“Chinese officials in Kunming have ordered two fake Apple shops to close, not because of piracy or copyright concerns, but because the stores in the southwestern city did not have an official business permit,” Melanie Lee reports for Reuters.
“Five self-branded ‘Apple Stores’ were found to be selling Apple products without authorisation from the California-based company but only two were told to shut, officials said,” Lee reports. “An investigation into the stores was apparently sparked by a storm of media attention over an elaborate hoax Apple shop discovered by an American blogger. The order did not apply to that store, which is applying for a reseller licence with Apple, a local government spokesman said.”
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Lee reports, “Chang Puyun, spokesman of Kunming government’s business bureau [said] ‘China has taken great steps to enforce intellectual property rights and the stores weren’t selling fake products.’ Officials are investigating whether Apple had applied with the Chinese government to have its store design and layout protected by law, Chang added. In addition to protecting trademarks, Chinese law prohibits companies from copying the “look and feel” of other companies’ stores, but enforcement is often spotty. The United States and other Western countries have often complained China is woefully behind in its effort to stamp out intellectual property (IP) theft.”
Lee reports, “All the five unauthorized Apple shops in Kunming were selling genuine Apple products bought from other authorised resellers in China, Huang Yinghui, an official at the city’s business bureau, told Reuters. Apple has just four genuine Apple Stores in China, in Beijing and Shanghai, and none in Kunming in Yunnan province. The company, which has 13 authorised resellers in Kunming, could not be reached for comment.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Does the U.S.A. have any laws barring copying the look of another company’s stores? We only ask because:
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“Chinese law prohibits companies from copying the “look and feel” of other companies’ stores…”
Too bad China is way ahead of the USA with this law, kind of embarrassing when Microsoft can copy the Apple store layout, look, and feel and get away with it… again.
Best comment of the day and it’s only 9.15am. 🙂
Apple probably feels that MSFT’s copying is funny and works to their benefit, as most consumers have already been to an Apple Store, and like you probably feel that they’ve walked into an alternative universe where noone but a few gamers play with the Xbox/Kinect but otherwise are devoid of shoppers.
But M$ does not label them Apple Stoers.
That’s why no one goes in there:;-)
I think the zombie dancers in the Microsoft stores change the look and certainly the feel of the stores enough. That and the lack of customers makes for obvious differences that only a Windows Fanboy wouldn’t notice.
Say, didn’t Apple copy ‘The Gap’?
Microsoft attempts to copy the look and feel of the Apple Store. However, once you see the Microsoft logo and those poor quality junk-all that comfort turns to dread and angst. Then again, have they really copied the “feel” of Apple?
The look and feel of Apple’s superbly designed products, by default, does not exist in the heart of any M$ stores. For that reason a M$ store will never have the same look and feel of an Apple store, no matter how hard they try to emulate the style. But copying is in M$’s DNA, so they will try to copy the Apple store concept.
The problem is, the general public doesn’t always understand that. I could see MS stores actually hurting Apple’s brand by leading people to believe they are getting a crappy experience and buying crappy products at an Apple store.
Maybe that’s MS’s strategy.
I would not worry about it.
Anyone who is in a MS store and thinks they are at the Apple Store is likely a runner up for a darwin award and will probably remove themselves from the gene pool doing something simple like shaving or using a garage door opener.