Counterfeit and Rip Offs in Magic
Knock it off!
In the magic community, we love calling out and talking about Exposure, which seems as divisive as ever these days with the advent of social media and influencers using magic exposure to build a brand and get views.
While we can talk about exposure ad nauseum and will do so until Jesus returns and judges the world or the sun explodes, there’s another problem that is discussed less, but is probably more impactful to the economy of the magic community -
The issue of rip offs and counterfeits in the magic market.
What these are are usually low quality duplicates of a magic prop sold for a much cheaper price or a copy of the digital download/DVD for a few dollars, usually sold by some unnamed, impersonal website or on eBay. This is a big problem and has led to magicians taking steps to avoid getting ripped off so they can continue to make a living or worse, stop releasing altogether.
With magicians getting into this art through mostly digital means we need to educate one another on the right way to buy magic so that we not only respect magic but the artist as well.
Counterfeits Conjurors
A couple years ago Jon Armstrong posted a photo of someone who was making Tiny Plungers and putting them on sale despite it already being in the market through Tenyo.
Fortunately with the following Jon has news of this spread very fast and anyone who was friends with him quickly unfriended the seller on Facebook. Unfortunately the counterfeit artist doesn’t seem to think he did anything wrong, taking the high road and claiming that he was not the same as other such producers like in China.
It’s been a year or so since this persons work was exposed and out of curiosity I wanted to see if he was still up to no good and upon checking his Facebook page (after friending him as his account was private) I can see he very much is still selling copies of Tiny Plunger among other props, seemingly unaffected by the initial noise. He doesn’t speak English, communicating only in Spanish so even my efforts to bring awareness will have limited reach.
Official Rip Offs
Another example is with Vincent Hedan’s Pi Max effect, a multi-phase memorisation routine with the mathematical Pi number that I remember him debuting in Australia over 10 years ago with great reactions.
A German based magician saw Vincent’s effect and decided to release his own version knowing that he was ripping off the original creator. The whole story is written on Vincent’s blog which you can read here but it highlights an issue with regards to the lack of morals and ethics within the magic community.
https://magic.vincenthedan.com/en/blogs/articles/buch
On the magicians’ store page for his Pi Book Test he makes the following claim.
A note on my own behalf:
Contrary to some claims, this book test is BeLu’s interpretation of a Pi book test. The trick techniques were developed specifically by BeLu for this purpose, tested in practice, and are in no way comparable to trick techniques of similar products. The effects also differ from other products in both their nature and presentation.
This opens up another type of discussion around magic creation and crediting but just because you change the method slightly to accommodate your needs does it give you free rein to then produce and sell that as a product? Let me know your thoughts in the comments or reply via email.
In my opinion there needs to be honour and respect amongst magicians, this is a small community after all. If you buy an effect and play around with it you most likely will end up changing it a bit to suit yourself, which is normal for most magicians. However, if you want to then produce that new method and sell it then you need to get in contact with the original creator and get their permission to release it, with full crediting given and see where that road leads. While this may not be possible in all cases such as if the creator has passed away, in most cases magicians will be contactable.
You’d be surprised by how accessible magicians are if you just reach out and contact them.
Counterfeit Stores
Then there’s the unnamed rip off, counterfeit places you find all over the internet.
Magic websites that sell digital copies of tricks, lectures and DVDs for as cheap as a few dollars only to send you a dodgy download link to a file that was downloaded from the original source. Or a cheaper knock off of a trick on eBay or AliExpress or any of those International sites.
I remember buying David Stones Real Secrets of Magic DVD set off eBay when I first got into magic over 15 years ago and got what was clearly a counterfeit product. Fortunately I was able to get it refunded but it was a lesson in buying from legitimate sources. I went for that option because the cheaper price looked too good to be true, and it obviously was too good in the end.
I think that’s where the allure comes from. When we got into magic at an assumably young age we may not have the money to buy what we want, so seeing it available somewhere for cheap can be tempting. But it’s not good enough as an excuse, if we can save money to buy a new $1000 smart phone or splash money on a Labubu doll/Pokemon card or whatever fad is next then we can save up to support a creator for a magic trick they’ve put their time and effort into creating.
Andy Gladwin lead an initiative that became a documentary which explores this world of sites that steal magic and sell them for cheaper. It’s not out for public viewing yet, but I look forward to when it is so we can see what he discovered!
You can keep up with where it is here - Stealing Magic
If money is an issue when it comes to learning magic, there are so many more free resources out there that there’s no excuse in getting your magic fix.
I’ve listed a few here in previously posts but I know there’s a bunch of new great ones that have come up in the last year so a refresh is probably due.
Free Resources to Learn Magic Online
The Best YouTube Channels to Learn Magic
One free resource I really enjoy is Alon’s community with a bunch of free lectures from different magicians with so much material that will keep you busy for a long time. Craig Petty alone has three lectures, but I really enjoyed Ashley Green’s lecture on the business of magic and Ben Williams for his creativity and DIY.
I’m sure there are other examples of knock offs and counterfeits out there but please be aware when shopping for magic, if a price is too good to be true, it’s likely a cheap copy or illegally downloaded and resold.
Magicians rely on other magicians creating magic, and if we’re undercutting them by not buying from them or reputable places, eventually they’ll stop releasing magic and we’ll get to a point where we have to, heaven forbid, create our own magic!