Refine playing cards (from Encarded Patreon)

[cgouwu]

Hey guys, I saw Paul posted an article on his Patreon page, anyone has more insight to this issue?

[BaconWise]

But that deck says "Refine". Paul's deck says "Aurum". I don't see a problem.
Okay, I'm kidding. Is that Refine deck a Bocopo campaign? I hope Paul gets some help taking that one down.

[Decknowledgy]

Let me just tell you, if this issue resides within China, there's basically nothing you can do... Just see how long it took Bocopo to blow up, and mostly due to the fact that half of their business is in the States. If this "ZhongChou" website has it's business within China's intranet firewalls, there's nothing you can do but only wish that the PRC gov will deal with it, which in most cases they won't, because they don't care about plagiarism.

Just ask how many times Sherm's Carat Cases got ripped off.

Oh, there's also the political factor in the Chinese plagiarism issue: they hate the West but like the quality or creativity of Western products. But in order to buy cheap and sell cheap, everything is face value, so the easiest thing is to copy the full design of international brands, and slap a wannabe name on it. I'll use automobile copycats as an example: https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/car-news/ ... ay-with-it

China's copycat cars: are they legal?
In 2018 we spoke to Oliver Tidman, a solicitor at intellectual property law firm BRIFFA, to find out what legal standing a car maker has if it thinks its design has been copied by another.

At the time, he told us: “There is no international copyright law, but there are international agreements such as the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works. These require countries to recognise each other’s intellectual property laws. Copyright laws vary from one country to another, and while the rules may differ, the principles are similar.”

And it’s not simply a material object that would be the subject of breaking copyright law, but the original design itself. “In the UK, copyright law protects certain types of work, including artistic,” Tidman added. “In terms of car designs, it’s likely that copyright would subsist in any original 2D graphic – on a computer screen or a drawing.”

If a company does think a design has been copied, however, it’s not that easy to prove. “The company would have to prove that there has been copying by assessing the objective similarities and deciding whether those similarities are the result of independent creation, or whether the infringing design has been derived from the original design,” said our expert. “There must be a causal connection between the two works, which can be difficult to prove.”

[akicer]

I feel sad seeing this coming, and I reported the project to the website. I see in the comment session lots of people called that plagiarism and reported the project as well, hopefully that will get the attention from the website.

The "creator" of the project replied to the accusation and insist that the design are different, and they are comparing themselves to Chicken's nugget and recent Vincent deck by Bocopo. Honestly someone else doing something wrong and not get punished does not mean they are not wrong.

Oh, there's also the political factor in the Chinese plagiarism issue: they hate the West but like the quality or creativity of Western products. But in order to buy cheap and sell cheap, everything is face value, so the easiest thing is to copy the full design of international brands, and slap a wannabe name on it.

Man let's not being political in this forum and please don't judge on a country with 1.4 bn population. I come from China, I do not hate the West, I hate this plagiarism and I hate this project (I hate Bocopo of course), I'm the one brought this to Paul's attention and I'm the one who suggested Paul to broadcast this to the patreons seeking for help. What's more, I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one, check the comment session of that project you will find how people dislike plagiarism.

On the other hand, I'm not saying Chinese manufactures are not doing those copycat things. Quite on the contrary, they do that quite often, but that doesn't necessary mean that all Chinese people likes it.

[MagikFingerz]

they are comparing themselves to Chicken's nugget and recent Vincent deck by Bocopo.

CNuggs are an obvious parody/homage, and any decks based on the works of a famous painter is going to be similar. Those comparisons don't hold water, and if they don't understand that they're ignorant and/or delusional.

[Decknowledgy]

Wasn't referring to the people, but was referring to what the PRC government teaches the people to believe and how it widely affects the business practices of state-friendly enterprises. That's why I mentioned the Chinese car expos because a lot of those car manufacturers will have state relations to even be legal to be displayed as such.

In terms of awareness to plagiarism in the playing card scene, I agree that a lot of Chinese cardists are the quickest to dismiss Bocopo well before its international blowup. A lot of the details about Bocopo's bad business practices actually came from within the wall, passed on to Chinese folks abroad, then shared among the playing card community.