Same could be said about Unlicensed 3P: it's theft. Somehow it's more moral because they put more effort into their stolen IP.

I feel that this is a more 'correct' answer.

After all: The Oreo cookie is actually a knock-off.​

 

You gotta love how it went from "Hey why would you buy a KO" to "if you are spending your rent or grocery money or racking up a ton of debt on toys and you can't see the problem, than you need help. Some people do that."

 

It's one thing to steal an IP, an idea originating from the 1980's, it's another kind of theft to take advantage of the market situation and scalp and or sell for multiples of original retail under the justification of it is a "collectable" and or "rare". If we want to get ethical about it, I call that stealing money from the willing and or gullible or unsuspecting. Talk with a comic book dealer about the value of comics as collectibles and whether rarity is the standard for value. The whole concept of IP is fairly modern one, and it's basis is in copyrights and holders renewing copyrights usually for royalty purposes. It's amazing the amount of content in the public domain, sites like download.org exist to maintain and preserve the past through digital archives. Seems like I've read somewhere at some point Hasbro had not renewed at least some of the TF related copyrights, probably renewed now, but TF went through years and years of rough spots as a brand. The theft involved is truly small, as it amounts to royalties to the rich and famous who could care less about me as a collector, could care less about my wants or desires or input about TF as a brand and the toys I buy. And it's that type of mentality that kills hobbies and brands and royalties as an end result. Whether or not it is justified, whether people like it or not, KO's actually have a place in keeping this hobby going. Personally, were it not for KO's, I never would have started buying Third Party and Official. So yeah, KO's played a role in benefiting and supporting 3P/official, and doubt I am alone.

 

I'd say when the original figure can be substantially improved or "fixed" (eg. Black Apple MPM Optimus), or when the original figure was never widely available for whatever reason (STILL waiting for someone to make an Animated Blackout KO... I want that figure but I'm not paying triple-digit scalping prices for a normal mainline voyager!).

 

Except, NO, the concept of "theft" was developed in relation to PHYSICAL OBJECTS, where one person taking it deprives the original owner of it.

In the era of endless amounts of perfect digital copies, the only potential "theft" is of POSSIBLE, potential profits. (In many cases, the original company literally loses nothing... for example, most of Takara's MP runs sell out, so the KOs reduce their profit margin by ZERO) We say "don't count your chickens before they hatch" but the argument that it's "theft" is literally doing that.

Also, the concept of Intellectual Property has expanded FAR beyond the bounds of whatever it was originally conceived as, to the extent that nothing new has entered the public domain for decades. We are full-on in the era of IP extortion, where "legitimate" ownership of almost anything with any kind of cultural currency is locked down by two or three corporate overlords (Disney, for example). Things were never supposed to be like that when the ideas of Copyright and Trademark were developed. This is especially true for "KOs" that actually modify the base design (even up- or down-scaling is modification, but in particular I'm talking about the kind of stuff WJ often does to cover up gaps, improve accuracy, etc.)

So, to return to your example... if somebody took Takara's PHYSICAL MOLDS and used them to KO toys, that WOULD be theft, because it's actively depriving Takara of the mold and thus the ability to produce their toys. But "stealing" a CAD, at worst, is "stealing" profits the original company might have gotten (as I said before, with TFs in particular, often Takara loses NO profits) and the fruits of labor of a designer who's already been compensated for their work. (Like, yeah, WJ gets to benefit from the designer's work too, but that guy still got paid by Takara to do it).

The original company still has the CAD plus the legitimacy of being the "real" product. The official company doesn't actually lose anything, and they have a massive head start in terms of product desirability. Like, I have a lot of KOs, but for almost all of them I got the official toy first and was disappointed, or as in the case of the iGear coneheads, the official toy hadn't been announced yet when it clearly should have been.

Also, in general, competition is good for consumers. 3rd Parties are also committing IP infringements left and right but are they or are they not pushing the official products to innovate more? Sunstreaker and Megatron in particular CLEARLY took cues from their 3P predecessors.

Finally, nobody's really talked about the ways in which IP infringement can be GOOD for the original company.

...okay, nobody aside from Metroplexcity2019,  

I'm certain that the combination of 3rd party and KO MP figures available has tremendously boosted the viability of the official MP line, because it's now conceivable that we can complete our collections. So it's gone from "one-off cool figures" -- like the Flame Toys niche -- to "gotta catch 'em all!" where we're getting characters we don't even care about just because they're part of the cast (which is especially helpful for Takara's super-obscure repaint/remolds like Tigertrack, Road Rage, Exhaust, etc.). In other words, the infringing goods incentivize the purchase of the official goods. This even happened with me: I initially passed on MP-10 because 1) I didn't like the robot proportions, and 2) the MP scale was going all over the place and I didn't see a good reason to replace MP-1. However, on a lark I bought the KO Lambor, and having that made me go and buy the official MPOP when Hasbro released it, as well as all the official MPs thereafter up until Megatron (which IMO is when Takara's cost-to-value ratio started going nuts, especially in light of the quality of KO and 3rd party competition).

 

I love the mega-debates these threads ALWAYS evolve (or devolve depending on how look at it) into.

 

yeah... I started to ramble...

 

FACTS. HYDROX IS THE OG!

Which also goes to show how dumb it is to accuse someone of stealing an "idea." IP is only supposed to apply to SPECIFIC EMBODIMENTS OF IDEAS.

 

Definition of THEFT. Doesn't say it applies specifically to physical stuff. It's about ownership and relieving someone of it.

Everyone buying KOs here is basically saying: a person is not entitled to the fruits of his work, because a CAD is someone else's work no? Whether it's a CAD or a mould, they are simply manifestations of someone's work. What's the difference between copying a CAD and homework? So basically now your teachers were wrong as well? And your parents etc?

In fact let's move to the extreme. Now that most of the world has gone digital, basically theft is now impossible. Identity theft? A myth. Why? Because it's not physical. Stealing someone's money from their bank account? IMPOSSIBLE. ITS ALL DIGITS GUYS. THEREFORE IT'S NOT THEFT.

Shit, no wonder we are in so much trouble. Mental gymnastics have replaced morality.

 

Correct. 3rd Party design based on existing HasTak characters meant to be those characters or straight up KO or KO that's been modified; it's all theft to some degree.

It'd be nice if people here could have the intellectual honesty to just own that.

 

I'll own up to that.

 

Generally speaking (and only for myself), I prefer not to go the KO route. But we no longer live in a world where that's a practical choice.

In the past, the choice to go official was relatively easy, because it was assumed that the official would be a "safe" choice, and have fewer issues than the KO. Two things happened: QC on MP figures dropped through the floor, and their prices dramatically increased.

As an example: MPM-4 was a complete disaster on first release which physically could not transform properly into alt mode, supposedly due to mold damage. Though the issues were supposedly fixed on subsequent releases, it was a dice roll what you would get if you ordered one. In fact, the only practical way to get a copy of that mold with a low likelihood of issues, was to buy the Legendary Toys KO and avoid the official.

This is how bad things are now: sometimes, you have to rely on the KO to get the product you were promised with the official.

Right now, we're seeing something similar happening with MP Hound: random cracks and breakages on hinges from barely doing anything. If you're following the news thread, you can read reports of cracks developing when the figure is merely standing on a shelf, doing nothing. That is unacceptable for any figure, much less one that's so expensive. We have confirmation already that a different type of material was used for the figure, and given what we've seen, it's safe to assume that the material was cheaper and more fragile.

Is it guaranteed that a KO will fix those issues? No. But in the absence of an alternative, I can't recommend something that randomly breaks for no reason. This could only happen because HasTak is no longer interested in and/or capable of producing durable product, regardless of price point. And that means that relying on KOs to fix issues with official product is the new normal, until HasTak decides to invest sufficient resources into fixing the problem they caused with their own cost cutting.

-XCN-

 

When HasTak is no longer making money off the figure, the KO is so different from the original it wouldn't discourage someone from buying both, or when the original release is so shit HasTak doesn't deserve to make money off of it.

 

These sort of topics always devolve to theft and IP. Always.

 

Lol all the passive aggressive gatekeeping and internet lawyers in these threads is always hilarious.

I buy what I want.

I don't care what anyone thinks about my spending habits.

I always buy what's the best deal as far as aesthetic, cost and availability allows.

My resources and interests are finite and no company's is ever owed anything.

 

But seriously, knockoffs are never ok in my book. Someone is cashing in on someone else's hard work. Design your own version and sell it ya thieves.

 

After a skim, a few interesting points have come up here, and it's made me realise.

I would never have bought all the official products I have now, had I not bought a few KOs first in a testing the water type of way.
I probably wouldn't be a collector at all.
And I've since lost all interest in KOs.
Unless I can buy a spare replacement crotch for MP BW Megs.

So I suppose KOs can damage a company, but it really depends on the buyers.

You might say KOs almost help to discourage poor QC from the official companies because they run a greater risk of losing slightly more sales to knock offs at a result of poor QC in an expensive figure.

But it's still theft, and I don't think knock offs of figures should be produced while the figure is still popular for sure, because that's damaging the designers sales and reissue. Say something like 24 months leeway to possibly help people start collecting like I did.

 

Yes, I have no problem buying KOs of 3P figures as well as Hastak. They're less common, at least in the MP space, but my Powerglide is the AoD KO of DX9 Richthofen. I'm not aware of any other KOs of 3P MP figures that are of good quality, but if there were, I'd buy them over the originals. A good chunk of my legends collection is KOs (albeit oversized and improved rather than direct KO).

 

I think the word TC was looking for is "worthwhile".

I would personally only consider it worthwhile to buy a KO if it was superior in quality to the official product. With Hasbro using cheaper and cheaper plastic all the time, KOs keep looking like a better and better option.


As for whether or not its ethically justified...personally, I think the idea of intellectual property ownership is a total bunk concept that is holding the advancement of our species back. Infinitely reproducable things like ideas and electronic data should not be made artificially scarce just because of stupid, outdated notions of property ownership that evolved based on the natural scarcity of physical property. If an idea exists, it should be free for everyone to use, there's so much in the world that could be done with the information that exists that we simply don't do because of these arbitrary rules that everyone is bound by, so I'm all for anything that gives a middle finger to the big corporations who want to control all the new ideas in the world.

 

I think it's a wee bit more complicated than that, but you make the point that non-material conceptual ideas/thoughts (IP) communicated to others can be stolen. The question then becomes stolen from who? The concept artists, or the corporate business henchmen who opted them out of individual rights to their creations? And bringing morality into it is another philosophical can of worms. Morality as in subjective or objective or both? Based on what standard? Then there is the legal debate about whether certain laws should apply universally and on what basis? The reason this is relevant, is because the KO (and 3P) manufacturers are based in China, while the official manufacturers are based in Vietnam. So some might view the KO companies similar to Disney's Robin Hood, where the late taxers and scalpers could be compared to the Sheriff of Nottingham. Anyway, I have no hate for KO, 3P, or Official, options are a good thing in my view, we come out the winners, and either way you slice it, whether KO, 3P, or Official. we pay with cash, which can be measured and represented by digits, on physical devices, while the numbers themselves as immaterial concepts are eternal, so who owns the IP on those? Seems to me we're all "borrowing", nothing I've typed here is original, it's borrowed, sure the arrangement might be different but borrowed just the same. Anyway, sorry to ramble it's late and I need sleep. lol