I remember seeing people at flea markets selling bootleg compact discs. They'd rent a booth and have boxes and boxes of them in those fluorescent colored plastic holders, the ones you could buy in 500 packs at Sam's Club or Egghead. Some of them even printed out fake covers and labels on inkjet printers, heck they would be doing it in between customers.
I couldn't figure out why the cops never came and shut them down. Same goes for the gas stations or convenience stores that sold obviously bootlegged movies for $3 on the check-out counter.
Now I want to read an article on Adil R. Cassim, the guy behind that whole ring.
In some parts of the world (Singapore, Malaysia are places I have seen) there are shops in malls that openly sell copies of stuff. In fact when I first bought a PS3 and went looking for games for it in Singapore I was frequently turned away with "Oh, you want originals? We don't do that here".
...coupled with the "legitimizing" effect of paying some amount of money for something. aka "You wouldn't steal a car would you?" "No, but I might pay a dollar for it".
A group of my distant family were all into selling knock-off purses at flea markets. They all did it for years without any problems from the law. Suddenly about two years ago the police cracked down on everybody and they all had to stop due to being arrested & getting in trouble. I had heard it was due to some type of political pressure that had originated from the designers. I.e the correct local politicians palms had been greased.
I'd imagine the bootleg movie selling would be similar. The police don't really care until someone above them puts out the order to deal with it.
I couldn't figure out why the cops never came and shut them down.
At one Dutch internet marketplace, you still see people selling Garmin maps (topos) which are clearly copies. They even have the gut to say 'one topo for 25 Euro, two topos for 40 Euro'. Nobody seems to care.
As someone who buys them legally, I am quite appalled these businesses (since the people who purchase them legally are paying higher prices to compensate the profits of these crooks).
I'm not convinced that is always the case... there will always be downward pressure to compete, as long as there is competition. Copyright/Patent laws have been extended so far that it's become difficult or impossible to compete fairly, so black and grey markets become more viable as competition.
I couldn't figure out why the cops never came and shut them down. Same goes for the gas stations or convenience stores that sold obviously bootlegged movies for $3 on the check-out counter.
Now I want to read an article on Adil R. Cassim, the guy behind that whole ring.