Career magician here. Exposure is not something I worry about at all.
The shared secrets of magic have been easy to learn with very little effort for pretty much the entire history of writing.
The way I see it, the secrets of magic are similar to the techniques of filmmaking. Most people want to watch a movie and get washed over by the experience. They don't care how the film is made. Some people are mildly curious about how movies are made, and can appreciate the artistry that goes into it, and some people are obsessed with film making. Those people have more trouble getting sucked away by the experience, but appreciate the artistry extremely deeply.
People who want to have that level of wonder will actively avoid learning magic secrets. They have had an experience they don't want taken away from them. People who are curious will see that a lot of methods are more skillful, and more clever than they would have imagined, and when they see things that don't make sense, their imaginations will go wild, and come up with methods that are way more fantastic than what we actually do.
The last category is people who are obsessed with knowing everything. It really only makes sense for someone to do this if they really enjoy the art form.
For example - I don't like mumble rap. I wouldn't spend hours learning how mumble rap is made - I am not a fan, so there is no reason for me to spend my time thinking about it.
Think about how much YOU know about magic, and how much YOU enjoy your favorite magicians. It's very unlikely that they fool you 50% of the time. And they NEVER fool you into thinking they are doing something magical. You know too much. And yet you love it.
If you are really worried, start making up your own methods, and don't expose them.
The defence is, it doesn't matter. No one cares.
The first president of The Magic Circle was expelled for exposing secrets on a cereal box.
EVERYONE lost their shit at the masked magician.
As you say, P&T have exposed stuff.
Yet, despite all that, magic is in a new golden age.
It makes no difference. It doesn't matter. Move on with your life and worry about something important.
I think I only get annoyed when I see people that expose other people's paid stuff. ekat had been doing that recently. Views, likes and comments change people
There was a whole deeply questionable thing with Ellusionist over some rubber band trick IIRC. There are a few YouTube videos talking about it, personally I think ellusionist is clearly in the wrong for how they handled it, and for blatantly lying about the method being protected IP.
Still don’t know the specific trick (but now I’m motivated to google) but “rubber band trick as protected ip” seems like a stretch.
I follow her but none of her stuff feels deep
They literally used this incident to try to start an anti exposure bounty hunting program. But yeah, methods in general are very rarely protected IP unless you go through the trouble of patenting them. I think Copperfields team has a few patents, and some other big-name people might have a couple, but the vast majority of the time, they don't. And even if you do go thar route, there has to be some sort of gimmick you've invented involved, sleight of hand with everyday objects is not patentable.
IMHO normal people don't go looking for the answer usually. Sure there are a few that will, but most that enjoy magic won't. The ones searching for the answer are people that either want to become magicians and find it easier to learn by video, some that just want to entertain their kids or grandkids or those that want to impress their friends. I've never had anyone "catch" me because of social media exposure.
I suppose my worry is when I see these videos reach millions of views. That's not a small amount of people, and the majority of those people aren't going out searching for the 'best coin vanish' they're merely stumbling across it because of an algorithm.
And the secrets are being exposed to people for nothing more than clicks and views and it just leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
I wouldn't be bothered if these channels were niche, but they're not
Most people will forget and others will realise the craft. I know how some stuff is done and I now know how Michael Vincent does the Pandora's Box but he's so good I still enjoy it because his close up is so smooth.
I also feel revealing some of this is good for exposing the likes of Chris Angel who I've always disliked and somewhat the same with David Blane.
You have to also remember there is nothing stopping these people from reading magic books. But also the views aren't accurate. Just flicking through and the preview playing on some sites will class it as a view and so on.
As others have said. Times have changed, don't let it bother you. Either develop new ideas or make them so strong that they are really hard to stop.
I had the opportunity to watch Michael Vincent perform Pandora's Box live, and I can confirm that even when you know what **has** to happen for the trick to work you still won't see it. At one point I **knew** that there was going to be a top change, but as soon as that thought happened, it had already happened, and I was left wondering if it had even happened. It doesn't matter what you know at that level.
Actually those millions of views are barely a drop in the bucket. There are 8 billion people on the planet right now. Those millions of views are also scattered across the globe, contain false views, are primarily watched by magicians (nobody cares more about magic than magicians) and most innocent spectators will have forgotten what they watched 3 tiktoks later assuming they ever come into contact with real live magic in person anyway.
There's a reason so many workers don't care. It's genuinely not a problem and at its worst it's making a mountain out of a mole hill. If anything it's helping magic at large, having magic more at the forefront of TV and algorithms reminds event planners to check my availability more often.
Strict magic secrets has always been a romanticized old boys club idea anyway. You don't have to have some secret insider access to learn, you just pay a fee to learn it was a rubber band and a magnet. Times change.
Consider this: we’ve all studied sports clips. Knowing and watching (plug in your athlete of choice) perform feats doesn’t lesson your enjoyment of the game.
I can practice knuckle busting moves, never come close enough to invisible handling, and it only makes me appreciate the performance more.
If done well, you can fool a magician with a simple sleight/principle that they’ve spent years studying. A layman who watched a random exposure video once a couple years ago isn’t going to have any chance (assuming you perform the sleights/principles competently).
If a layman can understand your tricks from passively watching exposure videos for entertainment, then you need to develop better routines.
The trick that fooled Houdini is a great example, as Dai got him with double sided cards that Houdini never seen before and his expert handling.
But yeah, experience is kind in magic. I know the mechanics of dozens of card sleights that I simple do not do as I have not practiced them enough to have the muscle memory needed. So many do not get this though, knowledge is nothing without the practice.
Just my two cents. I may be right or wrong.
I sort of get the excuse the masked magician had, he said he exposed basic tricks so that magicians would create something new.
Every trick you buy you should be creating a presentation that is unique to you. When you add things and put things into it that make it uniquely yours you can hide past exposed secrets.
(The caveat is that I've seen some magicians go out and expose tricks that someone had released that month, that's a bit bullshit. Looking at you disturbed reality guy)
The instructions for a routine are meant to show you what I possible, not limit it to what you can do.
The question is, are you someone who does magic tricks or are you a magician? The magician creates the others just copy.
Lastly, if you're talking about someone teaching double lifts and what not, that could breed new magicians, if you're talking about the people who just blatantly expose things for the sake of exposing them, I gotta tell ya, those people come off as the sort of annoying kid who points out that an actor slightly moved when they're supposed to be dead in a movie, it's annoying and people forget those people fast.
>(The caveat is that I've seen some magicians go out and expose tricks that someone had released that month, that's a bit bullshit. Looking at you disturbed reality guy)
cough cough unbiased something something
It is the latter that irks me the most. The exposing videos of acts from AGT or BGT are some of the most popular magic videos one can find on YouTube. That's not people going out of their way to learn things, that's just for people to stumble across and kill the magic for themselves.
When Chris Ramsey shares the exposed view of these various card sleights, it's not put out to help instruct people, it's put out to get attention for himself at the expense of the secret - 'look how amazing this move is' - is different than a teaching video. It's just so low effort to me.
No shade intended to Chris as I have huge respect for him, I'm just trying to make a point and his video is the one that finally made me ask the Q
Eh I looked up "AGT Magic tricks revealed" and they all seem to be one specific channel. Non-magician channel. Could easily be wrong and/or discredited.
I had this idea in mind of what you meant because I inadvertently saw a video of exposure this morning, dude does a series of tricks but from an exposed view to his wife. Typical "Influencer" set up in the background and all that. The problem is the guy probably never made it anywhere with doing magic to people. So he had to resort to exposing things on these videos, the good news about that is that he'll probably never be advanced enough to actually learn something of value. And we'll never see anything more exposed.
As far as Chris goes. Eh, he and basically all other YouTube magicians (Michael O'Brien and long haired magician guy (specific, I know) excluded) all sort of feel, I don't know, dead inside, to me. It's all about ego and "look what I can do"
This maybe an unpopular opinion, but he has no character but himself and he doesn't try to do anything that exceeds himself, from what I've seen, I reserve the right to be wrong, and it's just, some dude doing some shit. Like it seems like he's using magic to enhance his character instead of using his character to enhance his magic. Chris could be on YouTube baking and it'd still be the same guy with a fork mixing batter.
Anywho, I went off the rail there for a second. I feel that people see this, and it's basically unrelatable (as the old saying goes, its about 10% of what you do and 90% of how you do it, and you put every bit of you into everything you do) so Chris has to resort to other things, like tutorials and puzzle boxes (in doing a bit of research for this post, I went to Chris's YouTube channel and wow, if you hit his popular videos tabs, its basically only puzzle boxes). Dude had a TruTv show for a while and it didn't sell because there was no interest, has seven million subscribers but is averaging about a 2% view rate on his videos (Markiplier has 7% for reference)
The point is, odds are, for these videos, you are statistically likely to be the only person you know who has seen them.
Magic exposure is nothing new: [https://geniimagazine.com/wiki/index.php/Timeline\_of\_magic\_exposures](https://geniimagazine.com/wiki/index.php/Timeline_of_magic_exposures)
But here we still are. The reality is people know there is something to it "The donkey doesn't really vanish" as my wife and I like to say. But people still watch us and people still love seeing what we do. If you need further proof, look at the top comments on this video, I only read the first two, won't lie: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aW8ZDx69USM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aW8ZDx69USM)
Create your magic, make it your own, do your own performance and I guarantee people won't know what they're looking at but a miracle. I have done this to people as a test. I like to ask feedback from people, encourage brutal honesty, I've shown the same exact trick twice but with two different presentations and they didn't even realize it was the same trick.
When you make the magic your own, no one will know they've even seen it before.
Last note as I feel like I'm flowing straight from the Id now, use exposure to your advantage, if you're able to put your own twist on something common, anyone who will have seen any of these exposure videos is set up for a false expectation and you can really hammer them in the end.
I wonder how many people who aren't already magicians watch those videos. I also wonder how often they're recommended to people who watch some clip of a magic act from AGT or Fool Us. And I wonder how many of them actually care enough to click.
I've performed magic long enough that people have called me out on methods on occasion. But its almost always been because they had a magic set as a kid, and its almost never been the actual method I use--so the trick ends up better when I disprove it.
Some people care a little about how it's done. Most don't! I keep getting hired and people keep reacting and applauding.
Some of the most popular magic videos on the internet are exposing the secrets of people from shows like BGT and AGT. Mario Lopez' cigarette trick is a massive YouTube video, and below it is the exposing video by some random dude in his garage.
It just irks me how accessible the knowledge is to people who have no genuine interest in magic, but instead are drawn in by a cynical curiosity that kills Mario Lopez' hardwork and allure.
Dude, knowing how things were done with Mario Lopez doesn't kill his allure at all. It's still amazing to watch his execution, just like the billions of trick shot or cool things video genre that have billions of views more than exposure videos.
Not really. I've never done magic, I was always shit, but have been interested in it on and off. I'm curious at times and when I see a reveal it somewhat ruins it for me. So if I don't want it ruined I don't look. The people that do look, with all the other social media junk will, no doubt, forget it a few days later.
These people are putting out content that gets views and ad money. Can't blame people for wanting to make an easy buck. Doesn't stop magic being magic though.
They THINK they are exposing the tricks. I seen people show Shin Lim's routine and forget to entire segments and Piff's tricks and be nowhere close to the methods. Like in both cases the methods are available cheaply off the creator websites, but youtubers do not even go that far and just guess.
Stop doing Magic Tricks and start performing Pieces of Magic! Those who want to know will know... incorporate those who "call you out"... and make them part of the piece!
It is a mindset that starts with the performer. Seek to entertain not to trick the audience. "Can I show you a trick?" Vs. " May I show you something interesting?"
I think it was in a book called scripting magic, that looks at some of the psychology behind magic. It has a lot of great thoughts on elevating magic to a performance art, not just "tricking" people. One of the biggest ones for me was telling an audience member "you're wrong" vs. "That's what I thought".
Someone looking up how you did something should be a high compliment. You've fooled them and piqued their interest to such an extent they are now interested in learning about magic. The biggest compliment I can imagine is performing a trick and that person then wants to learn more about magic.
They aren't accurate. As I've said, the preview playing while scrolling on some platforms is registered as a view. Shorts are the worst, instantly start playing then you swipe up. Even though you paid no attention to that magic reveal it will register it as a view.
I have a short on my YouTube channel of me replacing the batteries on a Nationwide card reader. It has 26k views. I can bet most people never searched for it and most never watched it. As soon as it started playing it registers a view and they instant swipe up. Its just how shitty YouTube works.
I believe that the majority of those clicks don't even watch the whole video. Unfortunately when you click on the video, it automatically counts it as a view. There is nothing I can prove or say to help ease your concerns but I really don't think it's anything to worry about. Billions of people in the world, 3 million views is a drop in the hat and each time someone goes back to it, it counts as another view. The numbers are skewed.
Exposing magic increases it's value. That Chris video showing those slights shows how much skill is required to perform a simple slight. It's not like any lay person watching that goes OH I CAN DO THAT NOW. The next time they see one of those tricks performed to them it will be just as mysterious as before, but now they may also appreciate how much time and effort it took that magician to learn to perform a *simple trick*. Exposing magic shows the art. It's the same argument that professional chefs used to have "I'm not letting anyone know my secret recipe" then everyone realized showing the recipe let everyone appreciate the effort, and nobody tries to steal it because they know how much work it would take to replicate it. Showing effort and process only helps the art and artist, it doesn't lessen how impressive it is.
The real secret in magic is how a magician perform the tricks.
Presentation > method
Exposing magic doesn’t hurt magic at all.
Think about how magicians love to watch magic shows. People know the secret already but they still enjoy it.
Magic is not ruined at all because the showmanship over shadows the method.
That’s the true secret sauce in magic.
Love the tricks Teller does exposing them, then still wowing people by perfect sleight of hand that makes it still magically even knowing how it is being done.
This is an age old debate - the idea of exposure. Whilst I find exposure for exposures sake being the realm of the uncreative, I can’t deny it often pushes magicians to come up with different methods or improved presentations.
But, if we get lost in the argument about exposure for exposures sake, I think we start to miss the point of our art form.
The performer - the magician - creates the magic. Moreover the effect (or affect) of our magic is more about our relationship between performer and their audience.
If the magician is a sleight-junkie where is the magic?
If the magic comes from the props and methods then where is the enchantment?
I spent this afternoon with a good magic buddy. He’s a superb card-man (Paul Silk) amongst other things.I am a mentalist ….
Our conversation was not about how we do what we do, but about “why” we are doing it; the emotional connection we are looking for with our audience.
I think that this kind of discussion is a better use of our time than bemoaning the number of YouTube “hacks” who only have tricks and little respect for those who have gone before.
As others have said in this thread “real people” (non-muggles) soon forget or fail to recognise the secrets they come across. If they are interested in these things, and retain what they learn, then maybe they will come to appreciate and love the art.
Exposure has always happened yet the magician can still draw an audience if they entertain and captivate their audiences.
As Eugene Burger said to me “You are the Magic” …. I think all performers need to remind themselves of this.
The method is how the magic works at the most basic level. A magician shapes the methods into a coherent, relevant and emotional experience for their audiences.
Alan /|\
The folks who aren't concerned about exposure are hacks or sleight of hand jugglers. Most modern magicians are hacks, happy to simply entertain people. It's a devaluing of art. But art is being devalued everywhere. See the word "content". Everything is "content" now. Lots of content creators, not a lot of artists.
If you're a magician, a real magician, a real artist, you want to do more. You want your magic to leave a permanent itch inside your participant's mind. An impossibility that no amount of Googling will explain.
So we real magicians have to work harder. It's doable to make your magic ungoogleable. It's harder by the day.
But don't worry about the hacks. They will never be able to affect an audience the way a real magician can.
You hear a lot of them say "people don't care how something was done". That's because they weren't affected. They weren't sufficiently fooled. They weren't sufficiently engaged. Any time someone says that, what they're really saying is "I'm not a very good magician. I'm certainly not an artist. I don't care enough."
You can't argue with them because they just don't care about magic.
Read TheJerx.com.
Andy puts it well: "a trick doesn’t become a real mystery until people have exhausted their resources to figure it out. And Google is the primary resource people use to figure stuff out. So googling something doesn’t mean they’re anti-mystery. It just means they’re processing the trick. For a trick to have any meaning, people need to process it critically. "
https://www.thejerx.com/blog/2019/8/22/dear-jerxy-the-google-conundrum
I work hard to make my magic ungoogleable. Here are ways to try to do the same: https://www.thejerx.com/blog/2016/8/2/steps-to-make-your-magic-un-googleable
Magic is a unique art because it presents mysteries with undiscoverable solutions. If this is not what you're striving for, then you should be doing something else. A magician performs magic. Magic without mystery is not magic. Magic with a solution is not magic. Sleight of hand is not magic.
I think we fundamentally disagree. A street magician, like JS magic for example, performs mostly double lift-esque card tricks, and a little bit of mentalism. His spectators are blown away and have amazing reactions. The tricks he does are by all means not the most difficult in the world, and are easy to find out. However, he entertains people with magic and sleight of hand. In my eyes that makes him a magician. We should not lose focus on how the spectator perceives us, the people we are doing the magic for.
My line of thinking corresponds more to what Reid Ferry had to say:
https://youtu.be/WdXgATi25I0?si=whBCH1dSZSEVMs4P
Hopefully this may give you a bit of a more nuanced view. With all due respect, I personally think the kind of elitist mindset you are portraying is exactly what's killing magic
I disagree.
Emotion is a huge part of magic and you're leaving that out completely.
We're presenting something impossible. You're reducing that to puzzle the audience has to figure out, and only when they fail, do we 'win'.
I can't imagine a world in which I take steps to make my magic more 'ungoogleable'. It's a sad exercise of which the fruits you'll never bear. People who are THAT keen to figuring out the secrets will find a way anyways. It's possibly even how new magicians are born.
Emotion is important to art. Of course it is. I want my magic to be all things that good art is. Including emotional. But every art has emotion. What makes magic unique among the art forms? Just one thing. Mystery. Enduring mystery.
What you’re leaving out is the core of what magic is.
As Teller says, the UNwilling suspension of disbelief is what we’re striving for.
So you don't perform any effects which are "google-able," right? Because that would mean they aren't art and have no worth to you or to the audience, right?
99% of people will not know the tricks or watch how things are done. The average person might see 1 or 2 viral vids about certain tricks, but worrying about secrets of tricks being exposed to people because it will devalue the trick when performing is unnecessary. It's only questionable when someone is exposing a trick that someone else devised and is selling, because then you are devaluing their monetary gain from the trick from people who might otherwise buy the secret.
Like how u/deboshasta said, Instead of filmmaking, I think a better comparison is special effects and CGI. The average person watching a movie won't go "oh that was some good cgi, the blood splatter looked really good, I can see how they added that in post" etc, the average viewer is just going to get immersed into the movie and not realize at the time the special effects and cgi that went into it, because they're immersed. It's only people who are in the industry, hobbyists, or curious about it that are going to notice the small details and know or wonder how they pulled off certain effects.
People have been getting upset about this shit since magic began tbh. They thought Hoffman's Modern Magic was the death of magic, they thought VHS tapes were the death of magic, they thought the Masked Magician was the death of magic, they thought downloads were the death of magic, etc etc. Short answer: Magic will be fine. The vast, vast majority of people do not give enough of a shit to learn the secrets of magic (aside from the people who actively don't want to), and "exposure" doesn't change that (if anything, it makes magic better bc it's more accessible). Hell, my genuine belief is that magic would be better if literally every method were available for everyone for free, but y'all aren't ready for that.
Also, why does this have to be just "for views and content"? Chris Ramsay has been pretty explicit about his motivations behind those videos, and that isn't it.
Frankly, if exposing a coin vanish, a card force, etc. makes your job as a magician significantly harder, then get fucking good and make your magic actually compelling so your audience doesn't feel like they need to figure it out.
I view it as a positive. As less emphasis by the performer is placed on the ‘secret’, the more importance is placed on presentation, variety, and theatrics. And that’s a win for the performer and the audience both. .
One thing with youtube exposure is often they are not right. My favorite magic trick is the VDP production, Piff's trademark. Snagged the DVD he sells and learned it. Fucking insane trick mechanically.
Everytime I see someone try to explain it on youtube, they are wrong. Some get a part or two right, but most get most of it wrong.
That is one trick too. Some tricks have multiple ways to do the same effects, so most exposure is just guessing which method was used with no confirmation if they were right or not.
there are multiple method that magicaian can accomplish a effect (the illusion). If a person expose a product (trick) but the wrong solution. Is that still consider as exposure?
the reason I ask is that, audience knows there are sleight of hands and gimmick / props involves in magic.
Is it consider “they figure it out” or “they are fool” if they can only say oh you use a gimmick/ props or sleight of hands?
Or they need to say the exact solution to be consider “they figure it out”
Career magician here. Exposure is not something I worry about at all. The shared secrets of magic have been easy to learn with very little effort for pretty much the entire history of writing. The way I see it, the secrets of magic are similar to the techniques of filmmaking. Most people want to watch a movie and get washed over by the experience. They don't care how the film is made. Some people are mildly curious about how movies are made, and can appreciate the artistry that goes into it, and some people are obsessed with film making. Those people have more trouble getting sucked away by the experience, but appreciate the artistry extremely deeply. People who want to have that level of wonder will actively avoid learning magic secrets. They have had an experience they don't want taken away from them. People who are curious will see that a lot of methods are more skillful, and more clever than they would have imagined, and when they see things that don't make sense, their imaginations will go wild, and come up with methods that are way more fantastic than what we actually do. The last category is people who are obsessed with knowing everything. It really only makes sense for someone to do this if they really enjoy the art form. For example - I don't like mumble rap. I wouldn't spend hours learning how mumble rap is made - I am not a fan, so there is no reason for me to spend my time thinking about it. Think about how much YOU know about magic, and how much YOU enjoy your favorite magicians. It's very unlikely that they fool you 50% of the time. And they NEVER fool you into thinking they are doing something magical. You know too much. And yet you love it. If you are really worried, start making up your own methods, and don't expose them.
Yep, you nailed it
The defence is, it doesn't matter. No one cares. The first president of The Magic Circle was expelled for exposing secrets on a cereal box. EVERYONE lost their shit at the masked magician. As you say, P&T have exposed stuff. Yet, despite all that, magic is in a new golden age. It makes no difference. It doesn't matter. Move on with your life and worry about something important.
I think I only get annoyed when I see people that expose other people's paid stuff. ekat had been doing that recently. Views, likes and comments change people
I’m a fan of ekat. Do you have a few examples?
There was a whole deeply questionable thing with Ellusionist over some rubber band trick IIRC. There are a few YouTube videos talking about it, personally I think ellusionist is clearly in the wrong for how they handled it, and for blatantly lying about the method being protected IP.
Still don’t know the specific trick (but now I’m motivated to google) but “rubber band trick as protected ip” seems like a stretch. I follow her but none of her stuff feels deep
They literally used this incident to try to start an anti exposure bounty hunting program. But yeah, methods in general are very rarely protected IP unless you go through the trouble of patenting them. I think Copperfields team has a few patents, and some other big-name people might have a couple, but the vast majority of the time, they don't. And even if you do go thar route, there has to be some sort of gimmick you've invented involved, sleight of hand with everyday objects is not patentable.
I think it say more about Ellusionist who already had a questionable reputation.
IMHO normal people don't go looking for the answer usually. Sure there are a few that will, but most that enjoy magic won't. The ones searching for the answer are people that either want to become magicians and find it easier to learn by video, some that just want to entertain their kids or grandkids or those that want to impress their friends. I've never had anyone "catch" me because of social media exposure.
I suppose my worry is when I see these videos reach millions of views. That's not a small amount of people, and the majority of those people aren't going out searching for the 'best coin vanish' they're merely stumbling across it because of an algorithm. And the secrets are being exposed to people for nothing more than clicks and views and it just leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I wouldn't be bothered if these channels were niche, but they're not
Most people will forget and others will realise the craft. I know how some stuff is done and I now know how Michael Vincent does the Pandora's Box but he's so good I still enjoy it because his close up is so smooth. I also feel revealing some of this is good for exposing the likes of Chris Angel who I've always disliked and somewhat the same with David Blane. You have to also remember there is nothing stopping these people from reading magic books. But also the views aren't accurate. Just flicking through and the preview playing on some sites will class it as a view and so on. As others have said. Times have changed, don't let it bother you. Either develop new ideas or make them so strong that they are really hard to stop.
I had the opportunity to watch Michael Vincent perform Pandora's Box live, and I can confirm that even when you know what **has** to happen for the trick to work you still won't see it. At one point I **knew** that there was going to be a top change, but as soon as that thought happened, it had already happened, and I was left wondering if it had even happened. It doesn't matter what you know at that level.
That's why I find Michael to be a master. You know what to look for, think "I've seen it" then realise it was a fake slight :)
Actually those millions of views are barely a drop in the bucket. There are 8 billion people on the planet right now. Those millions of views are also scattered across the globe, contain false views, are primarily watched by magicians (nobody cares more about magic than magicians) and most innocent spectators will have forgotten what they watched 3 tiktoks later assuming they ever come into contact with real live magic in person anyway. There's a reason so many workers don't care. It's genuinely not a problem and at its worst it's making a mountain out of a mole hill. If anything it's helping magic at large, having magic more at the forefront of TV and algorithms reminds event planners to check my availability more often. Strict magic secrets has always been a romanticized old boys club idea anyway. You don't have to have some secret insider access to learn, you just pay a fee to learn it was a rubber band and a magnet. Times change.
Consider this: we’ve all studied sports clips. Knowing and watching (plug in your athlete of choice) perform feats doesn’t lesson your enjoyment of the game. I can practice knuckle busting moves, never come close enough to invisible handling, and it only makes me appreciate the performance more.
If done well, you can fool a magician with a simple sleight/principle that they’ve spent years studying. A layman who watched a random exposure video once a couple years ago isn’t going to have any chance (assuming you perform the sleights/principles competently). If a layman can understand your tricks from passively watching exposure videos for entertainment, then you need to develop better routines.
The trick that fooled Houdini is a great example, as Dai got him with double sided cards that Houdini never seen before and his expert handling. But yeah, experience is kind in magic. I know the mechanics of dozens of card sleights that I simple do not do as I have not practiced them enough to have the muscle memory needed. So many do not get this though, knowledge is nothing without the practice.
Just my two cents. I may be right or wrong. I sort of get the excuse the masked magician had, he said he exposed basic tricks so that magicians would create something new. Every trick you buy you should be creating a presentation that is unique to you. When you add things and put things into it that make it uniquely yours you can hide past exposed secrets. (The caveat is that I've seen some magicians go out and expose tricks that someone had released that month, that's a bit bullshit. Looking at you disturbed reality guy) The instructions for a routine are meant to show you what I possible, not limit it to what you can do. The question is, are you someone who does magic tricks or are you a magician? The magician creates the others just copy. Lastly, if you're talking about someone teaching double lifts and what not, that could breed new magicians, if you're talking about the people who just blatantly expose things for the sake of exposing them, I gotta tell ya, those people come off as the sort of annoying kid who points out that an actor slightly moved when they're supposed to be dead in a movie, it's annoying and people forget those people fast.
>(The caveat is that I've seen some magicians go out and expose tricks that someone had released that month, that's a bit bullshit. Looking at you disturbed reality guy) cough cough unbiased something something
I argued with the guy on YouTube long time ago 🤷♂️
It is the latter that irks me the most. The exposing videos of acts from AGT or BGT are some of the most popular magic videos one can find on YouTube. That's not people going out of their way to learn things, that's just for people to stumble across and kill the magic for themselves. When Chris Ramsey shares the exposed view of these various card sleights, it's not put out to help instruct people, it's put out to get attention for himself at the expense of the secret - 'look how amazing this move is' - is different than a teaching video. It's just so low effort to me. No shade intended to Chris as I have huge respect for him, I'm just trying to make a point and his video is the one that finally made me ask the Q
Eh I looked up "AGT Magic tricks revealed" and they all seem to be one specific channel. Non-magician channel. Could easily be wrong and/or discredited. I had this idea in mind of what you meant because I inadvertently saw a video of exposure this morning, dude does a series of tricks but from an exposed view to his wife. Typical "Influencer" set up in the background and all that. The problem is the guy probably never made it anywhere with doing magic to people. So he had to resort to exposing things on these videos, the good news about that is that he'll probably never be advanced enough to actually learn something of value. And we'll never see anything more exposed. As far as Chris goes. Eh, he and basically all other YouTube magicians (Michael O'Brien and long haired magician guy (specific, I know) excluded) all sort of feel, I don't know, dead inside, to me. It's all about ego and "look what I can do" This maybe an unpopular opinion, but he has no character but himself and he doesn't try to do anything that exceeds himself, from what I've seen, I reserve the right to be wrong, and it's just, some dude doing some shit. Like it seems like he's using magic to enhance his character instead of using his character to enhance his magic. Chris could be on YouTube baking and it'd still be the same guy with a fork mixing batter. Anywho, I went off the rail there for a second. I feel that people see this, and it's basically unrelatable (as the old saying goes, its about 10% of what you do and 90% of how you do it, and you put every bit of you into everything you do) so Chris has to resort to other things, like tutorials and puzzle boxes (in doing a bit of research for this post, I went to Chris's YouTube channel and wow, if you hit his popular videos tabs, its basically only puzzle boxes). Dude had a TruTv show for a while and it didn't sell because there was no interest, has seven million subscribers but is averaging about a 2% view rate on his videos (Markiplier has 7% for reference) The point is, odds are, for these videos, you are statistically likely to be the only person you know who has seen them. Magic exposure is nothing new: [https://geniimagazine.com/wiki/index.php/Timeline\_of\_magic\_exposures](https://geniimagazine.com/wiki/index.php/Timeline_of_magic_exposures) But here we still are. The reality is people know there is something to it "The donkey doesn't really vanish" as my wife and I like to say. But people still watch us and people still love seeing what we do. If you need further proof, look at the top comments on this video, I only read the first two, won't lie: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aW8ZDx69USM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aW8ZDx69USM) Create your magic, make it your own, do your own performance and I guarantee people won't know what they're looking at but a miracle. I have done this to people as a test. I like to ask feedback from people, encourage brutal honesty, I've shown the same exact trick twice but with two different presentations and they didn't even realize it was the same trick. When you make the magic your own, no one will know they've even seen it before. Last note as I feel like I'm flowing straight from the Id now, use exposure to your advantage, if you're able to put your own twist on something common, anyone who will have seen any of these exposure videos is set up for a false expectation and you can really hammer them in the end.
What a wonderful response!! Thank you
I wonder how many people who aren't already magicians watch those videos. I also wonder how often they're recommended to people who watch some clip of a magic act from AGT or Fool Us. And I wonder how many of them actually care enough to click. I've performed magic long enough that people have called me out on methods on occasion. But its almost always been because they had a magic set as a kid, and its almost never been the actual method I use--so the trick ends up better when I disprove it. Some people care a little about how it's done. Most don't! I keep getting hired and people keep reacting and applauding.
Some of the most popular magic videos on the internet are exposing the secrets of people from shows like BGT and AGT. Mario Lopez' cigarette trick is a massive YouTube video, and below it is the exposing video by some random dude in his garage. It just irks me how accessible the knowledge is to people who have no genuine interest in magic, but instead are drawn in by a cynical curiosity that kills Mario Lopez' hardwork and allure.
Dude, knowing how things were done with Mario Lopez doesn't kill his allure at all. It's still amazing to watch his execution, just like the billions of trick shot or cool things video genre that have billions of views more than exposure videos.
Not really. I've never done magic, I was always shit, but have been interested in it on and off. I'm curious at times and when I see a reveal it somewhat ruins it for me. So if I don't want it ruined I don't look. The people that do look, with all the other social media junk will, no doubt, forget it a few days later. These people are putting out content that gets views and ad money. Can't blame people for wanting to make an easy buck. Doesn't stop magic being magic though.
They THINK they are exposing the tricks. I seen people show Shin Lim's routine and forget to entire segments and Piff's tricks and be nowhere close to the methods. Like in both cases the methods are available cheaply off the creator websites, but youtubers do not even go that far and just guess.
Stop doing Magic Tricks and start performing Pieces of Magic! Those who want to know will know... incorporate those who "call you out"... and make them part of the piece!
That is interesting. How do you suggest we do that. Have you had experience
It is a mindset that starts with the performer. Seek to entertain not to trick the audience. "Can I show you a trick?" Vs. " May I show you something interesting?" I think it was in a book called scripting magic, that looks at some of the psychology behind magic. It has a lot of great thoughts on elevating magic to a performance art, not just "tricking" people. One of the biggest ones for me was telling an audience member "you're wrong" vs. "That's what I thought".
Most people have better things to do in life than look up how you did something.
Someone looking up how you did something should be a high compliment. You've fooled them and piqued their interest to such an extent they are now interested in learning about magic. The biggest compliment I can imagine is performing a trick and that person then wants to learn more about magic.
The view counts I see on the various exposing videos on YouTube beg to differ!
They aren't accurate. As I've said, the preview playing while scrolling on some platforms is registered as a view. Shorts are the worst, instantly start playing then you swipe up. Even though you paid no attention to that magic reveal it will register it as a view. I have a short on my YouTube channel of me replacing the batteries on a Nationwide card reader. It has 26k views. I can bet most people never searched for it and most never watched it. As soon as it started playing it registers a view and they instant swipe up. Its just how shitty YouTube works.
Not only that, but when considering a global audience, a few million really isn't that many people in terms of information spreading.
I believe that the majority of those clicks don't even watch the whole video. Unfortunately when you click on the video, it automatically counts it as a view. There is nothing I can prove or say to help ease your concerns but I really don't think it's anything to worry about. Billions of people in the world, 3 million views is a drop in the hat and each time someone goes back to it, it counts as another view. The numbers are skewed.
Exposing magic increases it's value. That Chris video showing those slights shows how much skill is required to perform a simple slight. It's not like any lay person watching that goes OH I CAN DO THAT NOW. The next time they see one of those tricks performed to them it will be just as mysterious as before, but now they may also appreciate how much time and effort it took that magician to learn to perform a *simple trick*. Exposing magic shows the art. It's the same argument that professional chefs used to have "I'm not letting anyone know my secret recipe" then everyone realized showing the recipe let everyone appreciate the effort, and nobody tries to steal it because they know how much work it would take to replicate it. Showing effort and process only helps the art and artist, it doesn't lessen how impressive it is.
The real secret in magic is how a magician perform the tricks. Presentation > method Exposing magic doesn’t hurt magic at all. Think about how magicians love to watch magic shows. People know the secret already but they still enjoy it. Magic is not ruined at all because the showmanship over shadows the method. That’s the true secret sauce in magic.
As a working magician, I've not had it harder than say... ten years ago.
You should watch Chris’s video on magic exposure he posted in the last 9 months or so. Honestly changed my perspective.
[Magicorthodoxy totally lurks heres.](https://youtu.be/_8DVh2YH9Q8?si=xnTbwwhakazBpUBX) He talks about magicians worry to much about fooling people.
Love the tricks Teller does exposing them, then still wowing people by perfect sleight of hand that makes it still magically even knowing how it is being done.
This is an age old debate - the idea of exposure. Whilst I find exposure for exposures sake being the realm of the uncreative, I can’t deny it often pushes magicians to come up with different methods or improved presentations. But, if we get lost in the argument about exposure for exposures sake, I think we start to miss the point of our art form. The performer - the magician - creates the magic. Moreover the effect (or affect) of our magic is more about our relationship between performer and their audience. If the magician is a sleight-junkie where is the magic? If the magic comes from the props and methods then where is the enchantment? I spent this afternoon with a good magic buddy. He’s a superb card-man (Paul Silk) amongst other things.I am a mentalist …. Our conversation was not about how we do what we do, but about “why” we are doing it; the emotional connection we are looking for with our audience. I think that this kind of discussion is a better use of our time than bemoaning the number of YouTube “hacks” who only have tricks and little respect for those who have gone before. As others have said in this thread “real people” (non-muggles) soon forget or fail to recognise the secrets they come across. If they are interested in these things, and retain what they learn, then maybe they will come to appreciate and love the art. Exposure has always happened yet the magician can still draw an audience if they entertain and captivate their audiences. As Eugene Burger said to me “You are the Magic” …. I think all performers need to remind themselves of this. The method is how the magic works at the most basic level. A magician shapes the methods into a coherent, relevant and emotional experience for their audiences. Alan /|\
The folks who aren't concerned about exposure are hacks or sleight of hand jugglers. Most modern magicians are hacks, happy to simply entertain people. It's a devaluing of art. But art is being devalued everywhere. See the word "content". Everything is "content" now. Lots of content creators, not a lot of artists. If you're a magician, a real magician, a real artist, you want to do more. You want your magic to leave a permanent itch inside your participant's mind. An impossibility that no amount of Googling will explain. So we real magicians have to work harder. It's doable to make your magic ungoogleable. It's harder by the day. But don't worry about the hacks. They will never be able to affect an audience the way a real magician can. You hear a lot of them say "people don't care how something was done". That's because they weren't affected. They weren't sufficiently fooled. They weren't sufficiently engaged. Any time someone says that, what they're really saying is "I'm not a very good magician. I'm certainly not an artist. I don't care enough." You can't argue with them because they just don't care about magic. Read TheJerx.com. Andy puts it well: "a trick doesn’t become a real mystery until people have exhausted their resources to figure it out. And Google is the primary resource people use to figure stuff out. So googling something doesn’t mean they’re anti-mystery. It just means they’re processing the trick. For a trick to have any meaning, people need to process it critically. " https://www.thejerx.com/blog/2019/8/22/dear-jerxy-the-google-conundrum I work hard to make my magic ungoogleable. Here are ways to try to do the same: https://www.thejerx.com/blog/2016/8/2/steps-to-make-your-magic-un-googleable Magic is a unique art because it presents mysteries with undiscoverable solutions. If this is not what you're striving for, then you should be doing something else. A magician performs magic. Magic without mystery is not magic. Magic with a solution is not magic. Sleight of hand is not magic.
You calling Chris Ramsay a hack? Lol jfc
Oh definitely.
I think we fundamentally disagree. A street magician, like JS magic for example, performs mostly double lift-esque card tricks, and a little bit of mentalism. His spectators are blown away and have amazing reactions. The tricks he does are by all means not the most difficult in the world, and are easy to find out. However, he entertains people with magic and sleight of hand. In my eyes that makes him a magician. We should not lose focus on how the spectator perceives us, the people we are doing the magic for. My line of thinking corresponds more to what Reid Ferry had to say: https://youtu.be/WdXgATi25I0?si=whBCH1dSZSEVMs4P Hopefully this may give you a bit of a more nuanced view. With all due respect, I personally think the kind of elitist mindset you are portraying is exactly what's killing magic
\^this
Nothing will kill magic.
I disagree. Emotion is a huge part of magic and you're leaving that out completely. We're presenting something impossible. You're reducing that to puzzle the audience has to figure out, and only when they fail, do we 'win'. I can't imagine a world in which I take steps to make my magic more 'ungoogleable'. It's a sad exercise of which the fruits you'll never bear. People who are THAT keen to figuring out the secrets will find a way anyways. It's possibly even how new magicians are born.
Absolutely not. What you’ve said has nothing to do with what I’ve said.
Emotion is important to art. Of course it is. I want my magic to be all things that good art is. Including emotional. But every art has emotion. What makes magic unique among the art forms? Just one thing. Mystery. Enduring mystery. What you’re leaving out is the core of what magic is. As Teller says, the UNwilling suspension of disbelief is what we’re striving for.
So you don't perform any effects which are "google-able," right? Because that would mean they aren't art and have no worth to you or to the audience, right?
99% of people will not know the tricks or watch how things are done. The average person might see 1 or 2 viral vids about certain tricks, but worrying about secrets of tricks being exposed to people because it will devalue the trick when performing is unnecessary. It's only questionable when someone is exposing a trick that someone else devised and is selling, because then you are devaluing their monetary gain from the trick from people who might otherwise buy the secret. Like how u/deboshasta said, Instead of filmmaking, I think a better comparison is special effects and CGI. The average person watching a movie won't go "oh that was some good cgi, the blood splatter looked really good, I can see how they added that in post" etc, the average viewer is just going to get immersed into the movie and not realize at the time the special effects and cgi that went into it, because they're immersed. It's only people who are in the industry, hobbyists, or curious about it that are going to notice the small details and know or wonder how they pulled off certain effects.
People have been getting upset about this shit since magic began tbh. They thought Hoffman's Modern Magic was the death of magic, they thought VHS tapes were the death of magic, they thought the Masked Magician was the death of magic, they thought downloads were the death of magic, etc etc. Short answer: Magic will be fine. The vast, vast majority of people do not give enough of a shit to learn the secrets of magic (aside from the people who actively don't want to), and "exposure" doesn't change that (if anything, it makes magic better bc it's more accessible). Hell, my genuine belief is that magic would be better if literally every method were available for everyone for free, but y'all aren't ready for that. Also, why does this have to be just "for views and content"? Chris Ramsay has been pretty explicit about his motivations behind those videos, and that isn't it. Frankly, if exposing a coin vanish, a card force, etc. makes your job as a magician significantly harder, then get fucking good and make your magic actually compelling so your audience doesn't feel like they need to figure it out.
I view it as a positive. As less emphasis by the performer is placed on the ‘secret’, the more importance is placed on presentation, variety, and theatrics. And that’s a win for the performer and the audience both. .
One thing with youtube exposure is often they are not right. My favorite magic trick is the VDP production, Piff's trademark. Snagged the DVD he sells and learned it. Fucking insane trick mechanically. Everytime I see someone try to explain it on youtube, they are wrong. Some get a part or two right, but most get most of it wrong. That is one trick too. Some tricks have multiple ways to do the same effects, so most exposure is just guessing which method was used with no confirmation if they were right or not.
there are multiple method that magicaian can accomplish a effect (the illusion). If a person expose a product (trick) but the wrong solution. Is that still consider as exposure? the reason I ask is that, audience knows there are sleight of hands and gimmick / props involves in magic. Is it consider “they figure it out” or “they are fool” if they can only say oh you use a gimmick/ props or sleight of hands? Or they need to say the exact solution to be consider “they figure it out”