Why I hate clones (and so should you)

[Rothrandir]

I wish I'd found this thread a few days ago when it was started, there are just too many posts to go through right now.

This is actually a pretty complicated discussion, and there is more going on than might be apparent. Here are some points I'd like to make just to get them out there:

Intellectual property rights are a very important part of a properly functioning economy. Those who innovate must be allowed to recoup their investment so they can continue to innovate. What is the incentive to create new things if you'll go broke in the process?

If there are two identical products, one made in America and one made in China, the American unit will be more expensive. This is a lot more complicated than it seems, as there are many factors involved. Cheap labor is a commonly mentioned excuse for this, and while it is true, there is a lot more going on that that, including reduced cost of running a business (far less environmental regulation, accounting, paperwork, liability), as well as government subsidization. You're paying less "dollars" for a Chinese product, but you're actually paying a lot more than you realize.

Lack of quality control. How many times have we heard of a Chinese factory substituting a cheaper ingredient/component into a product to save money? How often does it happen without us even realizing it? If we're talking flashlights now, just because it works when you turn it on and shine it around for a little while does not mean that when you're in some deep dark cave or in the middle of the wilderness that capacitor or transistor that does not meet spec isn't going to poop out on you.


If only from an economic perspective, buying cheap clone products is not worth the price you pay. When you factor in everything else, It makes even less sense.

 

[march.brown]

As a designer and builder, I submit that it is a lot easier to duplicate a known and proven geometry than it is to develop one from scratch.

Good Evening McGizmo ... I realise that you are a builder of very high quality torches that are (in price) well above any that I own ... My torches include Solarforces and iTPs which are great for my personal use.

I have also bought some ridiculously cheap Chinese torches in single AA , single AAA and also in single 123 size ... These range from about $1 to nearly $4 and all of them so far have worked fine ... I have given some of these away to my children and grandchildren and they are perfectly satisfied with their free gifts.

Do you see the day when the market will be totally flooded by these cheap torches ? ... The possibility is that major supermarket chains will start selling them at these prices and will put a lot of the cheaper-end torch manufacturers out of business.

I saw this happen in the writing instrument market where many British pen manufacturers such as Conway Stewart simply went out of business in the 60s and 70s due to cheaper imports ... Manufacturers such as Lazlo Biro and his ballpoint pen took over and became a household name for the "Biro" ... Fortunately the name of Conway Stewart is back on the market with high quality pens that are made in the UK again.

Do you think that this problem is likely to happen with the cheaper branded torches ? ... What can be done to prevent it ? ... To a very large percentage of people , a torch is a torch and if it is cheaper and still works then that is great !

Luckily the higher end manufacturers like yourself will not be as affected by the appearence of ultra-cheap torches ... Neither will those manufacturers that have government contracts.

As a manufacturer , how do you see the future for torch manufacturers in all the price brackets ?
.

 

[Bullzeyebill]

I know, right? Everyone is at their best when they're passionate.

or worst.

Easy on the passion guys. You know some arguments can not be won, ever, so don't waste too much time and energy defending your positions. State your positions once then leave them be, and don't respond to baiting type rebuttals. It is ok for someone to disagree with you.

Bill

 

[headophile]

both sides in this issue have pretty valid points to me. i am somewhere in between.

on one hand, i value the fact that today, we can buy very good quality and high-performance lights that are only a fraction of the cost of surefires. fenix, jetbeam, olight etc. come into mind. (not sure if this is what the op meant by clones though.)

on the other, as a flashaholic, i can't help but appreciate lights like the 6p original and the m6 which are now deservedly called classics and a few other surefire models which i think offer some unique features. while i don't engage in the common practice of blindly worshipping the surefire brand as a whole, i do acknowledge that they have produced models that have stood the test of time and earned their rightful place in flashlight history.

i guess what i'll do in the end is what is always recommended in this forum: buy both.

 

[Flying Turtle]

I also hate clowns. They're scary.

What?

Oh.

Nevermind.


Geoff

 

[smfranke]

Expensive clowns are not scary.

It's the cheap ones that I hate ( & so should you).

The expensive ones use high-priced makeup from reputable brands. The cheap clowns often use lead based makeup that can rub off on the children or affect the clown's judgement / sanity. That's scary.

The high-priced clowns have usually been to an accredited clown school. These schools teach them how to perform well even when they're feeling ill or the weather conditions are extreme. The low-priced clowns are iffy & often too hung over to show up.

Lastly, the high-priced clowns reinvest performance fees into improving their acts. Balloon animal R&D, poodle training & chiropractic treatments are not cheap. Low-priced clowns aren't concerned with these things. Try explaining to a 5 yr old why his balloon lizard has no legs.

When high priced clowns are forced to compete soley on price their advantages are eroded. They may switch to lead based makeup & skimp on rabies vaccinations for their poodles. Then we all suffer!

 

[baterija]

So the new question should be, "Where do you draw the line?"

My line is at actual infringement of protected intellectual property. Everything else is fair game. From there it's a decision about the lights. A lot of clones cut corners so it's really a price to performance decision. In some cases the clone offers improvements/changes to the original model. For me those are 2 different lights no matter how similar and the company that best meets my needs wins.

 

[march.brown]

the company that best meets my needs wins.

The majority of the flashlight users/purchasers only need a cheap flashlight ... It is a relatively small minority that would consider build quality and reliability as highly desireable or essential ... The average man/woman in the street will buy a flashlight because it is cheap and it works OK ... You press a button and the light comes on ... They may select one that is brighter , to suit their needs , but unless they are a flashaholic , they wouldn't know much about the better torches.

I have a large number of friends plus relatives and none of them know anything about torches and batteries ... The lucky few have better torches than the rest because I have bought them as gifts ... If you give people torches as gifts , they normally wouldn't consider it to be an expensive present ... The only torches that they see are in supermarkets for a few dollars ... They don't realise how much a torch can cost.

When you say "the company that best meets your needs" , you are thinking as a person who has knowledge about flashlights ... Others needs may purely be based on low cost.

My own choice of torches is based on value for money , which (for me) eliminates the expensive torches ... I choose from Solarforce and iTP mainly because they are , to me , well made and reliable and good value for money ... Whether they are clones or copies , or whether they infringe any copyrite or patent I don't know ... They meet my needs.

You say "My line is at actual infringement of protected intellectual property"... Is there a list somewhere that shows flashlight models that actually do this ? ... I genuinely don't know enough about this and would be interested to know ... I suppose that it would be difficult to prove it as many of the manufacturers have R&D departments working on improving their products.

Are there any blatant copies that we should know about ? ... If there are any , perhaps we should bring them into the light ! (pun intended) ... Obviously we don't want to get involved with any legal issues due to this.
.

 

[McGizmo]

.....
As a manufacturer , how do you see the future for torch manufacturers in all the price brackets ?
.

march.brown,
Your guess is likely as good as mine and possibly better. I think CPF represents a niche market in a presumably much larger market of flashlights. I dwell in a very small niche within CPF and yet I see more and more "competition" .

I think the CPF flashlight market is demand driven. Some demand low price some demand specific features and the use of specific LEDs. CPF customers know or believe they know what they want and they know where to look. They are not limited to brick and mortar nor are they limited by country of origin. I don't think CPF is a viable gauge for the larger market.

I would guess that the average flashlight buyer responds to a supply based market and doesn't have any real designs or specific demand to be met. If this is true, it will be up to the big box stores and internet giants what manufactures get the business. These decisions are likely based on criteria that may or may not be in keeping with what we might cite as important. I imagine profit margin, dependability of order fulfillment, frequency of warranty claims and other aspects involved in running a large and active business will be key factors.

Until the technological advancements in LED performance and efficacy level off I think it will be difficult to get an idea of how the industry is going to evolve.

I am personally concerned that at least in the US we consumers are still placing too much of a premium on low price and I see this bring us short lived and disposable goods whether we wish to dispose of them or not. On the other hand, we have PK at the helm of a company like ICON where quality control and solid design is merged with low cost production and price sensitive target markets. I would guess that there are honest and viable flashlights at $5 and $500. There are also those that fall well short of the mark and again at all price levels.

The big customers for flashlights are not end users like members here. They are purchasing agents for Costco and Wallmart and HomeDepot and so forth.

There is a lot in flux these days!!

 

[was.lost.but.now.found]

My line is at actual infringement of protected intellectual property. Everything else is fair game.

I agree 100% with your statement. And yet ARC, despite having lost a court case of infringement upon intellectual property, remained a fanboy favorite on CPF.:thinking:

It makes you wonder whether some people just have it out for certain brands and labels, even if they aren't mentioned by name.😗

 

[Monocrom]

Just because you get sued, doesn't mean instant lose of respect. The head of a certain flashlight company is well known for his sue-happy antics. Sometimes justified, sometimes not. And by not, I mean bordering on a delusionary level of belief that he's invented every innovative feature that exists and will exist sometime in the future.

Sometimes it's the company doing the suing that loses respect.

 

[Brigadier]

I agree 100% with your statement. And yet ARC, despite having lost a court case of infringement upon intellectual property, remained a fanboy favorite on CPF.:thinking:

It makes you wonder whether some people just have it out for certain brands and labels, even if they aren't mentioned by name.😗

+1

I have two working eyes.

I'm sorry, but you can't say with a straight face that the light isn't a clone. I'll give you the variation aspect of certain Solarforce models. Especially the 2AA version. But where are the improvements over the 6P? Both the 6P and L2 can use the same aftermarket drop-ins. Sometimes it's easy to forget that the L2 is mainly sold as a host. No batteries, no emitter, no reflector. Doesn't sound like an improvement over a stock 6P.

Also, Solarforce's variations of the 6P use a reverse-clickie. That sounds like a step backwards rather than an improvement over the 6P. If there was actual improvement over a 6P, that would be one thing. But there isn't any. (And use of aftermarket drop-ins doesn't count since you can use them in a 6P as well.) So they're just clones.

+1. If it weren't for the 6P, would Solarforce even exist?

IMO, looking at an L2 next to a 6P I see a 'clone'. Now, put a Jet-III M next to a 6P, nope.

 

[was.lost.but.now.found]

Just because you get sued, doesn't mean instant lose of respect. The head of a certain flashlight company is well known for his sue-happy antics. Sometimes justified, sometimes not. And by not, I mean bordering on a delusionary level of belief that he's invented every innovative feature that exists and will exist sometime in the future.

Sometimes it's the company doing the suing that loses respect.

i think you just proved my point. You opinion of the two companies is set and I don't see how anything I would say would change that, regardless of facts.

 

[Bullzeyebill]

i think you just proved my point. You opinion of the two companies is set and I don't see how anything I would say would change that, regardless of facts.

Or one could take a neutral position because all the facts are not known, and or I don't care one way or the other.

Bill

 

[was.lost.but.now.found]

Or one could take a neutral position because all the facts are not known, and or I don't care one way or the other.

Bill

The fact we all know is that ARC had their day in court and lost. Being raised the way I was and having the background I do, I tend to put faith in the justice and court system of the United States of America. Given that, and absent any conflicting information, I will tend to believe the cases as they were decided and treat it as though the judge and jury made the best decision based upon the available facts.

Your opinion seems to be contrary to that position - you seem to believe absent any additional facts and information, the decision must be wrong. If your first instinct, absent any intimate facts or knowledge about a case, is that it was decided incorrectly, you must also carry the belief that the entire US legal system is injust, flawed, and corrupt to its core. If that is the case then so be it, you are entitled to your opinion, but once again this reinforces my position that some will believe what they wish to, and any debate on this topic is pointless.

 

[McGizmo]

The fact we all know is that ARC had their day in court and lost. Being raised the way I was and having the background I do, I tend to put faith in the justice and court system of the United States of America. Given that, and absent any conflicting information, I will tend to believe the cases as they were decided and treat it as though the judge and jury made the best decision based upon the available facts.

Your opinion seems to be contrary to that position - you seem to believe absent any additional facts and information, the decision must be wrong. If your first instinct, absent any intimate facts or knowledge about a case, is that it was decided incorrectly, you must also carry the belief that the entire US legal system is injust, flawed, and corrupt to its core. If that is the case then so be it, you are entitled to your opinion, but once again this reinforces my position that some will believe what they wish to, and any debate on this topic is pointless.

No reason to debate indeed. If this was the case where Mag contended that the Arc AAA infringed on the Mag Solitare sure, no real differences between those lights. 🙄

If anything this could be a case in point that a presumed clone (Arc AAA) because of its obvious similarity was in fact a new level of quality and performance and at its core, completely different than what it seemed to be.

In its simplicity, a light can be a metal tube host to battery and light source. The Solitaire and Arc AAA both fit as simple examples and surprisingly had similar appearance.

 

[BentHeadTX]

I got an interesting email this week, what desktop computer should I buy if I want something reliable as #1, fairly quick and quiet. I told them to build their own since the Dell/HP/Apple crew basically outsource everything to china and cheap parts rule.

Alas, he wanted a parts list so I basically listed all overclocker parts with the video card being something from the "silent computing" list (heat pipe monster heat sink) The motherboard glistens with monster heat sinks on the VRM modules, huge heat sinks on the Northbridge/Southbridge chips and even the Crucial memory has heat sinks on the thing. He will run the quad core at the slowest speed available (2.66 GHz) since the stock Intel heat sink is made for the entire line and will keep it cool.

The case runs two 120mm fans that are adjustable in output while the BIOS is adjustable in how to control fan speeds according to temperature VS noise. Has USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 to do with eSATA and SATA 6 connections and the BluRay drive has 4MB of cache. Even talked him into getting a Trippe Lite surge suppressor made out of aluminum with isolated outlets to protect the thing.

The parts are not cheap! Asus motherboard $130 Foxconn motherboard $43... the 500w power supply I spec'd was $70 and the exotic heat pipe cooling system on the video card pushed the price up over $40 over a typical cheap fan thing. Good memory $120, garbage memory $70 so it all adds up.

The problem with cheapo stuff is this: sometimes industry goes so cheap for such a long period of time that they can't make good stuff anymore. It is getting close to that with computers, you have to buy overclocker or server grade parts to have a computer run reliably for longer than 3 or 4 years.

The problem with flashlights is the LED technology is moving so fast, if you use it after 2 years that is rare. My Peak Red/UV lights have held up for going on 6 years now and I'll keep using them until they die (2020?) I would think that once LEDs exceed 200 lumens per watt, then you can buy a high quality light and use it for the next 10 to 20 years without issue.

I stopped off at a Honda motorcycle dealership and they showed me a $10K+ cruiser complete with chrome plated plastic and a plastic fender. Yeah, that will be a mess in 5 or 6 years but maybe it was meant to be disposable? My Nissan has plastic parts in the radiator construction so I guess everything is meant to die in 5 years?

Lovin' those laptops and phones without removable batteries... they look pretty but... more disposable junk I guess. Looks, thin, cheap trumps usability, reliability and common sense yet again. Next year when it is time to replace the Nokia, guess I have to look up "ruggedized phone" on the net and see how much one of those runs.

 

[Monocrom]

No reason to debate indeed. If this was the case where Mag contended that the Arc AAA infringed on the Mag Solitare sure, no real differences between those lights. 🙄

If anything this could be a case in point that a presumed clone (Arc AAA) because of its obvious similarity was in fact a new level of quality and performance and at its core, completely different than what it seemed to be.

In its simplicity, a light can be a metal tube host to battery and light source. The Solitaire and Arc AAA both fit as simple examples and surprisingly had similar appearance.

Thank you. You put that better than I could.

 

[carrot]

I would submit that "the good stuff" can be found in varying price ranges and that OP does not necessarily mean you should avoid buying inexpensive things. However, as McGizmo eloquently put it, my main beef is:

I assume that Carrot's contempt is focused on the "theft" of IP, design and features as well as likely on the potential of pretense and false expectations associated with a light that looks to be more than it is; often the case when a well designed light is copied in superficial form, only.

As it happens I would agree with McGizmo on many of the other points he has made and I apologize to anyone who seeks acknowledgement from the OP.

I was off camping for three days and during that time it seems this thread has run quite well on its own and is somewhat beyond my ability to reasonably reply to many parties involved. Of some interest, perhaps, is that I found a $40 USA-made light to be the only one I needed for camp chores and some night hiking, much to the dismay of more expensive and more "exciting" lights, should they be personified.

I found one post particularly irritating and in need of addressing:

+1!!! I have followed this thread from the beginning and I have to ask, why is it that when a Valid argument like the one above is presented, there no response from the OP???

Do you feel it is Your Duty to call out the OP on not visiting CPF for a few days, and subsequently not being able to respond to a post that you find particularly thrilling? I would humbly suggest that this thread is not mine, as it were, but a thread now belonging to the people of CPF. I am merely a person who had a thought that seemed worth expressing to the community at large, for discussion and for introspection.

In any case I will entertain your question with a (very) brief history lesson:

The man (and a friend) who originally invented the RCR123 that so many of you enjoy today spent thousands and thousands of his own money, out of his own pocket, to develop a safe, effective, and reliable solution, only to be backstabbed by the overseas manufacturers he contracted to make them. Instead of delivering the product as agreed, realizing how valuable it was, they took his chemistry and design and cranked them out without so much as an acknowledgement or a dollar to the man who designed them, squashing innovation and a brilliant mind in one go.

Fast forward to today, said man has defaulted on his house, had to give away his dogs, was dumped by his fiancée, and now lives barely paycheck to paycheck. This man is one of the smartest guys I know, and he had a lot of other industry-changing ideas that he had on his plate at the time as well as some awesome lights licensed from famous makers that he would have made, but his hopes and dreams and financial stability were all destroyed by unethical manufacturers who copied his original design. I'd bet, had he managed to make all the things he'd planned, each one would be at or near the top of every flashaholic's must-have list.

Now, I hadn't even considered this story when I'd originally posted the thread, but it rolls right in with Why You Should Support Innovators and Not Thieves.

As to whether AW is a clone or not, I couldn't say. I don't know the technical specifics of his batteries and how they differ or do not differ from other brands of batteries. I do know that, since the originator's batteries & chargers (which were apparently the best, from user anecdotes) are no longer made, AW is currently considered the best of what we can have, and as far as I am concerned, will have to do.

Regarding some matters brought up by others, especially Egsise, I should like to think that a product is not rip-off, clone, or what-have-you, if it innovates or otherwise substantially improves on the original. That is the natural progression of technology, and how we have gotten so far. I do not believe in supporting products whose mere existence is to simply undercut another product, as more clearly outlined by McGizmo above.

Egsise, you chose to argue that Nokia clearly defined the Very Personal Computing market with their smartphones in the early 2000s. My rebuttal would be that they were much too ahead of their time (before cloud computing and the rise of the web as a computing platform rather than a consumption platform) and that their implementation was poor (Symbian can be incredibly daunting for most users). Apple very clearly improved and innovated on the smartphone and PDA (of which there were many, including but not limited to 3Com/Palm, Psion, Handspring/Treo, Casio and Sony) by offering several key things: a User Interface and User Experience that was polished and ready for the masses, a fully capable web browser (anyone remember WAP?), a purely touch-based and gesture-based interface and finally, breaking the cell carrier's stranglehold grip on the handset. You, or anybody else may hate the iPhone, controversial it may be, but it is hard to ignore the industry-shaking effects it had/has, which the Nokia did not. To me, that is innovation, and is quite simply, why the iPhone is not a clone. But enough of phones...

drmaxx: With regards to the TED Talk on the fashion industry: I did see, and enjoyed that TED Talk before starting this thread. However, I believe it to be different because the primary driving force in the fashion industry is in aesthetics and defining a style and not necessarily pushing technology forward, although the push of technology is a side effect of keeping one step in front of the clones. On the other hand, having to keep ahead of the clones can indeed be a driving force to push innovators out of the woodwork and into the limelight where they must perform at their best, which relates to pretty much any industry. So surely, clones do have some place in an industry, but left unchecked I believe they can put a serious damper on innovation and the progress of R&D.

 

[Monocrom]

To: carrot ~

It is indeed terrible what he has gone through. I know who you're speaking of. Quite a few CPFers do. But just like his experiences with a certain bag-maker, I didn't know how badly things got for him. Thank You for presenting a clear outline of what took place.