Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

In my opinion, unlicensed copies are stolen material, and one of the reasons that they exist I'm sure, is to cash in on the appeal of the original article without having the expense of R & D, and without any form of recompense to the originator.

So, in effect, the makers of these items are like thieves that break into your home, take your goods and then sell them cheaply to willing buyers down at the local.

Hi Ben and Paul!

This sentence in my above post may have had an explanation if you would have not overlooked it:
>If I would not have had the chance to afford a copy in the 1970ies, when I was a kid, I would never have gone for the real thing (as already my ARIA copy sounded different than any other bass that time).<

For me and many other bass players the cheap copies we played those days was the reason we bought an original 4001 later on (I also know sworn-in-Fxxxxr-players, that just did not have the luck to experience a Rick). The Ricks were very rare those days in Germany and mainly copies were cruising among the bands. Nowadays it is the opposite.

What I mean is that in Germany the copies substantially contributed to the increased request for original 4001/4003 basses.

Based on todays success of Ric. co the copies obviously never took a real share off their profit, just the opposite is evident: as in the car industry (see the cabrio cars), the demand, once awaked by the cheap ones (Mazda MX5) sooner ore later goes to the real expensive ones (BMW and Mercedes).

Even if my observation might be wrong (I don't think so) I frankly spoke out and obviously gained a little bit of "needle pinch". We have the word "the hitten dog barks" in Germany.

Other than that I still wonder what another reason may be for all that fuzz about copies???

...@Paul: I thought about "Alain Silberstein": The trouble starts when the copy watch is really of the same quality like the original one, which possibility I doubt about.

However the copies might give sufficient challenge to the original manufacturer to keep the quality on the high end side. I like this idea...it worked for the Rick basses!

Peter:

We have a phrase in Southern Colloquial English:

"That dog won't hunt".

Hey, when I was in Hong Kong they were selling Rolex watches on the street for ten dollars!

I didn't buy one.

Probably the reason I don't wear a Rolex today. Didn't have the chance to try out a fake one first.

Paul: So, I'm lucky, again!