I must admit that I am often quite surprised by the 'Genuine Fakes' that are available in the market.My understanding (correct or incorrect?) was that a design patent prevented others from importing, manufacturing, using or selling the patented design for the period of the patent. For me this gave explanation to the Barcelona and Le Corbusier designs on the market (usually sold under a different name to the original design).
Lately, however, I have noticed copies of designs such as Marcel Wanders' 2007 'Skygarden' Pendant for Flos Lighting and Tom Dixon's 2006 Beat lighting range. I have even seen a copy of Front's 2006 'Horse Lamp' for Moooi.
In Australia, a new industry collective, Authentic Design Alliance, have formed to support the integrity of original and authentic design.
What is your opinion of original design over copies?
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3 comments:
This is a very disturbing issue especially for product designers that spend months sometimes years creating designing and refining a piece only to find that someone took all the hard work and simply copied the piece. As a matter of principal I refuse to buy a copy, regardless of its quality this is plain plagiarism and theft and we should all refuse to be part of it. We all know that there are companies that spend their days on the internet finding new designs to copy instead of putting all that energy in creating, but I guess if they could create they would not be doing this anyway. The really sad part is when the designer of a piece is not really known or does not belong to one of the major companies and the copy becomes the original because the copier could launch it and distribute it on a large scale. I think (and am afraid) that this is an issue that will always be there.
I believe that exact copies are wrong. I saw a barcelona chair knock off at a local supermarket / home centre here called Superstore selling for $89. It was obviously made cheaper with bad vinyl upholstery. I was outraged. I think that the rule with fabric should apply..that is, it must have 3 distinct differences before it should be allowed it's own place in the market place (whether that be change is scale, colour, pattern, etc.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wpdvEWEWETk&feature=player_embedded
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