MetaFilter posts tagged with knockoffs

Meet the Cheatles

acb — Thu, 22 Nov 2012 16:43:57 -0800

In February 1964, when the Beatles played the Ed Sullivan Show, record executives in America were faced with the question of how to get a piece of the Beatlemania action. The result was an explosion of knockoff Beatles records, promising things like “The Beetle Beat”, “Beat-A-Mania” and “The Original Liverpool Sound”, credited (often in type far smaller than the famous song titles) to bands with names like The Bearcuts, The Manchesters, The Moptops and the Liverpool Kids, and featuring cover models with varyingly plausible approximations of the Beatles' haircuts, as detailed by WFMU's Gaylord Fields (SLVimeo).

Rose-coloured spectacles?

Fizz — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 13:17:04 -0800

Cheats may or may not prosper, but they despise themselves for cheating. At least according to an intriguing piece of research published in Psychological Science by Francesca Gino of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Research suggests wearing fake goods makes you feel a fake yourself, and causes you to be more dishonest in other matters than you would otherwise be.

Obligatory accreditation system for IT security products

caddis — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 11:12:41 -0800

Give us your secrets. The Chinese government plans order foreign manufacturers to reveal information about their digital products, a Japanese newspaper reported on Friday. It will introduce rules requiring foreign firms to disclose secret information about digital household appliances and other products from May next year, the Yomiuri Shimbun said, citing unnamed sources. If a company refuses to disclose information, China would ban it from exporting the product to the Chinese market or producing or selling it in China, the paper said. This is lightly sourced, so, lacking a second independent source, it is offered in the spirit of Drudge. Anyway, if true this could seriously harm trade. From the Yomiuri article:

Specifically, foreign companies will be obliged to disclose relevant products' source code, or a sequence of statements written in computer programming language designed to control digital appliances and other high-tech products. The system, whereby manufacturers will be allowed to sell their products on the Chinese market only after they pass tests based on disclosed source code and inspections by an accreditation body, is said to be unprecedented. Products expected to be subject to the system are those equipped with secret coding, such as the Felica contactless smart card system developed by Sony Corp., digital copiers and computer servers. The Chinese government said it needs the source code to prevent computer viruses taking advantage of software vulnerabilities and to shut out hackers. However, this explanation is unlikely to satisfy concerns that disclosed information might be handed from the Chinese government to Chinese companies.

Considering the propensity for knockoffs from some Chinese manufacturers one can understand the fears. Unprecedented though? I have seen them make similar requests of highly proprietary validation testing procedures for chemical and biological processes. If this story holds true, expect fireworks from the US and Japan among others.

the Knockoff Project

jimmy — Fri, 10 Oct 2003 04:36:11 -0800

The Knockoff Project. Album cover homages and rip-offs.

Daema kicks some serious ape butt

RichLyon — Sun, 26 Aug 2001 13:50:25 -0800

Daema kicks some serious ape butt The sequels to Pierre Boulle's original Planet of the Apes novel are, apparently, leaving something to be desired. Lets invent some and raise the tone, shall we? Planet of the Jeeps: An astronaut lands on a planet and gets rammed in his Nissan Micra at an intersection by a Simian driving a Sport Utility Vehicle. Director Tim Burton gets slated by the critics - "Good Science Fiction should show us things we've never seen before".