Saturday - flea market day in fairground. With patience and a lot of luck this is sometimes the opportunity to get awkward things for little money.
My success was limited today. Not a total failure. Got the Blu-Ray disc of Amadeus and a PS1 game with two CDs (Platinum series). Means: I now have three PS1 discs suitable for targeted destruction once I have a sufficient light source and a possibility to use a smartphone instead of my eyes on the microscope.
This alone isn't worth a blog entry. What made me angry beyond believe was a guy with a bunch of Nintendo games. Wii. Wii U. Some consoles. All looking okay. Not worth looking at. Such a seller normally makes the exact same prices that are common on the internet (minus the warranty professional sellers have to give even on used stuff).
What caught my eye was the complete collection of Pokémon generation 1 and 2. The six cartridges looked... from several meters away... just wrong somehow. Something very fishy.
So I went near and grabbed Pokémon Crystal. Having it in my hands I could directly say it was an inferior bootleg by holding the opaque (fake!) cartridge against the bright sunlight. A PCB inside roughly filling a third of the cart (fake!). Wrong screw (fake!). Bad printing (fake!). No battery (fake!). No clock crystal (fake!). So many indications screaming "Fake!". The others were the same.
I asked him for the price for the Pokémon games playing naive and innocent. He had an slimy grin and answered "20 Euros a piece."
A disgusting way of talking, impossible to describe. Really condescending. I couldn't believe it! He wanted to sell this garbage for a high price. Copyright infringement (commercial piracy) and he attempts to sell it as legit (fraud). So I asked him "20 Euros? Although they are obviously fake?"
"Yes of course." he said -- with overwhelming smugness (after a single second of astonishment, that I was able to identify these obvious fakes as fakes).
For a moment I thought about informing the flea market host (or even the police). But I doubt any of them would have cared. So this guy could continue offering bootlegs between legit stuff and might eventually have found somebody who he could rip off successfully.
This man ruined the experience today. I must find a way to fight against such criminals.
My success was limited today. Not a total failure. Got the Blu-Ray disc of Amadeus and a PS1 game with two CDs (Platinum series). Means: I now have three PS1 discs suitable for targeted destruction once I have a sufficient light source and a possibility to use a smartphone instead of my eyes on the microscope.
This alone isn't worth a blog entry. What made me angry beyond believe was a guy with a bunch of Nintendo games. Wii. Wii U. Some consoles. All looking okay. Not worth looking at. Such a seller normally makes the exact same prices that are common on the internet (minus the warranty professional sellers have to give even on used stuff).
What caught my eye was the complete collection of Pokémon generation 1 and 2. The six cartridges looked... from several meters away... just wrong somehow. Something very fishy.
So I went near and grabbed Pokémon Crystal. Having it in my hands I could directly say it was an inferior bootleg by holding the opaque (fake!) cartridge against the bright sunlight. A PCB inside roughly filling a third of the cart (fake!). Wrong screw (fake!). Bad printing (fake!). No battery (fake!). No clock crystal (fake!). So many indications screaming "Fake!". The others were the same.
I asked him for the price for the Pokémon games playing naive and innocent. He had an slimy grin and answered "20 Euros a piece."
A disgusting way of talking, impossible to describe. Really condescending. I couldn't believe it! He wanted to sell this garbage for a high price. Copyright infringement (commercial piracy) and he attempts to sell it as legit (fraud). So I asked him "20 Euros? Although they are obviously fake?"
"Yes of course." he said -- with overwhelming smugness (after a single second of astonishment, that I was able to identify these obvious fakes as fakes).
For a moment I thought about informing the flea market host (or even the police). But I doubt any of them would have cared. So this guy could continue offering bootlegs between legit stuff and might eventually have found somebody who he could rip off successfully.
This man ruined the experience today. I must find a way to fight against such criminals.
