…innovation. To celebrate the release of The Knockoff Economy, let’s have a contest. Send your photos of crazy knockoff items to photo@freakonomics.com Here’s an example we saw a while ago…
We want to thank everyone for their questions — it’s great to see people responding to, critiquing and, in some cases, tweaking, the ideas we set out in The Knockoff…
Here is an excerpt from The Knockoff Economy: How Imitation Sparks Innovation , which has just been published by Oxford University Press. Over the next few weeks, we’ll be running…
We are excited to the announce the winner of The Knockoff Economy contest for best photo of a knockoff. In fact, we are excited to announce that we have two…
…readers in a Q&A. We’ll also run a contest for the wackiest photo of a knockoff item. THE KNOCKOFF ECONOMY CONCLUSION The traditional justification for trademark law, which protects brands,…
…paid $400 million to a generic drug maker, Barr Laboratories, to settle their patent dispute. Why would the patent holder make such a huge payment to the knockoff artist, and…
…that stores like this (and/or their suppliers) are not afraid of selling knockoff U.S. Government merchandise or knockoff MLB merchandise but that they are afraid of selling knockoff NFL merchandise?…
(Photo: Börkur Sigurbjörnsson) China is famously a hotbed of copying. Western firms constantly kvetch about Chinese knockoffs of their products—and often with good reason. China’s intellectual property laws are fairly…
…price of the generic Coke knockoffs). This would clearly be terrible for Coke. It would probably also be bad for Pepsi. With Coke now much cheaper, people would switch from…
…strongly that knockoffs are not harming the high-end of the fashion market. Why? Knockoffs are almost always cheaper than originals—often substantially. Were, say, the Forever 21 version of a Marc…
…working-class Mexicans clamoring to buy knockoff versions in street stalls. “These shirts like Barbie’s have become the fashion,” Mario López, the governor of the Mexican state of Sinaloa, told reporters…
Two arrested in “money-making potion” scam. (Hat tip: Consumerist) Are economists incapable of cognitive dissonance? Meteorite crashes in Peru, causes panic. Cigarette merchants sued for selling knockoff Marlboros….
…indicators. Blog contributors Kal Raustiala and Christopher Sprigman on China’s knockoff economy. Statues on the cheap: North Korea’s national art atelier, Mansudae Art Studio, produces and exports large monuments at…
(Photo: Timothy Vollmer) In The Knockoff Economy, we wrote about how turning products into experiences is one way to blunt the detrimental effects of copies. Products – especially digital ones…
America’s top colleges are facing record demand. So why don’t they increase supply? (Part 2 of “Freakonomics Radio Goes Back to School.”)…
