African men in Athens selling their wares

It has nothing to do with the OP Thrym, thats what I meant. I am sure its very relevant to the people directly suffering. I have no time for their suffering to be honest.

I have not the inclination to invest time discussing with you. I rest upon my previous posts, and state once again that I respect EVERYBODY'S point of view, OK? Goodnight!

Thanks for the explanation Borrego. For a non native speaker like me, its not always evident to get the nuances of a word.
However, i just checked the word 'imitation' on dictionary.reference.com and they do say: 3. a counterfeit; copy

In my native language, Dutch, we both use the words 'kopie' and 'namaak' (=imitation) in this case.

The problem is that not all countries respect international manufacturer's right/copyright. Thailand eg doesn't and they allow to copy an object with the original brand name. In Singapore for example, they sold fake Rolexes with the name 'Bolex' on it :) Apparently they allow to copy but not to take over the brand name on the product.

I agree it is all rip-off but it can be a kind of flattery indeed. If i start designing a collection of purses, it would be a proof of succes if i would ever be copied. But 'imitation goods' - as you put it - sometimes can be more annoying than copies because legally you can't do anything against it (i think it's 7 details that must differ from the origininal for a product not to be a copy), whereas copies which are manufactured or imported in a country that respects international copyrights, can be destroyed.

Still, the sunglasses with brand names on it, which i saw everywhere in Greece (during 3 trips between 2003 and 2006) amazed me very much.

Has anyone considered the damage these pirate CDS/DVDS do to the music or film industry?
I know the Greek music and film industry is a small and struggling market, but when the average monthly wage is only 800 euros, and the cost of a pirate CD is only 8 euro as opposed 20 euro, surely there is a temptation to buy, and certainly there is a market here for pirate goods, hence the dominant prescence of the African vendors.

But, how much does it cost to buy an empty CD, make a color photocopy of the artist, copy music from a cd recorder or download from internet, or make a copy with a cellular from a cinema, and then sell at 8 euro per piece?
How much of a percentage is this? with no taxes to pay?
10 cds per day [yes, there is demand and it's a catch 22 situation] =over 2,000 euro - minimal costs with no rent or taxes to pay.
Compare that to the average Greek wage, the damage done to the local music/film industry, and perhaps one should place their sympathies elsewhere,.not with the Greeks or the African vendors, the gypsies who use children as bait for sympathy, the traffic light/metro/tram beggers, .....

Nice one Harvey!!!! You become around the 40th person to cut and paste from my bio! My stock answer has become "your bio Harvey, tells me everything interesting about you, which is absolutely nothing!" have a good old read at the whole Bio, go on, its a top read I promise you.

It would be a dull planet if we all had to agree on every point, but you do not have to try and undermine anyone who has a differing opinion.

I think this discussion is out of topic for a travel forum ,I just want to add a few things only, Greece has not any xenophobia, in the contrary Greece has invented the word "Filoxenia" that means friend to the foreigner ,anyhow that does not means that all Greek behave the same but generally the big majority of Greeks welcome any foreigner that want to work and Live in Greece . As about the fake items for sale or Maimoudes (monkeys) as they called in Greece that is a very old story starting back in the early 50's where Greek conmen (not foreigners) pretending they where Greek seamen, where selling cheap clothing material as real Kashmir to several naive victims mainly in the area of Piraeus and Athens. But those people that we are talking about in this thread are not this kind of people, they are honest Africans and other nationalities that are trying to build a new life in Greece ,that was the job they find and that is OK for me ,the ones to blame are the people that run those fake item industries and not the resellers .A few years ago the Greek police discover in Athens a house that was a real cd's copy factory , but in nowadays the fake cd's or dvd's does not make so much harm to the music or film industry as the various file sharing programmes and other online well-known websites and is not only music or films that can be download for free but all kind of software programmes. As about the Greek films, every weekend almost every Greek Newspaper gives for free dozens of DVD's with all kind of films, my self I have collected almost all the Greek films from the 50's onwards plus tones of other quality films from the international film industry, and that happens not only in Greece but in the UK as well with many weekend newspapers offering free DVD films (well not the same huge quantities like in Greece) and probably in many other countries in the EU. So the fake music and film cd's dvd's is not the main problem. To be honest the increase of the cost of living and the low wages for the most of the labour class turns many Greeks to this kind of cheap shopping. You just have to visit a local Laiki Agora (open market) in any area of Athens and you will see any kind of housing good from kitchen items ,hardware ,clothes , perfumes and even cigarettes sold for a few EURO's. So nothing to blame some poor Africans what is to blame is poverty. Sorry for my long post.

<blockquote>Quote
<hr>Greece has not any xenophobia,<hr></blockquote>
If only that were true. I have yet to meet a Greek person with a good word to say about the many Albanian, Bulgarian and Romanian immigrants that live in Greece.

well like my user name says just passing by ,though I read and never post I thought I should drop a line here,for Mr or Mrs grecophile,You probably know the wrong Greek persons because every educated Greek knows that what Greece have achieved the last 20 years (even he best ever made Olympics in 2004) are due to cheap labour from the above countries.The rest is just cheap populist propaganda from certain directive mass media and certain populist political parties........

Re #40. I have a good friend who visits Greece frequently, speaks very good Greek and says exactly the same thing as Grecophile. He says that casual racism is widespread throughout Greece.

In the end, we're talking about people who are trying to escape from desperate povery, the like of which no TT user is ever going to experience first hand.

If there are any people out there that are in their country and their ancestors are from elsewhere, then you better get a life. I am a Greek American and d--- proud of it. My grandfather went to the usa and lived with a bunch of guys, knew no English and lots of the people looked down on them also, but they made a good life for them selves and families and became college graduates, etc. All these people in Athens or where ever are in need of piece of bread to survive. If our countries were not exploiting them they would be maybe better off in their own countries. But people like us support our governments who in turn are ripping off these peoples countries and we can't except them into our lives somehow. Who cares if the Gucci is fake or not anyway. Is that so important. Plus, most of the people of the world can only afford the fakes. Don't be so high and mighty!
Give the poor a break for Gods sake and show a little compassion.

Amazing all the support folk on this branch are willing to give to multi millionare purveyours of the so called genuine article, The said giccie bags original DVDs etc. But this stuff is just so much crap in the first place. Its OK if the fools with to much money want to pay fantastic prices for named items of uslaee junk but please dont get on at poor people ripping the stuff off its there duty to do this whenever they can.

The first 20 or so messages read like a sympathy card for millionares well stuff them they can look after themselves and long may there over priced trinkets be ripped off.