Crane machines are absolutely illegal and pirated products are rampant, and the probability of grabbing becomes a mystery. Selling tobacco in disguise
□ Our reporter Zhao Chenxiwen
The silver metal claws descended slowly and firmly grasped the head of the Hello Kitty doll. Watching the doll was firmly carried to the hole by the claws, Li Xiaoyuan's heart finally relaxed as the claws were released, fell, and the sound of music sounded. In one breath, he quickly leaned over and took away the pink HelloKitty that had been caught 6 times.
As a senior "doll control", catching dolls is Li Xiaoyuan's favorite entertainment. The intense and exciting process of catching and the joy of finally harvesting dolls make her want to stop.
"In the past two years, it has been obvious that doll catching has become more and more popular. Every home appliance store will place a lot of claw machines. You can also see many self-service claw machines in shopping malls and movie theaters." But Li Xiaoyuan found that the current claw machines on the market are placed inside. Pirated products account for at least 70%.
"The claw machine must not become a blind spot in the supervision of the proliferation of pirated products, and should be strictly punished." Li Changan, a professor at the School of Public Administration of the University of International Business and Economics, said in an interview with a reporter from the Rule of Law Daily. There are more, but less attention has been paid to the issue of pirated products. Under the situation of my country's continuous strengthening of intellectual property protection, there should be zero tolerance for infringement of copyrighted property rights.
"Mixed true and false" has become a hidden rule in the crane machine industry
Recently, the reporter came to a large video game city in Xicheng District, Beijing. Dozens of crane machines were filled with dedicated players. Judging from the doll storage bags carried by many people, they have gained a lot today.
For Chen Tuo, who has been operating a video game city for many years, he is more concerned about the "fineness" of the products in the shop's claw machines.
"The easiest way is to see if these dolls have a'birth certificate'." Chen Tuo pointed to a Batman doll piled up in a crane machine in front of him and said, although this doll is well made, it just looks like " "Fake at first glance", because no logo can be found on the body, there must be a label on the genuine doll.
The reporter found that more than 30% of the dozens of doll machines in the store did not have a "birth certificate."
According to Chen Tuo, "Mixed true and false" is a routine operation in the current video game city. Compared with the fakes in previous years, there has been a certain "improvement" in the claw machines.
Regarding the question of whether the dolls in the claw machine are genuine, the reporter asked the staff of the game city. A supervisor surnamed Zhang frankly said that most of the products in the store are genuine, but after all, the price of the game currency in the store is not high. For two coins, Dawawa will also have three coins at a time. "There is no store in such a consumption range that can guarantee that all of them are genuine."
Li Xiaoyuan also said that some video game stores on the market that mainly sell their own IP genuine dolls cost about 9 yuan for a doll, and the probability of “powerful claws” that must be able to catch the doll is adjusted to a relatively low level. Dolls do mean that players have to spend more money to crawl.
Therefore, for some players who enjoy the crawling process, they don't care whether the doll they caught is genuine. The price of a single crawl and the difficulty of crawling are the factors to consider.
This has given some merchants more "assuming". In a crane machine shop in Chaoyang District, Beijing, the owner "outspokenly" stated that the blind boxes for grabbing in the crane machine in his store were all "unmarked", only The blind box with the genuine logo is what the player exchanges for the in-store lottery ticket.
Claw machine placed fake goods suspected of infringement
In order to obtain high profits, placing pirated dolls has almost become a recognized unspoken rule in the circle, but Li Changan said that this kind of behavior of the business has been suspected of infringing the intellectual property rights of the copyright owner.
For example, many doll machines currently contain Mickey, Donald Duck and other classic Disney dolls, but these dolls are not authorized by the copyright owner. They are pirated products that infringe intellectual property rights. Once investigated and dealt with, the merchants need to bear the corresponding laws. responsibility.
At present, some businesses seem to be concerned about copyright issues, and will mark the words "genuine" and "genuine authorization" in eye-catching fonts on the claw machine, but this may be another "trap".
Li Xiaoyuan once caught two "Star Delu" with the Disney logo in a store marked "Genuine", but after comparing it with the genuine "Xing Delu" purchased at Disneyland, she could find the signs and workmanship There are many differences in details, which are high imitation products.
Such behavior also appears in the more popular lipstick machines.
In order to attract more players, some merchants began to place some well-known big-name lipsticks and perfumes in the claw machine, which is very expensive.
But this "big name" is not the other "big name". Earlier, the Beijing Dongcheng District Market Supervision and Administration Bureau had received reports from consumers that a lipstick with the "CHANEL" logo was found in a claw machine in a home appliance game city in Beijing. There were 14 lipsticks with the "YSL" logo, and it was finally verified that these products were all counterfeit products.
“This act of placing high imitation brand products by merchants violates the provisions of Article 57 of the Trademark Law, and belongs to the sale of goods that infringe the exclusive rights of registered trademarks and infringes the exclusive rights of registered trademarks." Li Changan believes that the merchants placed the claw machines in the claw machine. There is no essential difference between high imitation products for consumers to capture and direct sales of counterfeit goods. The Trademark Law stipulates that if the sale of goods that are known to be counterfeit registered trademarks constitutes a crime, in addition to compensating for the loss of the infringed, criminal responsibility will also be pursued in accordance with the law. .
According to Liu Junhai, a professor at the Law School of Renmin University of China, this behavior of merchants who used fakes as authenticity also violated the Consumer Rights Protection Law, defrauding consumers, and suspected of infringing consumers' right to know and fair transaction rights and other legitimate rights and interests.
"Selling fakes through claw machines has now become a new type of trademark infringement, and it is concealed. If it is not for market monitoring or consumer reporting, it is generally difficult to find." A staff member of Beijing Dongcheng District Market Supervision Administration introduced Most of these infringements occur in large video game cities or large-scale shopping malls with high reputation, and consumers tend to trust the products they provide.
In addition, even if consumers find fake products or defects, they rarely take the initiative to complain or report to market supervision departments. Therefore, the current supervision of such behaviors is indeed difficult, and the illegal costs of businesses are far lower than the benefits.
In Li Changan’s view, it is necessary to form a joint force to deal with the problem of fake doll machines. In addition to businesses must increase their legal awareness and actively choose genuine products, relevant departments should also form a normalized supervision of the doll machine market, forcing merchants to rectify and respond to repeat offenders. Increase penalties and even revoke business licenses.
In addition, the regulatory authorities should follow the path to find the source of counterfeit products and curb the proliferation of counterfeit products from the source.
In view of the fact that many current video game cities, especially self-service claw machines, are mostly opened in large shopping malls, Liu Junhai believes that shopping malls should perform their audit duties, in addition to timely reviewing the legal business qualifications of the claw machine merchants, and for the products in the claw machine, especially The authenticity of genuine products should also be checked. Otherwise, once there is a problem, the market may also be jointly and severally liable if it involves publicity.
Cigarettes placed in the claw machine are suspected of illegal
During the investigation, the reporter noticed that there are still some "unsuitable" products that have been put into the claw machine.
In a tobacco and liquor retail store in Fengtai District, Beijing, a claw machine with flashing lights is particularly conspicuous. Compared with its appearance, the products inside are more "eye-catching"-dozens of boxes of Chinese cigarettes are "waiting" Grabbed away.
The owner told reporters that this crane machine is a second mobile phone he bought online, mainly to solicit business. The Chinese cigarettes in the machine are all real cigarettes. Scan the code for two yuan and grab it once. If you catch it, you can take it away or redeem it. Other cigarettes.
During the reporter's stay in the store, a customer tried to catch cigarettes, and after 4 attempts to no avail, he chose to buy directly.
The shop owner said that he bought this claw machine to allow buyers to experience the excitement of “boosting with small and big”, but Liu Junhai reminded that such behavior is suspected of being illegal.
"Claw machines are a type of automatic vending machines, and my country prohibits the use of automatic vending machines to sell tobacco products." Liu Junhai introduced, Article 51 of the Rules for the Implementation of Tobacco Monopoly License Management Regulations stipulates that citizens, legal persons or other organizations shall not use automatic vending machines. Vending machines or other forms of automatic vending, selling or disguised selling tobacco products.
In addition, this type of gambling and repurchase of prizes may also be suspected of gambling and even bear criminal responsibility.
Experts suggest that the probability of catching the claw machine should be clearly stated
Crane machines are absolutely illegal. The "Administrative Measures for Game Amusement Equipment" issued by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism has been implemented on January 1, 2020, which clearly states that game amusement equipment must not contain content that promotes gambling.
Li Changan believes that the claw machine is a kind of amusement equipment, and there is no need to regulate it separately. However, considering that there are more chaos in the current claw machine, it is necessary for the regulatory authorities to increase the supervision of the implementation of the policy.
At present, the most complained by consumers about the claw machine is that the claws are too loose.
Chen Tuo revealed that there are almost no “technical machines” on the market today, and they are all “probability machines”. That is, the merchants can control the probability of “must hit” powerful claws through the background of the claw machines. Some may be issued once every 15 times. It may only be released 30 times, depending on the value of the product and the merchant’s marketing methods.
"The claw machines have probabilities. As long as the coins are'fed', they can be caught." The director of the video game city named Zhang also confirmed this statement, but he said it was inconvenient to disclose the specific probability.
"In order to induce players to continue to invest coins, the probability of chance is to set the claws into two stages. The doll is easy to grasp, but the claws will be released automatically when the highest point is reached. Three of them succeeded in'picking up the leaks', creating an illusion that the dolls in the store are easy to grasp." Chen Tuo said.
The "Administrative Measures for Game Amusement Equipment" clearly stipulates that if game amusement equipment provides in-kind rewards in a probabilistic manner, the operator shall clearly indicate the probability range in a prominent position on the front of the game amusement equipment.
However, during the investigation, the reporter did not find any claw machines to make explicit statements.
Liu Junhai pointed out that the state has issued corresponding management measures, which are focused on implementation. It is recommended that relevant departments implement the work of expressing the probability range of the doll machine as soon as possible in accordance with the law, increase the fairness of equipment and the transparency of the consumption amount, and provide consumers with more fairness. A benign entertainment model.