Chinese Knock-offs Can Kill You from Planck's Constant

Chinese officials have recalled some
170 tons of milk powder tainted with
deadly melamine in the latest evidence
that products from the last industrial
scandal were repackaged and placed
back on the market.
Photo Credit: Newser

In my article Louis Vuitton Whores Shopping In Chinatown I noted that one can buy bogus branded handbags, watches, and boots in New York City's Chinatown.

I failed to mention that every brand product is being knocked off by the Chinese, not just fashion items. Even famous brand guitars with names ¹ such as Les Pauls and Stratocasters are being counterfeited.

Robot manufacturing equipment today can reproduce any item in metal, wood or plastic so accurately that even some experts might find it difficult to tell the fake from the genuine. But if the fakes are so well made and are priced 90% less than the original, why not buy the fake?

If it doesn't bother you that thieves are making money without investing years in research and design to make that product, consider the fact that Chinese knock-offs can kill you.

In my 12 Jul 2007 article Americans Want Geographic labels on Food I linked to a Fox News report that 94 people in Panama died from a tainted chemical product made by a Chinese company.

In my post China Beats Our Meat I reported that the feds demanded the recall of 450,000 tires made by the Chinese firm Hangzhou Zhongce Rubber Co. implicated in fatal car crashes.

And just a few days ago, a Federal Judge sentenced a husband and wife team who owned a Los Angeles department store to three years behind bars for selling counterfeit designer jewelry containing dangerous levels of lead ².

So go ahead, buy that fugazy Chinese counterfeit and place your life in the hands of Chinese manufacturers who don't care about you or any one else. Chinese knock-offs can kill you.

Notes

(1):

vintagerock.com, Counterfeit Guitars

Payless Guitars offers this fake
Gretsch White Falcon - a model
used famously by rocker Neil Young
- for $210. Genuine Gretsch
models typically run around $3,000.
From the solid body, single-cutaway styling of a Gibson Les Paul to the sleek contours of the Fender Stratocaster and Telecaster guitars, the instruments and many of their top-level rivals are being cloned in massive Chinese guitar factories and sold through web sites and eBay for as low as 10 cents on the dollar compared to the genuine guitars. The instruments are all stamped with trademarked U.S. company names and styled after their American counterparts, complete with logos, stickers and cases. Only guitar experts and very savvy guitar buyers can identify the knock-off guitars as fakes, with younger or more inexperienced buyers in danger of committing a felony while buying what they think is their dream guitar.

(2):

National Jeweler, 13 May 2011, Husband, wife sentenced for selling toxic fakes
According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California, U.S. District Judge Margaret M. Morrow sentenced 58-year-old Il Keun Oh (a/k/a James Ken Oh) of L.A.’s Hancock Park neighborhood and his wife, 56-year-old Jacqueline Oh, to 37 months in federal prison after the couple pled guilty in June to one count of conspiracy and one count of introducing and delivering a hazardous substance.
The investigation into the Oh’s business, the Elegance Fashion Mart located on East Olympic Boulevard in downtown Los Angeles, began in 2007 when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations division received a tip that the store was selling counterfeit merchandise.

Over the course of the investigation, federal authorities said they seized more than 25,000 counterfeit pieces of jewelry and accessories, including necklaces, rings, bracelets and watches, as well as cell phone charms and hair accessories. Later lab tests showed that some of the counterfeit jewelry--which was labeled as “lead-free”--contained nearly 20 times the amount of lead deemed safe by the Consumer Product Safety Commission for handling by children.