During my Christmas shopping I browsed a lot of MP3 players and searched for the one that offered the most for the least amount of money that I had to drain from my bank account – which already suffered collateral damage from the pre-holiday shopping. Not surprisingly, I passed by several iPod look alike (why manufacturers aren’t confident enough to manufacturer their own style and design is a different story).

What caught my attention was a $23.95CAD lime green, 1 Gig, iPod Shuffle. Instinctively I said to myself, “what a bargain!” If you live in Toronto, you would know that a 1 Gig iPod shuffle sells for at least $84CAD in stores. But my excitement died when I realized it wasn’t a genuine iPod anything, just an imitation made in China. Nonetheless, I was stuck with the temptation to purchase an unknown brand that claims to perform all iPod functions at only ¼ the cost (without the warranty or guarantee that it’ll work and it wasn’t compatible with iTunes).

When I was living in South Korea, I was introduced to the imitation products that floated around Asia and guilty of buying shoes, socks, radios, and clothes. On average, I found that they weren’t durable, reliable, or in the case of electronics – bug free. However, I only needed to fork out change that I had after a meal and it didn’t interfere with my budget. And on that note it gave more satisfaction to make the purchase.

Read the rest of this entry »