If the fake is almost real, does it really matter?
Stuff my nightmares are made of now. Anyway, I always open all power adapters/supplies I buy from there, because my original education is EE, so I never used these. But the idea that some people are using such things is quite scary.
Not to poo poo on aliexpress itself. There are some exceptional quality sellers and products to be found there. You just have to know how to find them.
https://www.redpoints.com/blog/amazon-commingled-inventory-m...
You're making the point I'm making. While I don't (to the best of my knowledge) purchase counterfeit items, I don't pretend that certification is anything other than certification. Hopefully certification comes with standards, and aren't self-reporting... but that's not always the case.
Only when a case goes to court, it will be determined if the certification was rightful or not.
https://support.ce-check.eu/hc/en-us/articles/360008642600-H...
I opend some of them non-destructively to check them out, and deemed them sufficient. They barely get warm at all.
Nonetheless I put them in some closed rack where they only could produce some stink, but no fire.
I'm too lazy to unplug them right now to upload photos to Imgur, or such, because it would disrupt some services.
Anyways, no urban legend. Just the usual bureaucratic disconnect from reality, saying otherwise.
Meanwhile another bureaucratic entity, the german customs really likes to hassle you because of exactly that sh..! :-)
edit: Some of them in continous operation for just over a decade, some others about 5 to 6 years, YMMV. (shrug)
I'd also say it absolutely matters depending on the class of product -since they are saving money somewhere; so by logic if the outside looks the same, they skimped on the insides.
Electronics can kill you, makeup can contain toxic chemicals, toys with lead, or parts that break too easy and hurt the user...
Not the least, fake books are just theft from the author, who probably isn't getting the best deal from their publisher in the first place. So only a shitty person would be cool knowing their book was just a really good fake.
The only difference between the two scenarios is that one involves copyright infringement. Theft means a possession was taken. Potential income is not a possession. There are various ways to describe the harm ("damages" comes to mind) but "theft" isn't among them.
And theft is defined as stealing, which has "to take or appropriate without right or leave and with intent to keep or make use of wrongfully" which applies fully here so...
You can nit pick definitions all day, but you'll find most people would consider this theft, as you're depriving the artist of the rights to their creation. I really feel people who want to argue the other way are a stain on this earth, because you're so happy to defend it...it's just mental gymnastics to a pathetic argument
Lemme give an example of how I see this:
I have some idea to do something in a certain way, and because of that I declare it forbidden to everyone else to do it the same way, except they pay me something to be allowed to do it that way.
Wouldn't you think of something like F! How dare he/she/it/whatever?
A person can steal an idea (or market share) and it wouldn't make them a thief.
The fact that a victim of copyright infringement may end up disadvantaged to the exact same extent as if they were a victim of theft does not magically equate the two, even if the two involve stealing.
My comment is in the red.
Usually, but not always, which is why theft of electricity is a thing.
Paintings, manuscripts, etc. are subject to theft because they are nonfungible. The content itself is subject to copyright because the copies are fungible.