04/22/2008, 3:10pm, EDT
Tuesday, April 22nd
Apple cracks down on UK iPhone clones
Apple is coming down hard on UK vendors of iPhone clones, reports say. Most such clones are produced in China, where copyright law is less restrictive and an imported iPhone is too expensive for all but the upper classes; the clones nevertheless attempt to reproduce superficial features of the iPhone, in some cases including Apple's own logo. As a result of these problems Apple is said to be pursuing legal action against a variety of UK importers, such as Digital Playworld.
The company recently reached a settlement with in Apple in order to avoid a potentially bankrupting lawsuit, over what Apple considers a violation of its Community Registered Design. The similarity between the clones and the real product is said to be "striking," according to an Apple letter, creating the same "overall impression." Apple claims that this is confirmed by terms used on the Playworld website, such as "iPhone style," "in the style of the iPhone," and "looks very like the iPhone."
Playworld's managing director says that under the settlement, he must not only remove all items considered clones from his website, but promise to avoid any more clones in the future, and inform Apple of who supplied the original devices and how much was paid for them. Money has also been paid to cover damages and legal expenses.
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:-(
The knockoff is made of cheap plastic, instead of metal and scratch resistant glass.
The camera spec is fake. The listed "2.0 megapixel camera" can be a 1.3 MP crapcam or a VGA really-crappy-cam depends on the version, or if you are lucky, you'll get one that interpolates the image size but still garbage in garbage out. Other specs are fake too.
Has NO WIFI capabilities, some bluetooth but it's hard to use as the overall knockoff phone.
You can't use your hand on a knockoff. Have to use buttons or stylus to control. (There is a knockoff with touch control but it's not a phone.)
You get what you paid for. He only has it for 6 weeks and is already have problem with the proprietary cable (can't connect to computer).
LOL