Re:This was mostly about 'product piracy'. (Score 0)

Really, this gets modded up? How do you confuse a real iPod with one that costs 1/4 of the price? Who's the actual cheap-ass, the guy making the ripoffs or the guy who buys them? If the Chinese take something apart, make a cheap copy of it, and then sell it back for cheap, what's the problem? They're filling the demand for a part of the market that wants to buy things cheap. If quality is a concern to you, all you have to do is not buy the cheap imitation. That would be true regardless of where it's being made. If the German economy is somehow suffering because of low-end Chinese imports, the question is, why aren't you making stuff to serve the low-end market also? If you're simply refusing to compete on the low end because you feel entitled to higher profit margins, then your economy deserves to get steamrolled by the Chinese or whoever else that cares to do real business. Isn't it ironic that in a truly free market, China dominates? It's only in markets that are protected by draconian IP laws that the "free" economies of these nations seem able to sustain themselves. Everyone does realize that the good, real iPods are made in China too, right?