate profits only.

 

You can buy Beats headphones that are "real" on the gray market due to lots of Chinese companies having a policy of a "3rd" shift. You cannot do the same with a Mont Blanc which is made in their own factory in Germany.

[Charles Rice]

 

this is very simple.

 

piracy and counterfeiting make a copy of the original which may or may not be presented as an authentic. theft is the removal of the original from its owner.

 

you can stop being all offended, I'm not arguing any of these activities are ethical, but counterfeiting is not theft in the same way orange is not green.

We could argue all day about what is "theft". So what. One way or another, to me buying a fake is criminal.

[huy3825]

Well all of these posts are based on the premise that the design of, say, the MB149 was originally the property of Montblanc etc... It is entirely POSSIBLE that someone else may have thought of the design of the Montblanc in their backyard and failed to make the design legally recognised.

Then we would have a case of two wrongs, whether or not two wrongs make a right is a different topic of conversation.

 

I'm not saying that Montblanc has stolen anyone's idea nor am I justifying the idea that it is right to purchase a counterfeit pen.

 

I honestly think that it is fine to purchase a $16USD pen that happens to look like a Montblanc pen so long as its performance is on par or superior to that of other pens within that price range.

[redisburning]

We could argue all day about what is "theft". So what.

 

but you'd still be wrong. a lack of specificity to suit your fake anger doesn't change the meaning of the words themselves.

 

 

 

One way or another, to me buying a fake is criminal.

 

no (bleep).

Edited November 26, 2014 by redisburning

[sirgilbert357]

It is the buyer's responsibility to determine whether an item being sold is the genuine article. If one is buying a Montblanc lookalike for $15 then it's obvious. The op knew the pen he was buying was not genuine. It's not doing any harm to the makers of Montblanc.

While it's true that it doesn't really hurt Mont Blanc, that's only because they don't sell any 15 dollar pens. The problem lies with a buyer receiving a fake when they paid actual Mont Blanc prices. Then, it DOES hurt Mont Blanc, because that's a sale that was "lost".

 

Either way, the counterfeit culture is a perversion of authentic goods and I find it shady.

[dmwake]

This is turning out to be a very interesting thread.

 

All the comments are interesting and relevant. I guess the issue for me is, what are you buying when you pay lots of money for a Montblanc, if there are near knock-offs out there that look, feel and perform very similarly to the original product?

 

If you push aside the economic legalities and the intellectual copyright issues, why would any of us buy a Montblanc over a pen with a similar look, feel and performance that sells for $16.

 

Like I implied before, I'm interested in how Montblanc builds brand loyalty. Not so much the legalities of trademark violation.

[Michigan]

I have no tolerance for fakes. Arguably, one needs a phone, so perhaps a fake Apple could be justified that way. But pens? You could pen a dozen masterpieces with free ballpoints from your local bank's teller window. Pens are free.

 

Montblancs are not. MBs are luxury goods bought for important but rather ephemeral reasons. They signify quality, pedigree, and taste in both the good and the user. You can tell me you don't own them for those reasons until you are blue in the face. Many, perhaps most do. Fakes and the fakes who wield them have goals antagonistic to people who own the real thing, more or less. They want to trick the rest of us, or more pathetically, themselves.

 

And let's get to brass tacks here. There are no fakes with the same quality. Find me a knockoff with a gold nib for $15. I bought my kid a Pelikan Twist for that price recently. It writes--that is all I can say for it. But at least it stands on its own terms as a tool. It doesn't pretend it is something it can never be. And that is mostly all that fakes do. Further, show me a fake that will be a gem to behold decades from now. I suspect my silver 146, in use since 1998, will be penning run-on sentences and scratching out misspelled words for my grandkids in 2098 the same as it does for me today. Will any fake do the same? Doubtful.

[huy3825]

+1 redisburning

Buying a fake is not a criminal act IMO.

When politicians lie and commit legitimate criminal acts which causes grievous bodily harm I don't hear you complaining. When someone has the intention to purchase A fake pen, all of a sudden it's Armageddon.

 

They want to trick the rest of us, or more pathetically, themselves.

Salespersons are guilty of this then. Everyone is guilty of this. The people here are fortunate enough to purchase relatively expensive pens compared to BP etc not gonna go there. It would stand to reason that most people here have, for the lack of better words, 'fancy' clothes. These 'fancy' clothes are to trick the eye. Make-up has the same purpose, a car has the same purpose etc..

Everyone here is a fake, me too. Where is the harm in extending the fakeness to pens?

Edited November 26, 2014 by huy3825

[sirgilbert357]

 

this is very simple.

 

piracy and counterfeiting make a copy of the original which may or may not be presented as an authentic. theft is the removal of the original from its owner.

 

you can stop being all offended, I'm not arguing any of these activities are ethical, but counterfeiting is not theft in the same way orange is not green.

 

Agreed. Its not even semantics...the two are quite different. I know, cause I've been stolen from, lol.