shasha
Fractal Fanatic
I stayed out but here are my opinions on the matter. I'm not pointing any fingers or judging anyone; this is just my own personal opinion and how I deal with it. It's much like abortion; I am pro-choice, but I know that we would never have an abortion in my home. That's my personal values, but basically keeping them to my damn self.
1. If a company is not honest enough to put their own name on the guitar (regardless of design) then I wonder how much they care about how it is built. I own a Rondo guitar. It's one of the higher end models and it's great. If it had a fake headstock it would not sound or play better.
2. If a company is involved in counterfeiting you have to wonder about what other "business" practices they are involved in. There is a lot of nefarious stuff going on in this world and I don't want to be an unwitting participant.
3. This is probably the single biggest issue I have with the whole thing.....maybe 20 years ago you really didn't have a selection of good cheap guitars...they were all basically crap. There is no excuse for buying a cheap guitar and just not being honest about it's origin of manufacture or brand. There is absolutely nothing wrong with rocking the crap out of a cheap or budget guitar if you like it and those imported fakes are not going to be better than a good imported guitar on their absolute best day. Reward an honest company for delivering a great value to the customer and when you play it in front of others the honest company gets exposure and recognition.
And yeah, real Gibsons can take a bit of work to get right sometimes; I'm not making any excuse for that, but that doesn't make any of this kind of stuff kosher. Whether it's counterfeiting, theft of intellectual property, robbing someone with a gun and taking their money or whatever it's all dishonest regardless of whether you pay for said illegal service. I mean we all complain about a lack of jobs and stuff in this country, but when it comes down to spending our own cash we run to WalMart and buy the cheapest import crap we can get our hands on regardless of quality or impact. Now if someone makes and sells a competitive product and sells it cheaper then so be it, but at least it's honest.
1. If a company is not honest enough to put their own name on the guitar (regardless of design) then I wonder how much they care about how it is built. I own a Rondo guitar. It's one of the higher end models and it's great. If it had a fake headstock it would not sound or play better.
2. If a company is involved in counterfeiting you have to wonder about what other "business" practices they are involved in. There is a lot of nefarious stuff going on in this world and I don't want to be an unwitting participant.
3. This is probably the single biggest issue I have with the whole thing.....maybe 20 years ago you really didn't have a selection of good cheap guitars...they were all basically crap. There is no excuse for buying a cheap guitar and just not being honest about it's origin of manufacture or brand. There is absolutely nothing wrong with rocking the crap out of a cheap or budget guitar if you like it and those imported fakes are not going to be better than a good imported guitar on their absolute best day. Reward an honest company for delivering a great value to the customer and when you play it in front of others the honest company gets exposure and recognition.
And yeah, real Gibsons can take a bit of work to get right sometimes; I'm not making any excuse for that, but that doesn't make any of this kind of stuff kosher. Whether it's counterfeiting, theft of intellectual property, robbing someone with a gun and taking their money or whatever it's all dishonest regardless of whether you pay for said illegal service. I mean we all complain about a lack of jobs and stuff in this country, but when it comes down to spending our own cash we run to WalMart and buy the cheapest import crap we can get our hands on regardless of quality or impact. Now if someone makes and sells a competitive product and sells it cheaper then so be it, but at least it's honest.