talkmagic.co.uk

When I first got interested in magic ages ago, Youtube was my first stop for finding out how the tricks were done. However, the terrible performances and the often completley useless or more times than most inaccurate or needlessly complicated methods put me off. I then started buying magic books and dvds as I'd realised that if you want to really know how stuff is done, you have to pay for it.

Putting aside the moral arguements about exposure sites and torrents and the other dubious sources of information on the internet for one moment, the real issue is the quality of the work. You always get what you pay for and if you pay nothing for something, you will get nothing back in return.

I think most people who watch the exposure videos on Youtube do either of two things. They either are smug for a few minutes because they know how it is done and then they completley forget all about it as they have no real interest in magic OR, like myself, they realise that the videos are several different shades of c*** (not the best) and move on to better quality and also more legitimate sources of info i.e. books and dvds that they have to pay for.

If you have the passion to persue the study of magic either for professional or recreational interests, you will put in the effort and more importantly the financial input required. If someone doesn't care much, they will watch the Youtube videos, maybe download some torrents, watch or read them, and then go back to doing whatever they were doing before and not give it a second thought.

I think the reason people put up the exposure videos is because they want attention. The best way of dealing with most of them is to simple starve them of the oxygen of publicity.

I have a version of "this, that and t'other" which is slightly different from the versions and explanations seen on YouTube. Most people have never seen the effect before, despite it being in the YouTube top 100 at one point.

Sometimes I will start to perform it and someone will say "Oh, I have seen this one on YouTube. It's great... " but they don't jump in and stop me performing it.. or spoil the ending. I think they like the feeling of being 'one-up' on their mates because the know the punch line.

Often this can work in my favour. They say "hey everyone come and look at this guy... This is good... I saw someone on YouTube try to explain how it works but it takes real skill.. wow... I wish I could do that... How long do you have to practice ... can you make my wife disappear.. hahaha ... show us another...."

Discombobulator, it sounds like you perform for magicians or at least, those who slightly care about magic?

For a paying lay audience I've never ever ever ever ever heard such a thing.
However, I believe the key to this is that I use material that is sufficiently unique to make it unfindable on youtube.

Whilst the original versions might be, I have modified the handlings and presentations enough to avoid any exposure.

Lenoir wrote:Discombobulator, it sounds like you perform for magicians or at least, those who slightly care about magic?

For a paying lay audience I've never ever ever ever ever heard such a thing.
However, I believe the key to this is that I use material that is sufficiently unique to make it unfindable on youtube.

Whilst the original versions might be, I have modified the handlings and presentations enough to avoid any exposure.

Its mostly students in a pub setting. No magicians. (I perform to collect donations for charity) Perhaps that age group are more into watching anything on YouTube and sharing YouTube links with each other on Facebook.

Definitely.
Students love knowing a few bar bet type tricks and usually accidently find this and that, etc.

Lenoir wrote:For a paying lay audience I've never ever ever ever ever heard such a thing.
However, I believe the key to this is that I use material that is sufficiently unique to make it unfindable on youtube.

This does not remotely surprise me. In an industry where most people can name only 2 maybe 3 magicians how on earth would they begin to know what an effect was called?

Unless you say for example "Now for my next trick I am going to perform Guru by Jay Crowe." how would they know what to look for?

I can see the situation arising where someone watches some random video on YouTube and then remembers this when they see you doing something but unless it's a set piece or grand illusion where you can search by the name of the performer I doubt someone could research a specific effect on YouTube. I might be wrong though.

Like I said earlier, if they know the name of your effect, you are doing it all wrong.

I also believe if you are performing any effect exactly as it was described and demonstrated, you are also doing it all wrong. But that's another thread.

To summarise what other people have said (this is quite a long thread) and hopefully add something new (I can't remember exactly what's been said):

1 Most people can't really be bothered to look stuff up on the internet when they get home...even if they do feel that they desparately want to know how it's done for an hour or so straight after. People are generally lazy.

2 A huge percentage of people seem to not even want to know how something is done. They just want to enjoy it.

3 Even if someone has seen how an effect is done, they often forget. Memory fades over time. If they're not really into magic, they'll soon forget what they saw on youtube or what someone told them.

4 It can be easy to suggest that another method is used (other than whatever they may have seen on youtube). Of course, there's no point in this if the other method seems likely to them, but if the other method seems ridiculous then this can work as a confusion technique. Try levitating a drinking straw with IT while talking about 'magenetic forces'. They're looking for the magnet, and it gradually dawns on them that a drinking straw would not be drawn to a magnet. But they're too busy thinking about this to connect the effect with anything they might have seen on youtube.
In general: if you say 'this is magic' they'll say 'no it's not', but if you say 'I'm harnessing magnetic forces' and it's blindingly obvious that you aren't (but you say it deadly serious), they can actually start to think that there is just something very, very weird (and magical) going on...

5 It's also easy to debunk knowable methods by mixing up different methods. Vanish a coin from someone's hand with Coin Unique. There's a possibility that they'll say, 'Oh, my friend has this, it's just a ----- ----'. Or, 'I saw this on youtube'. But if you then make the remaining coin vanish too, they'll quickly decide that you are not just relying on a gimmick or one specific method they saw on youtube.

6 There are thousands of effects, routines, gimmicks etc in the world. Even those who have viewed a few of these videos (which most won't have), their knowledge will still only be very limited. [see 5 above]

Most of these concepts can be summed up with the vague psychological concept (possibly from NLP or even from the pickup artist community) of 'blurring'. (At least, I think so. It makes sense in my head, anyway!)

I'm not sticking up for youtube or the dumb people on their who reveal stuff, by the way. I'm just pointing out the various reasons why we shouldn't let it worry us.

A J Irving wrote:You always get what you pay for and if you pay nothing for something, you will get nothing back in return.

Very, very true. Not just in magic either.

Guys you are awesome, there is no doubt. I certainly appreciate all the opinions you have put into this thread. I still feel the whole magic revealed on youtube thing is pointless and inapropriate, but seems less aggravating to me after reading all the posts. I have developed a few tricks here and there and I could imagine how angry I would be if I saw some scrub half assing all of my hard work just to expose or "teach" others how to do it. Thanks again for your inputs-Nemic

Yes. It does suck. I've invented an effect and I was thinking of selling an instructional PDF, but now I'm thinking it may be better to sell it as a physical product.

Oh most definitely, I went onto a torrent engine and in a matter of moments tracked down Ninja 1 &2 and about 5 or 6 other Brad Christian/ Ellusionist DVD's as well as the Buck twins trilogy and the extras dvd- I mean for god sakes! this is absolutely ridiculous! I'm in the states and am all for free speech and the like, but this is taking the proverbial food from the creator's mouth. Oh sure the temptation to get these bits of gold for free is absolutely immense, despite the fact i already own some of these. But the fact is that would make me no better than a common crook...IT'S STEALING why are there no reprecussions to this?!?!

Nemic386 wrote:IT'S STEALING why are there no reprecussions to this?!?!

Most people do not see it as stealing, I certainly did not view it that way before joining the forum.

The reason being it is information and it is certainly a common theme of my generation that having the freedom to learn anything and everything without restriction, monetary or otherwise is a good thing.

It is only as this freedom begins to impact on people in negative ways that this viewpoint is slowly changing as people realise a little bit of restriction can be a good and often safer thing.

A curiosity and desire to learn is something that I will always endorse because it is in my nature to want to know more about things so it would be hypocritical of me to chastise others for the same, however doing so at the expense of somebody else is unfair. Knowledge alone is very rarely enough to actually do anything worthwhile, it is the application of the knowledge that is important thing. Magic is different in so far as sometimes the knowledge without the application element is still detrimental to the inventor.

Going back to YouTube though I did start to think if maybe some of us are not too blame, albeit indirectly. For example if someone comes on and says "My friend showed me a trick and I want to learn how to do it, he did this, this and this." A pointer towards Royal Road is vague but if someone says "Ah that sounds like OOTW, there are different variations that can be bought here." there is nothing stopping the enthusiastic newbie searching on YouTube for OOTW and finding something they normally would have had much more difficulty locating.

Sorry for post length, slow afternoon!

A_n_t wrote:Going back to YouTube though I did start to think if maybe some of us are not too blame, albeit indirectly. For example if someone comes on and says "My friend showed me a trick and I want to learn how to do it, he did this, this and this." A pointer towards Royal Road is vague but if someone says "Ah that sounds like OOTW, there are different variations that can be bought here." there is nothing stopping the enthusiastic newbie searching on YouTube for OOTW and finding something they normally would have had much more difficulty locating.

This is a very good point. I think I may have done this myself on rare occasions. I certainly won't in future. We are all of us in the magic community (and everyone in all walks of life) learning to adjust to this newfangled machine, The Internet. The world is changing so fast that there's bound to be all sorts of weird inventions that will completely change what we do.

What if, for example, scientists really did invent something that can make an object vanish or relocate elsewhere? All of our vanish sleights would become obsolete!

Yeah, people could go to the effort of registering on TM, asking a question and then going over to YouTube but that's a lot of effort for a casual person who just wants to see how it's done.