I'm not sure if copyrights would pertain to what were are talking about. You could register your trademark or try to patent a design, if it was unique enough. But I think all these are generally enforced by the holder and would usually involve engaging legal representation and there would be significant costs involved.
In my understanding of industrial design rights, it borrows or employs the legal language from copyright.
Because of costs incurred from legal representation, I don't see a situation where an original designer, who is mid-sized business or lower, would follow up on legally addressing violations of their 'right to exclusive distribution.' While going after one in court, another could pop up and be engaged in same tactic, thus having original designer forever chasing violators, and going bankrupt in the process.
In some ways, I see the non-deceptive counterfeit market as worse than the deceptive kind, as there isn't general agreement among public to go after the non-deceptive kind, even while it impacts 'exclusive right to distribution.' For a larger company with more resources can steal idea, change a few minor things, and duplicate the product and make greater revenue than the original designer.
In previous discussion on this topic I said that I long for the day when robots / automated machines can produce all the things humans currently produce or provide a service for, as that will even out the lopsided playing field. People (some of whom I know) have no issues with violating copyright, and that sort of piracy since dawn of the internet is rampant. While many have a problem with this, I submit that more do not, and that the same rationale is in play - tough cookies if you don't like copies being made that may, or may not violate copyright, still going to happen regardless of your moral positioning. So, I long for the day when it can all be replicated via automation and no one is profiting from it, just because they can. You may love your business and products it produces / services it provides, but the way global economy and technology is going, you will be undercut by others on the planet who have found both legal and questionable methods to do exactly what you do at much lower costs with greater stream of revenue, even if it means taking your exact products/services and claiming them as their own.
As all that is years away, then I just assume stick to principles of current discussion and try to understand from pro-cloners what is the problem with counterfeiting as they understand it, even the deceptive kind, with the overriding notion that regardless of what you think, it'll still occur.
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