It is good to rub and polish our brain against that of others - De Montaigne
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Nokia says one in five mobile phones is fake
ACCORDING TO a statement from the Finnish phone maker Nokia, 20 per cent of the mobile phones on the planet are fake.
Esko Aho, a member of Nokia's executive board, explained that the proliferation of counterfeit devices is hurting businesses, such as his presumably, as they try to enter emerging markets.
Nokia sells phones like Heinz flogs beans so it's pretty likely that more a few of its low end devices have appeared in clone form on more than one rogue factory conveyor belt somewhere. Perhaps surprisingly though, they aren't all made or found in China.
"It is mostly China-originated, but it is global. It is not only in Asia, but also in Latin America and even in some parts of Europe," he said, according to Reuters.
Just last year that cuddly, soft-spoken man of the people Steve Ballmer said that Chinese forgers were harming Microsoft's business, possibly in ways that he could never have conceived of.
Mind you, he did his best to harm future business himself when he discounted the biggest market in the world with the sort of grace Prince Philip can only dream of and attacked them all with a walk the plank attitude.
Speaking to Walt Mossberg about whether the interviewer should buy his software, Uncle Fester said, "80 million Chinese people won't this year, if they paid then you wouldn't have to."
Just yesterday the issue was raised again, when US President Obama cited more figures from Ballmer. "Steve Ballmer of Microsoft pointed out that their estimate is that only one customer in every 10 of their products is actually paying for it in China," reported White House transcripts. µ
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@Grumpy Ol' Man - sounds exactly like Sony. But of course those 4 little letters make the shite product worth $100 more than the LG product that looks identical (and actually works properly, and has tech support and warranty service).
Nokia in Australia need not worry about fakes while their idea of warranty service is so very poor. If you like nothing being fixed or being lied to regarding the problem,(in my case for over 6 weeks) then buy a nokia phone. If that idea is not acceptable to you then look elsewhere/anywhere....nokia fix your piss poor idea of service before you start bleeting about knockoff's...your products are really not that good...
...here in The Land of Smiles the situation is very similar. The only legal copies of Windows I've seen here in many years are my own, and maybe a few other American expats that come here to sample the...uh...cool dry climate...yeah, that's it...yeah, that's the ticket...cool dry climate!
And one particular fellow expat actually brings over a load of old laptops annually to give away to rural villagers that he buys dirt cheap in the US from his local university dump-old-faculty-issued-computer-sales outlet. After arriving in Bangkok and soon after he has had a chance to er...umm...sample the..uh...cool dry climate a time or two, he then heads to a computer shop to have bootleg copies of Windows loaded before he hands them out.
Don't know about China but the average daily wage in rural Thailand is 200~250 baht which equates to around...let's call it $8 dollars/day. Windows 7 Home Basic is around 4200 baht or $140 dollars and Ultimate is 8400 baht or about $180 dollars (just Googled these prices). Since anyone can have a and version bootleg copy of Windows installed for 100 baht or half a day's wages at any computer shop here, not many legal copies are sold. But let's look at it from a different perspective. If it took you the better part of a year's wages (don't forget you have living expenses too) to pay for a legal copy of Windows 7 Ultimate versus half a day's toiling for a bootleg copy, which way would you go?
And there are many bootleg phones sold here from China as well. They used to be mostly Nokia look-a-likes, but iPhonies are popular these days. While they may roughly look like the corresponding real Nokia or Apple model on the outside, they have cheap internals and limited functionality as the OS is usually some very basic Chinese variant.
I've lived in China for the last nine years.
One in ten buying the software? That's hilarious. In nine years here the only time I have EVER seen "Real" Microsoft products was in one shop - which was of course empty when I went inside out of curiosity (Guys inside looked kinda forlorn too...)
I doubt if one in a thousand buy ...I have never seen a genuine copy ever in schools, homes, businesses or shops...
I suspect the real rate is probably closer to 1 in a million but I know no-one will ever believe me ....
You all beat me to it.. great comments :)
It's sounding like Nokia, with this comment, is preparing the ground for shareholders to be presented with poor fourth quarter numbers.
Yikes! The stock is likely going to take another big hit.
That might explain why my N97 is so shite.
Haha, nice try Nokia. I'm still departing after 10 years of Nokia ownership to get a 'droid.
So I guess that chinese dual-sim TV phone named "Nckia" (with the "c" almost like an "o") is a fake too?
Bummer.