HHere you see everything twice. Two identical Gameboys, car rims, road sweepers, emergency breathing machines, roasters, coolant pumps, watering cans, kettles, fondue pots, sleds, vices, shower heads, high-pressure cleaners and much more stand and hang on pedestals, on the wall or in showcases. Some products will be fairly familiar to visitors, such as WMF’s fondue, Nintendo’s Gameboy and Stokke’s Tripp Trapp children’s chair.
Anyone who visits this museum in Solingen without prior knowledge, which has found its rooms in the beautifully restored goods halls of the former site of the main station, can deduce from the name what this permanent exhibition is about. It’s called plagiarism. Since 2007, the museum has been draping the plagiarisms, which the Aktion Plagiarius association has been collecting since 1977, alongside original products. The museum of the same name is probably better known than the museum in Solingen, which is awarded annually by the association to the most brazen counterfeiters, including special prizes such as identity theft and the laziest serial offender.
Significant security risk
It’s not all funny. Christine Lacroix, who heads the Aktion Plagiarius association and also looks after the museum, repeatedly emphasizes that counterfeiters not only steal ideas, but also risk people’s lives and damage the environment with their product piracy. Take ventilators, for example: they have to be 100% reliable. They go through a certification process. The AC Schnitzer rim copied by a German company did not withstand a stress test at TÜV Nord. Result: significant security risk!
The fact that the imitation roaster from Zwilling not only leads to a mediocre roasting result, but also poses a risk of material overheating can be seen by lifting it briefly. It’s made of lightweight aluminum, not heavy cast iron. If an auto repair shop uses the counterfeit Mercedes-Benz SD Connect multiplexer to diagnose a vehicle with this system, an employee could misuse the software to disable the seat belt reminder or speed limit.
Christine Lacroix is not surprised that the fake is usually worse than the original. “Quality and safety controls cost money, as do certifications and the development process,” says the manager. Most of the time, the plagiarists want to earn as much money as possible with their forgeries and invest little in material and processing. Quality has its price. The range of potential plagiarism is increasing.
Until the beginning of the millennium, counterfeiters tended to copy simple products because it was technically too complex and often impossible to imitate complex ones. Since the technical possibilities have improved, for example through mass production, 3D printing and digitization, the counterfeiters dare to tackle technically complex products such as the multiplexer from Mercedes-Benz. Pirates used to look for goods from the consumer and luxury sectors, where they only copied the design.
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