Apologies if this is old news; I just thought I’d pass it on.
I was talking to a friend today who’s about to import USB memory sticks from the Far East to sell in the UK. The manufacturers (my emphasis!) produce both ‘real’ i.e. the advertised capacity and ‘fake’ (typically half or quarter the advertised capacity) models.
Yes, you read that correctly: you can buy (to resell) so-called ‘16GB’ memory sticks with all concerned—except the punter you’re selling the sticks to, obviously—knowing that in fact, the sticks have only 4GB capacity.
The ‘fakes’ cost the reseller half the price of the real ones. So if you see exceptionally cheap memory sticks online (including on eBay), make sure you ask the seller up front what the REAL capacity is, and also that they will give you a refund if you find they’re ‘short.’ An eBay seller my friend spoke to allegedly said that he shifts about 40 ‘fake’ sticks a day on eBay and gets only about three complaints a week (!), but little/no bad feedback and hence carries on selling on eBay. And also according to my friend, this guy is an eBay Platinum Seller (!!!). (And no, I don’t know who it allegedly is. :))
I’m still getting my head around this whole concept.
(Torben: you may wish to post a German translation in the German forums? If so, thank you :))
PS: My friend will be selling the real ‘full fat’ ones :D, and at a good price. 
If anyone’s interested, PM me and I’ll post his details back to you when he sets up shop.
PPS: ALWAYS a good idea to check out the actual capacity on any memory stick you buy ASAP (right-click the drive in Explorer, then click Properties). And ideally, also try to fill it with data to the advertised capacity …
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