Category: Forget It Jack It’s Chinatown

This is what they call the double whammy: A German holding company created several brands for use on Kickstarter, where they pimped new Made-In-Germany camera lenses at prices of $3,000 or more. Then the “brands” went bankrupt without fulfilling all of their Kickstarter orders. As is common practice on Kickstarter, that doesn’t mean you get your money back. So a lot of people paid three grand and didn’t get a camera lens.

The people who did get their lens? Well, that’s the second part of the double whammy.

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I have a bit of a distaste hierarchy when it comes to made-in-China stuff. Are you a Chinese company, using your own brand and forthrightly discussing Chinese production? Then maybe we can do business — this article is being written on a Lenovo Y900. Are you an American company that makes some of your products in China, clearly labeling them as such? Okay, Pelican and SILCA… let’s give it a shot (although I just had an unpleasant experience with a Chinese SILCA product, more on that in the near future). Do you obscure the place of production in favor of long bullshit rants about American design and sustainability and being a force for good? Sorry, Patagonia, you can fuck off.

Ah, but there’s a level of Chinese obfuscation even below that of Patagonia et al — the level where you claim to make things in Western countries, or in Japan, only to send me Chinese products when I order them.

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Fool me one time, shame on you
Fool me twice, can’t put the blame on you
Fool me three times, fuck the peace signs
Load the chopper, let it rain on you

Imagine how happy I was to get my new Dragon-Hide Hoodigan from Betabrand just in time for a few long plane trips. Then imagine how I felt to see that they’d sent production to China. Well, it’s nobody’s fault but mine.

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Ugh, this one burns. I can’t remember the last time I sent this kind of money to mainland China. It was bad enough when I bought two Haro reissue bikes, but at least they are made in Taiwan, The Land That Chabuduo Mostly Forgot. This is Straight Outta China, bro.

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Welcome to our newest feature: Forget It, Jack, It’s Chinatown. In this feature, we will be exposing products that are made in China despite carrying a non-Chinese brand and not advertising their Chinese provenance. With any luck, this will provide definite answers to people who Google “xxx made in China”. (I’m not the only person who does that. Right? Right?)

Today’s episode: the Sennheiser HD598CS.

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