Copycat culture harms holders of IP rights

A recent video about a small street in Nanjing, Jiangsu province, is amusing, but also thought-provoking. It has attracted many Web users in China.

The video captures various "well-known" brands on the street: Pizza Huh, Bucksstar Coffee, I-Eleven, Haagon-Bozs The logos resemble the originals in such a "creative" way that one netizen commented, not without ridicule, "it is definitely a new achievement in human imagination".

It was later suspected to be a marketing ploy to rent new shops on the street at a better price, for the logos disappeared within days after the video was put online. The street does not actually sell rip-off brands. However, it is now dubbed a shanzhai street as the visual impact best illustrates the wildly popular copycat culture in China, which is embodied in this buzzword.