After Luxpro removed its “Super shuffle” from their CeBIT booth on Friday, the iPod shuffle rip-off once again appeared on Saturday.
“Urged by Apple’s lawyers Luxpro had taken the player out of its show cases on Friday, only to put it back in again on Saturday for the benefit of the weekend visitors to the CeBIT event. Who, moreover, did seem to show an interest in the device: The player offers besides all functions present in the genuine iPod shuffle an FM tuner, a WMA playing capability (according to the manufacturer also with digital rights management) and voice recording – only AAC support has to be dispensed with. At that the iPod lookalike is only marginally thicker and according to statements by staff at the stand ‘in any case cheaper than the original,'” Robert W. Smith reports for Heise online. [Super shuffle image here]
“Even a visibly distraught Apple product manager was unable on the Saturday evening to persuade Luxpro’s stand manager to once again remove the Super shuffle from the display. The stand the visual appearance of which is strongly reminiscent of an Apple ad campaign provided a bizarre backdrop to the brief yet heated verbal encounter that ended without mutual agreement.’Our lawyers are in the process of weighing legal options,’ Apple press spokesman Georg Albrecht said,” Smith reports.
Full article here.
Related MacDailyNews articles:
Attention Apple Legal Dept: LuxPro debuts blatant ‘iPod shuffle’ rip-off called ‘Super shuffle’ – March 10, 2005
I wanna see Apple kick some ass!
With all the reality TV on these days…I wish there had been cameras to catch this action. I’m sure it went from professional to spitting fire pretty quickly. I’d pay to see that play out
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Drive the bastards into the sea.
They are great at copying stuff, but Asians just don´t have the ideas and talent or mentality to create new things…all about having a society based on people being a worker ant and working for the hive, don´t stand out or be different. Copy others.
Very smart people, but not creative.
Why is it that Asian companies are almost always the companies that rip off something that proves profitable in the western world and something in which their companies almost always have a hand in manufacturing?
It’s because their governments have no respect for trademarks or intellectual property or western business practices. And as such don’t punish these companies unless it has some political gain for the powers that be.
Will it ever end?
Didn’t know Dell were Asians
Dear 4395 etc.
If ignorance be bliss, then you must be a very happy person in deed!
These are just some of the many Chinese inventions:-
http://www.crystalinks.com/chinainventions.html
And that’s just one of the many Asian countries.
Nr. 439502-3994822:
Ok, I’m offended. That’s like me saying Europeans have no creativity. They copied fireworks, paper making, print press and spagetti from Chinese.
There are many creative people in Asia. You just have not looked in right places.
Creativity comes in many different ways. Many people would not consider Dell to be a creative company, however, they did succeed making PCs into a commodity through creative manufacturing process management (improvement in the manufacturing process was probably creativity of Asian companies).
you guys normally hate lawyers…
bawahahhaahahhah
Asians are overrated.
If Luxpro like’s to stay in business they’d better change their tactics. To show up in Europe in front of their prospective clients with a direct copy of one of the best known products. What are you saying? Hey look, we can copy your product too! I would never ever do something that stupid. And if Apple successfully sues them it would destroy the rest of the image they was left. Well I’m happy wipe their name out of my list of suppliers.
Luxpro should be a shame of itselfs, it will not harm Apple. There are so many of these m-players that look like ugly X-mas decoration sigar lighters.
No point at al making this a debate about human characteristics.
The WTO needs to make member countries respect copyrights.
Copycats need to be kicked or we’ll have no innovation at all.
Warren Buffett says today he can’t find enough decent companies to invest in… Luxpro and its like sure as hell won’t help things.
Step right up – let the racism begin folks. Don’t let anyone beat you to it.
What a loser mentality some of the posters of this board have:
different =threat huh?
I’m embarrased to be a non- Asian, when these displays of bubbaism show up.
And the lawyer cheerleaders is another worry. What a way to start the week.
Go get’em Apple! No one has the right to make money on such a rip off!
dobbie,
Racism? And here I thought he was just saying Communistic leaning societies do not reward individual creativity. Who knew that was racism?
Seriously, I would like to buy a Super Shuffle. It offers more features than Apple’s device, and costs less.
Luxo says it’s better. An FM radio is not something that I want on my MP3 player. If I want an FM radio I’ll listen to an FM radio. The point of having an MP3 player is to listen to your own music without commercials. I don’t see the advantage or what is so much better by having a radio attached. This product is a rip off and should be banned. If they came up with there own design then I wouldn’t say anything but to come out with such an identical player and then on top of that make an add picture of exactly the same thing that Apple is doing just adds fuel to the fire. I hope Apple has a field day in court with this rip off company!
The racist arguments are silly and irrelevant. Plenty of Asians have invented things (as I recall, one Asian company, from Japan, invented the Walkman). Plenty of Americans violate our copyright laws, and plenty of American companies rip off the inventions of others (Microsoft copying Apple’s GUI look and feel comes to mind).
Apple’s options: now that is a more interesting topic. I am not a lawyer, but the appearance at the German show has given Apple two choices of venue: Taiwan, and Germany. Taiwan’s laws probably don’t give Apple enough ammunition. I don’t know how strong Germany’s (or the EU’s) trade dress laws are. The best bet would be for the rip off product to be shown and preferably marketed in the US, in which case the strong laws here would apply, giving Apple loads of ammunition.
Another thought is to check where the parts are coming from. That thing looks so much like an iPod Shuffle that I wonder if any of Apple’s custom designed parts for the iPod Shuffle were used on it. As Apple holds the rights to all of its designs (unlike PC makers like Dell), Apple’s parts manufacturer is probably going to find an irate customer (with an excellent legal team) hitting them with a breach of contract suit. Cutting off Luxpro’s supply of Apple designed parts would slow them down long enough for Apple’s legal team to prepare their strategy.
John
My car came with an FM and AM radio I don’t listen to AM – I’m not loosing any sleep over it. It might be that the next owner of my car does like AM. iPods are traded on ebay-like boards everyday. Some futere owners might like a radio – some don’t. It is cheaper for the car manufacturers to put both types and cover all bases. it stands the reason that Apple could do the same. I for one would love a Luxo like product.
OK, so who has a link to a place that actually sells one of these? I already have a shuffle, but want one of these too. The Luxor site doesn’t say where to get one..
Its not racist remarks, it is about the Asian society and culture and government and religion.
Nr. 439502-3994822 said Asians were smart people.
Look at the stifled societies in the Arab lands, any new ideas come out of their lately – Nobel prizes for medicine? People are fine, the government and religion and culture keeps them oppressed
Lux-Pro has it right.
Their design will PROBABLY be ruled to violate Trade Dress. Meanwhile, they’re going to get MAD publicity over the thing. If they lose, all they have to do is paint the thing black. They sell for less than the iPod shuffle and have more features. It’s a winner.
The only thing missing is the ability to play encrypted ITMS files, which is easily dealt with by converting to MP3.
Their numbers aren’t going to compete with Apple’s (probably), but they’re going to sell a BOATLOAD of their product as the alternative to the iPod shuffle.
I shall purchase one as soon as I can.
It’s a publicity trick and it worked!
I wouldn’t be surprised if it is an empty box. I’m sure they don’t have a warehouse full of them, they never really expected to sell any of them. Just make a bigger name for themselves and get people to visit their web site to see the dozen or so other mp3 players.
It worked.
dobbie:
No racism here. It just seems the Asians pull this crap more often than the Germans, Polish, Italians, Russians, Americans, English, French, Czechs, Canadians, Mexicans, Aussies, Kiwi’s, etc.