Shoddy Knockoff Product/Playing With

Basic Trope: A poor-quality, cheaply made object made to resemble another, more expensive thing in an attempt to fool potential consumers.

• Straight: Bob buys a yPhone in his attempts to buy an iPhone. He discovers that the yPhone has none of the iPhone's functionality, and only makes normal telephone calls.
• Exaggerated: Bob buys a jPhone, which looks exactly like an iPhone but is hollow inside and doesn't work at all.
• Downplayed: Bob buys an lPhone, which, while very close to the iPhone is missing an app or two.
• Justified: Bob is a cheapskate, so instead of looking in official outlets for an iPhone, he looks at flea markets and shady retailers.
  • Copyright laws are not well-enforced in the area.
• Inverted: A real product designed based on a simpler, cheaper alternative.
• Subverted: The product is, in fact, a legitimate Follow the Leader attempt to compete with the iPhone, including its own library of apps and its own interface, similar to but distinguishable from the iPhone's.
• Double Subverted: Of course, it kicks off its own wave of imitators.
• Parodied: We get a glimpse of Bob's house, and it's filled with similar products: Somy television, Macrosoft Windews operating system on a Dull computer, Bob clearly can't tell the difference between the real thing and a shoddy fake.
• Deconstructed: Bob never actually gets what he needs out of things: his computer hardly works, and what it does it doesn't do well. His TV has bad picture quality and only gets three channels. His yPhone doesn't do the things he wanted an iPhone to do, or even send text messages (which causes problems, because his friends do a lot of texting). The counterfeit producers are taking his money and hiding behind Chinese sovereignty to keep away from the wrath of Sony, Microsoft, Apple, and the like.
• Reconstructed: Of course, Bob doesn't really need these electronic devices much anyway. They're entertainment. Plus, he eventually learns to recognize the real deal, and doesn't get fooled anymore.
• Zig Zagged: Bob buys a yPhone, but it turns out to be a legitimate attempt at competition with the iPhone. His grandmother, however, doesn't know he bought one and buys him a jPhone, which hardly works. Bob then gets rid of both and learns to spot fakes, but the counterfeiters learn to produce better fakes and Bob ends up buying a Somy television...
• Averted: There's no fakes or knockoffs.
• Enforced: The director wants to deliver a stealth PSA about these kinds of devices.
• Lampshaded: "Oh, Bob, you didn't buy another fake again, did you?"
• Invoked: "I need to make money, but how... Oooh, I know! I'll make counterfeit versions of real electronic devices and fool people with them!"
• Defied: "Oh, Hell no. I ain't getting fooled by this crap. I know a fake when I see it."
• Discussed: "Bob's always buying fake devices like that yPhone. Should I talk to him about it?"
• Conversed: "Ugh, this episode Bob buys a yPhone. More like yPhony, am I right?" "Lame pun, and they do this plotline way too often. It's like the director has a Fetish for crappy fakes."