The Traditional/Social Performing Divide: Part One

I said I wasn’t going to wade back into the EDCeipt drama anymore. And it really wasn’t my intention to do so. Despite the fact that I recently learned the girl I’ve been dating online for the past two and a half years was really Michael Weber catfishing me. And now, not only have I lost the person that I thought was my soulmate, he also has all these sexy pictures of me that he’s threatening to release as part of a new website he and Trono are working on where they rate magician’s genitals on a scale of 1 to 100. The site is called MagiciansGenitalRatings.com. That’s got to be illegal, right? And how fucking unoriginal is that website name? Ugh.

I actually don’t have more to talk about in regards to the drama surrounding this trick, but I have been getting a few emails asking if I have any thoughts on how to deal with some potential weaknesses in the trick itself. I have some thoughts. But it will take a while to get to it.

One of those emails I received was from Edward H. who said,

“[Regarding the receipts themselves] The Tyvek receipts feel strange, the stores aren’t common to my area, the addresses are far away, the prices are all wrong.

[…]

How do people get their spectators not to notice these things? On facebook they said people don’t look at the receipts that closely but the trick REQUIRES them to look at them closely. Am I being gaslit? I’d accept that maybe I’m just a bad magician but I’ve had people comment on some of these issues before I’ve even really started the trick.”

I’m going to help clarify what’s going on here. I think what’s causing the issue here is not about whether you are a a good or bad magician. The issue here is caused by whether you’re performing in a social style or a traditional style.

When ProCaps came out, I wrote a post about Uncanny Valley props. These are props that are designed to look like common objects, but they don’t quite reach that standard. And because they’re somewhat off, they might as well be all the way off. Because a bottle cap that does something magical is going to be suspect to begin with. And if it’s not clearly normal and examinable then it doesn’t matter that it’s an “everyday” object. It will just come off as a fake everyday object.

After that post I received three emails from people who said things like, “You were wrong about ProCaps. I use these at my restaurant gig and rarely does anyone question them.”

If that’s the only feedback I’d heard, I would have posted here that maybe my initial impression was wrong.

But I also received a bunch of emails that said something along the lines of, “I thought you were being overly cautious when you said people would notice something odd about the cap [or the stack of coins] but you were right.”

And there was a clear trend on the people who were having a good experience with the trick and those who weren’t.

The people who wrote to say they liked it were performing the trick professionally. The people for whom the trick didn’t work well for were performing it socially.

Now, because my site is written from the perspective of a social magician—and a large portion of my audience performs socially rather than professionally—I was getting much more negative feedback about that trick. If this was a blog about performing magic professionally, the feedback about the trick may have leaned positive.

A very rudimentary assessment of this feedback might have someone say, “Ah, the lowly amateurs didn’t like the trick because they’re not as good as the professionals who can pull it off well.”

But that’s not what’s going on here.

Here’s what’s happening. Traditional magic is a capital-P “Performance.” It’s a separate thing from the normal interaction you’re having with someone. For the period of time the trick takes, you are clearly “The Performer.”

In Social Magic, the magic trick is a more casual affair. The dynamic isn’t “performer and audience” it’s “you and your friend.”

And it’s because of this that everything is judged differently by the people to whom you’re showing the trick.

For this post, let’s consider a simple example. Imagine a standard magic line. “Hold out your hand… no, the clean one. Oh… that was the clean one.”

You can say this in a professional show and people may think it’s funny or not, but they won’t be confused by it.

You can also say it if you’re showing someone a trick in a traditional way in your living room. Again, they may think it’s funny or not funny, but as long as it’s in context of a PERFORMANCE it will come off as your SCRIPTED JOKE that’s part of the PATTER for your MAGIC TRICK. They can categorize this sort of statement.

But if you’re performing in the casual/social style, this line is going to confuse people because it doesn’t fit with that style of the interaction.

Imagine I’m casually chatting with a friend over coffee. I ask her if I ever talked about all the time I spent trying to bend metal with my mind when I was a kid. Like months and months in 5th grade. I could never get it to work. But then for like a six weeks when I hit puberty I could do it. But the ability left just as quick as it came. But sometimes, like if I look at a picture of Elle McPherson on the cover of the 1988 issue of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue…

I get some of that energy flowing again and I can sometimes get it to work just a little bit. I pull up the picture on my phone. I ask for a quarter. I ask her to hold out her hand. “No, the clean one. Oh, that was the clean one.”

Do you see how out-of-step that is with the social style of performance? The style that’s supposed to replicate a real human interaction?

Any scripted, jokey line is going to feel out of place in that style. And it’s not because my friend thinks this story I’m telling them is true. It’s just incongruous and doesn’t fit with a naturalistic style of performing.

You can imagine a dream sequence on the Simpsons. You can imagine a dream sequence on The Big Bang Theory. But you can also feel how out-of-place a dream sequence would be on The Office, yes? Why? They’re all just half-hour sitcoms. They’re all clearly fictional. Why can’t the The Office have a dream sequence? Or a laugh track? Or a flashback to when Michael Scott was a kid? Because those things don’t fit with the mockumentary style.

That’s what’s going on here. There are certain things (props, tricks, lines) that work perfectly fine in certain styles of performance but they don’t mesh well with others.

Tomorrow we’ll take a look at this distinction further and hopefully have a better understanding of why certain props and tricks are great for performing in the social style and why others are much harder to work with. And how this translates into some talented magicians thinking a particular trick is great, while other talented magicians can think it’s unworkable.

Dear Jerxy: Invisible Braille

I've had an idea I've played with, but it seems to be missing something at the end.  I'd love your thoughts or those from your readers.

I call it "Invisible Braille" and it uses a stack and preferably a marked deck (like you, I prefer DMC Elites).  It comes after doing a trick, preferably a divination of some sort.  I'd ask if they know how I do that and I explain using marked cards.  But, I tell them, the markings are not what they think.  I have them choose a card and I hand it to them (me handing it is important).  I then reveal the card to them.  I ask them to feel around near the corner and ask if they feel that.  They usually get confused and I explain I can tell the card just by feeling.

To prove it is not the back of the card, I then have them cut cards and hold the packet cut to their chest w/o looking.  I peek at the card below (using the markings) and know what card they have.  Without either of us looking I have them pull it off their chest enough for me to touch the face corner and reveal their card.  Then I have them feel for the markings again.  I may proceed to do it once or twice more, depending on the audience.—DP 

I see two issues here.

First, the trick doesn’t really build (probably what you’re saying when you say it’s “missing something at the end.”)

Second, it verges too much on believability, in my opinion. If you look at most playing cards (including the DMCs) there is a finish on them that looks like tiny bumps. If you told me there was someone who could “read” those tiny bumps, I’d think, “Nah…, that can’t be true. Well shit… maybe?” I prefer to push them over into “definitely not true,” and then still do it.

If I was going to do this trick, here’s how I’d do it. I’d start it the way you do where I perform a trick and then “expose” the invisible braille markings. Then I’d give a couple of examples of how I can read the cards with my fingertips. Essentially the same as you’ve written it up.

“It’s funny… let me show you something,” I’d say as I get on my phone. I’d tell them these decks have made their way into some gambling circles and it’s become a huge issue because people are using them to cheat. “My friend, Allan, is super paranoid about cheating and doesn’t have the sensitivity to know if the cards are marked in this way. So this is how he made us play cards the last time we got together.” And I’d turn my phone to them and show them a picture of me and a few friends around a table, playing cards. All of us with big smiles on our faces and oven mitts on our hands.

Then I’d explain that I took that as a challenge to try and increase my sensitivity to the subtle braille markings. And I’d have them shuffle the deck while I got some oven mitts from the kitchen. I’d return wearing the mitts and have them hand me the cards under the table. I’d feel the first card, name it, but get it slightly wrong. The second time I tried it, I’d name three cards I thought it might be, and I’d eventually make a guess at which of those three I thought it was. (“Hmmm… it’s either the 4, 5, or 6 of Diamonds. I think the 6?” I’d get it right, but not with much confidence.

The way I could do it with a shuffled deck is that these two cards would be in one of the oven mitts. And I’d just remove the cards when I put my hands under the table and then place them on top of the deck when they handed me the deck.

A month later I’d say, “Oh, I’ve been wanting to show you my progress with this.” I’d give them the deck to shuffle and I’d put on the oven mitts. Take the deck from them under the table, then start naming cards and pulling them out one at a time. Eventually whizzing through, naming a card every second or so.

The method is that I just stuff their shuffled deck into one of the oven mitts under the table and remove my stacked deck from the other mitt.

Then, if you wanted to take it further you could say, “It takes a few hundred hours to get to that proficiency. But many people can pick up on the basics really quickly.” Then spend a couple of minutes having them feel the difference between red and black cards. “You probably won’t feel it physically. But your subconscious will learn the subtle differences.”

After a while, I’d hand them 20 cards or so and see if they can deal them into reds and blacks. Of course, using a partial deck handling of Out of This World, I could reveal that they did.

Now, this is probably not a trick I’d do in reality. But I wanted to dive into it as an example of some of the subjects I’ve written about in the past (Reps, breaking up a trick over time, establishing a process before launching into a spectator as magician plot, etc.)

I’ve made a post in the past that I think magic is the manipulation of belief. It’s not about being convinced something happened when it didn’t. It’s not about being fooled. It’s about a state of mind where you’re wavering between what is real, what feels real, and what could be real. That’s what the progression I’ve laid out here is trying to capitalize on.

They see a trick. You “explain” the trick in a way that is maybe plausible. You demonstrate this technique so it’s feeling more possible. You show the picture, which seems to lend credence to the idea that maybe it is real. But then you demonstrate it in a way that couldn’t possibly be real. But if you’re faking it… why didn’t you just get the cards dead-on right? Then a month later you demonstrate it in a way that must be fake. But then you follow it up with a demonstration where they themselves accomplish a rudimentary version of what they had just decided was fake. This is how you manipulate and “sculpt” with a person’s sense of belief.

If you say, “I can read these cards with my fingertips,” that’s a fine premise, but not overly memorable.

Seeing that picture of a group of guys playing cards with oven mitts on, watching you fumble around with the deck with mitts on yourself, having the trick reintroduced a month later, and finally achieving the color separation themselves—those elements are what’s going to make the trick stick with people.

Mailbag #80

With all the talk of sock-puppet accounts and secret identities, do you worry about your identity being outed?—LM

Not really, no.

I’ve explained this before but it’s hard to go into detail without giving away too much. But there’s a fundamental misconception behind the search for who writes this site. So asking me if I’m worried if someone is going to find out who I am would be like asking me, “Look at those burglars in your house. Are you worried they’re going to find your stash of gold?” And my answer is, “All my money is in silver. And that’s not my house.”

So no, I’m not concerned. You can do detective work, and that will bring you—at best— to people who help run the site. But it would be hard to get much further than that.

Plus, this isn’t like uncovering Erdnase. He claimed to be an “expert” at gambling and sleight-of-hand. I can understand the desire to track down this famous expert.

But I’ve said, “I’m nobody you’ve ever heard of. I’m an amateur magician who performs socially. These are my personal conclusions from performing in that environment.” If anyone did somehow track me down, they would discover… I’m an amateur magician who performs socially that they’ve never heard of. It wouldn’t be quite the revelation some might hope. And it would make the person “uncovering” me look corny—it wouldn’t make me look bad at all.

I’ve had various reasons for using a pseudonym throughout the years I’ve been writing about magic. But the primary one now is that I want to be able to engage with the people in my life and show them tricks without them saying or thinking, “Oh, are you going to write up this incident for one of your little books or blogs?” My ability to get honest reactions and genuine interactions would be gone at that point.

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You were well represented at Magifest last week. I saw a few GLOMM pins and shirts. One guy did a trick for [our bartender and waitress] where a deck that was invisible became visible and vice versa and it destroyed them. He said it was your trick. Someone else did the most impossibly hands-off ACAAN I’ve ever seen which he credited to you. Another guy did a really interesting sponge ball presentation which he credited to you. Are these on your site or in your books? —PE

The first trick is from a book of mine which is now out of print.

I believe the ACAAN you’re talking about is something I was discussing over email with the person you saw perform it. It’s not my trick. There’s an effect called F.A.S.T. that I’ve been playing around with for a couple months. It’s frustrating because half the people I’ve tested it on were incredibly fooled by it and the other half literally walked me through step-by-step how it’s done. What you saw was my attempt to address the parts of the trick people we’re seeing through. My additions make it entirely hands off and far more difficult to figure out, but there are also drawbacks which make the trick less convenient. There’s a good chance my changes will be in a future newsletter where I can delve into the trick a little more deeply, but without giving too much away because it’s not my trick.

The sponge ball thing… the guy was either fucking with you or I just don’t remember it.

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I can’t find the messages at the moment, but last year I received a couple emails asking me what type of bag I use. I’ve mentioned in the past I carry my computer with me when I’m out doing work and I usually have some magic items in there.

For the most part I use a messenger bag that has some interior pockets in which I can store effects.

The one I have is similar to this.

If I’m doing something a bit more active than just walking from my car into a cafe, I sometimes use a Fjällräven Kånken laptop backpack…

with an interior organizer like this…

Obviously this just comes down to personal style. But what I’m looking for is something that has different pockets so I can keep my magic stuff separate from my other work stuff. But I’m not looking for something that you look at and say, “Wow, that’s got a lot of pockets!”

Dustings #78

I want to keep you all in the loop on a fun show coming up at the Smoke and Mirrors Magic Theater in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on April 1st.

“Can you guess which one of these guys is a lawyer?” Haha, good stuff, good stuff.

Can you guess which one is a child molester? It’s the one on the left.

On the page for upcoming shows, they don’t list the names of these “two superb comedy & mystery” performers. I’m going to guess it’s because if you google Jeffrey Leach, Jeff Carson, Ron Geoffries or whatever other name the guy on the left is performing under, you’re going to find his sex offender profile which details his crime:

OFFENDER INAPPROPRIATELY TOUCHED VICTIM AND HAD VICTIM TOUCH HIM INAPPROPRIATELY OVER A 6 YEAR PERIOD.

Or you’ll find articles giving information such as this:

According to the indictment, he was accused of molesting a girl more than a dozen times, starting when she was 10. In that indictment, Leach was accused of “placing or rubbing his penis against her,” “having the victim touch his penis for the purpose of sexually arousing or sexually gratifying himself or to humiliate or degrade” her, “showing videotaped pornographic images of adults engaging in sexual behavior” to her, and “masturbating in view” of her.

Sounds like a fun guy! I wonder what zany antics he has cooked up for the April Fools day show! This guy’s got a MILLION jokes. Like when he gains your trust in order to get alone with your child and then molests them for six years! April Fools! 🤣🤣🤣 He got you so bad! You thought he WASN’T a pathetic pervert when really… he is! That’s classic Jeff Carson for you! (or classic Ron Geoffries, or classic Jeffrey Leach).

Please note that the show is 18 and over only.

Here’s a shot of Jeff Carson when he learned that.

I will be adding “The April Fools” to Jeff’s listing on the GLOMM website. Jeff, tell your lawyer friend there not to worry, I’ll include the trademark symbol so everyone knows it’s the official April Fools. Not some people just trying to coast on your name.

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You might ask, “Andy, didn’t you say in Wednesday’s post that you weren’t going to be posting on controversial topics? And then this is the lead off to your Friday post?”

Well, no, not exactly. I said not to expect me to dip into every controversy, especially the morally grey ones. Expect me just to go after the true scourges of the magic community like sex criminals and Joshua Jay.

I did ask myself if I really wanted to post about this. I don’t see it as my job to follow around sex criminals for the rest of their lives and make sure everyone knows what they’re up to. I wouldn’t even say everyone on the GLOMM boot list is a horrible person. They may have made a horrible decision and cleaned up their life afterwards. I can’t always judge. That’s why the GLOMM list is just binary. “Were you convicted of a sex crime—yes or no?”

On this site, however, I have different standards. I do a little more editorializing on this site. I’m not going follow every move made by some 20-year-old idiot who convinced a 15-year-old to send him nudes for the rest of his life. I’ll chalk that up to youthful stupidity. But I’m not sure a guy who was in his 40s, molesting someone for six years, deserves any grace. Jeff Carson may have paid his dues to the legal system, but my heart goes out to the kid. I can’t help but think of the 10-year-old who has to live with this face in their nightmares.

That’s a life sentence that they don’t deserve.

I’m not saying he should never be able to perform again. I’m not saying the theater should cancel the show. I’m sure they know his history; they’re free to do whatever they want. He’s certainly allowed to pursue his art (if you consider the card duck or the Chinese sticks to be “art”). I’m allowed to pursue my art too: talking shit about creeps.

I had never heard of the Smoke & Mirrors Magic Theater before this. That’s cool that there’s a theater devoted to magic. I’m not too far away and I look forward to checking out a show there at some point. Not this show, of course. But maybe a different show in the future. With someone who didn’t coerce a kid into playing with his dick. Do you have any of those coming up?

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Changing subjects completely—although still in the general realm of “controversy” talk—when the Petty/Weber situation came to light a week ago, I didn’t immediately know if Craig Petty was being brave or foolish with his claims.

With his latest attack though, I know for sure that he’s not acting brave or foolish.

He’s acting dangerously reckless.

When you go after Michael Weber, you’ll probably piss him off and some of his buddies in magic’s old guard. Who gives a shit. That’s a small portion of the magic community.

But in this recent video on how to act at the Blackpool Magic Convention, he takes aim at a full 98% of the magic community when he cautions them…

You’re on your own here, Craig. I’m not going to alienate most of magic by taking a stand like this. I actually like your average magic convention attendee’s scent. The breath that smells like they’ve been sucking on a blue cheese lozenge, the unscrubbed armpits, the butthole that has had almost a full 60% of the fecal matter from their last bowel movement cleaned away, and whatever that cologne is that they wear (I think it might be soy sauce). I think it’s great. This is Craig’s war to fight. Please don’t drag me into this.

Mailbag #79

I have a date with this girl I met on Hinge on Tuesday and I feel like I'm set up perfectly to do some sort of trick for her. We've had multiple instances in the past couple days now where she would type something as I'm typing it, almost word for word. She said it was "pretty magical" so I feel like this is a great opportunity to go into some sort of trick along those lines.

I will point out that I did tell her I'm into magic, her bio says she's an atheist, and she mentioned that she doesn't believe in the Law of Attraction/Manifesting. I was worried it might come across as manipulative to imply there's some kind of supernatural connection between us if she actually believes in that sort of thing but it seems like I'd be in the clear on that. However, I also feel like it would still come across weird to do something like that on the first date anyway. So maybe, if this goes anywhere, I'll wait until it happens again in person and then use that as an opportunity to go into a trick. I'm not sure. What do you think?—AO

Yeah, your instincts are right here. That’s a sketchy situation. You don’t want to toy with the idea of your “connection” too early.

There are only two ways that can play out:

1. She really believes that this magical thing that just occurred was caused by some unusual “connection” between you two. In which case, that’s really emotionally manipulative.

2. She doesn’t really believe that this magical thing that just occurred was caused by some unusual “connection” between you two. But she thinks that’s what you want her to think. In which case you come off as a completely corny douchebag.

Now, once you’re actually in a serious relationship with someone, you can play around with the idea that maybe something happened because of your connection.

Do you see the difference?

Once you actually have a connection, then it can be fun or flirty or sweet to suggest that what happened might be because of that connection.

But what you don’t want it to look like is that you’re trying to establish a connection by using a trick. Then you’re just socially awkward at best and a conman or incel at worst.

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In your blog post of November 7, 2022, you mentioned that people often believe that the explanation for the Ambitious Card effect(s) is a trick deck/trick cards, and that they entertain similar suspicions regarding other props (e.g. sponge balls or coins), ascribing what they’ve seen to the prop(s) being a trick whatever.

My question is, do have your participants examine the cards (when they are not gaffed of course) and/or other props you use? Also, it seems to me that if a prop is examinable, it would be more desirable to have it examined prior to the magical effect, rather than after. What are your thoughts on this? —AD

I’ll answer your last question first.

It’s more important to have an item examined after an effect than before it. The issue is, before an effect, people don’t know what they’re supposed to be looking for. It happens all the time that you can let someone examine an object, do something magical with it, and then they want to look at it again.

If you only let them examine it beforehand, they’ll think along these lines, “Oh, I didn’t know what to look for. I must have missed something originally. If I could get a look at that quarter [or whatever the object is] now, then I’d definitely see what’s going on with it.” The trick ends and you put the object away. “Oh… he’s not going to let me look at it? I knew it, there’s something weird about it.”

If you only let them examine it afterward, they’ll think along these lines, “Oh, there must be something unusual about that quarter. If I could get a look at that, then I’d know how it was done. Wait… he’s going to let me see it? Well, now I have no idea.”

So I always allow someone to look at something at the end. And often at the beginning as well. However, sometimes I want to increase the suspicion around an item. In that case I won’t have it looked at before the trick.

In general, when it comes to social magic, I avoid using the term “examine.” It’s too formal and clinical. I may say, “Check this out,” or, “Look at this.” But even that is unnecessary most of the time. If I hand you a quarter and say, “Here, I want to try something with this.” You’re going to naturally take a quick look at it. And at the end, if I hand it back to you, you’re going to feel compelled to examine it without me saying anything. But throwing around the word “examine,” is going to make this feel more like a challenge—which is not the vibe I think you generally want to go for in a social interaction.

Dispassion, Thieves and Bullying

Okay, guys. I’m done talking about the ethics of receipt-based magic effects.

I’m going to be honest with you… I don’t find this sort of content super exciting.

When I was writing the Magic Circle Jerk, I was working a desk job, so I spent a lot of time digging around on the Magic Cafe and giving my thoughts on things going on there. That’s because I had no choice but to be at a desk for 8 hours a day and talking shit about magic dullards and their petty issues was a fun way to pass the time when I was stuck at a desk.

These days I work for myself. I work on magic. I work in other creative industries. I’m never just sitting at a desk with nothing to do killing time, waiting for my day to be over.

In this post, I discuss how I use the Magic Cafe, which involves checking in there once or twice a week and looking at the threads for tricks I’m interested in. That’s the extent of my interaction with the Magic Cafe. I’m not active on Facebook. I don’t follow the drama or the controversies in the magic world unless someone brings them to my attention.

There is a chunk of my time that I can devote to magic-related things week to week and my favorite thing to do with that time is show people a trick, or test out an idea, or think up new concepts or premises. I also like writing this site, because the supporters of this site afford me the time to do more of those things in the previous sentence.

Now, while I enjoy hearing about magic controversies and gossip, I have no real passion for these issues. So writing posts about them takes three times longer than writing a post about something I’m really excited to talk about. It reminds me of when I would have to write a thank you letter for the new shirt my grandma got me for Christmas. I’d write a sentence, walk around my room, flop on my bed, pet my dog, go get a glass of orange juice. Try to think of another sentence. And so on. Four sentences later, 90 minutes will have passed.

That’s what writing these posts have been like. It’s hard to write fun, interesting posts, while also trying to stay balanced. It’s easy to write wildly biased posts, but that’s not really fair to do when you’re dealing with a nuanced issue.

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The type of emails I get when I’m talking about performance ideas and presentational concepts are so much more interesting to me than the ones I get when I’m writing about these magic arguments. These types of debates bring a weird element to my email box.

I got a bizarrely unhinged email this weekend from someone who was pretending to be a fan of the site who was now angry with me for not hopping on the Weber/Petty fiasco sooner. Why wasn’t I reporting on Weber’s sock-puppet account being outed?

He said, “As someone who seems to know every move made on the Magic Cafe, it sure seems weird that you didn't mention the massive controversy going on there with Weber and Trono.”

Now, of course, it would be hard for me to comment on these things given that I hadn’t written a post since this “massive controversy” went down. My last post of the week went up on Friday, but it was written Thursday night (the sections on Picture Consequences and ISO were written even further back). This dolt literally thought I write the posts in real time right before posting them. He thought I had written 1500 regularly scheduled posts over almost 8 years and that there wasn’t any sort of planning involved. That I would write for an afternoon deadline that afternoon. And beyond that, he thought that a controversy would come up Friday morning and I’d write about it immediately without reaching out to the people involved. No amount of rational thought could convince this dumbfuck that maybe he was misreading the situation.

BTW, if you want to pretend to be a fan of my site, don’t suggest it seems like I “know every move made on the Magic Cafe.” Before this week, 2 of the 1500 posts on this site were specifically about something happening at the Cafe. I’ve written as many posts on how not to shit your pants.

This dude who wrote in had all sorts of fascinating theories. He believed I was paid to write negative reviews. (People are paying for that?) I asked him to tell me anything I’ve ever said about a product that wasn’t factually true or a reasonable opinion. His answer was the moron’s go-to: ”Let’s agree to disagree.”

He suggested that making a judgment about a magic trick after watching the demo would be like making a judgment on a movie after watching the trailer. When I informed him that’s literally the only thing people do with movie trailers, he jumped to some other weird criticism or conspiracy theory.

You know how when you argue with a dumb person and they’re like, “You tracked mud all through the house!” And you’re like, “You’re the only one who has gone outside today.” And instead of apologizing they’re like, “Okay, well. I guess we’ll never know.” That’s what it was like going back and forth emailing with him.

He was by far the stupidest person who emailed about this subject, but he certainly wasn’t the only one. When this week’s posts went up, I had more emails from people asking why I didn’t get into more details about “Craig Petty’s lies.” Or more details about “Weber’s bullying.”

Because I’m not the fucking magic police. Okay?

You want me to go after Craig Petty, or Michael Weber, or Lloyd Barnes, or Rick Lax, or whoever you have an issue with…it’s probably not going to happen. Because I don’t really give a shit about these issues the way a lot of you do. You think I’m going to follow along with a thread on the Magic Cafe about a trick I have no interest in… on a FRIDAY?!?!?! What kind of life do you think I lead?

I get that people like it when I step into the fray. I know it brings more visitors to this site. But this site already has too many visitors. I’m not looking for more traffic. I want less.

This site was built around me writing about whatever I happened to be interested in writing about at the time and that’s how it’s going to continue. I like talking about the beautiful aspects of this art. And for me, those are the aspects that come from performing for real people and experimenting with new ideas. So if I don’t happen to write about whatever squabble you're concerned with, it’s not because I’m on someone’s side or in someone’s pocket. It’s just because these subjects are generally not interesting to me.

“So you don’t care about proper crediting?”

No, I care very much about that. But I’m not an expert on the history of magic and crediting. And I recognize that frequently these issues aren’t all black and white. So if I were to comment on all the issues that came up, it would be a lot of, “Well, I can see both sides.”

“So you don’t care about bullying and threats?”

Hey, listen to me. I’m going to empower you.

You’re an adult. No one can bully you unless you allow them to.

Do you know what I would do if Michael Weber “threatened” me and told me not to release something because it was too close to something that was released before? First, I’d do an honest assessment and ask myself if he was right. If so, I’d agree with him and not release it. But if he’s making an unreasonable “threat,” then I’d tell him to fuck off. I’d say, “Beat it, Lurch.”

If you’re in the right, and you’re a reasonable person, you will find it nearly impossible to be controlled, bullied, or threatened by someone else. Not your parents. Not your boss. Not your spouse. All you need is to have a “fuck off” chambered. Just don’t play their game.

In magic there are no gatekeepers anymore. I got censored on the Magic Cafe 20 years ago. I told them to fuck off and now I’m the most widely read writer in magic. I never thought of Steve Brooks as a bully. I just thought of him as a douchebag.

How is Michael Weber or anyone else going to bully or control you if you’re in the right? This isn’t 1992. You have the means to make your case so everyone can hear it. Do what Petty did and make it public. If you’re on the right side of things, people will back you.

Here’s What I WILL Always Publish On This Site

I’m more than happy to shine a light on clear-cut cases of stolen tricks or other intellectual property.

I’m also very willing to call out genuine bullies who are pushing around anyone who’s powerless to fight back.

If you’re being unreasonably censored on the Cafe or somewhere else, I’m always happy to amplify your message on this site.

And if there’s a disagreement that both sides are willing to have me mediate, I’d definitely be down to do that.

Beyond that, I’ll comment on the disputes for which I feel I have something to add. But don’t expect me to have an opinion on every dopey debate in the magic community. Someone told me in an email that I have a duty to comment on these things because of the “platform” I have. Yes, I have a platform. But I built that platform on my joy of performing and experimenting with magic. I’m not going to be a truffle pig seeking out controversy so I can feign outrage over stuff that otherwise would never cross my mind. If you need that nerd-shit, seek it elsewhere.

How to Respond When Your Sock-Puppet Account is Revealed On the Magic Cafe.

When I wrote the Magic Circle Jerk blog back 20 years ago, I had a mole inside the Magic Cafe who would send me their backroom discussions where they were panicking about me and scheming ways to get the site taken down.

One day, about a year after my site started, he sent me an email with a list of 40 or so known magicians and their sock-puppet accounts on the Magic Cafe, thinking I might want to publish it. All your favorite magicians were on there.

I don’t quite remember my thought process at the time and why I chose not to. I may just not have been able to come up with a good angle for how to write about it. Or I might just not have thought it was necessary to bust people on secret identities. It would maybe be seen as hypocritical of me, given that I was writing that blog (and now this one) anonymously and no one knew that I was really Tony Hassini.

I’ve had people ask me if I have an account—sock-puppet or otherwise—on the Magic Cafe at the moment. Believe it or not, once I got booted from the Cafe I never created an account again. I didn’t have to, because I had a few friends who gave me their passwords if there was something I wanted to post or a restricted area of the Cafe I wanted to look at. I’ve posted on the Cafe using those accounts throughout the years, but I’ve never made a single post about this site or any of my other work on there (or anywhere else). So I wouldn’t say I have any “sock puppet” accounts. Just accounts my friends let me use when I need to post in the “Clowning Around” section to ask what face-paint people are using these days.

Sock-Puppet accounts are on people’s minds recently because Michael Weber got busted for his on the Cafe. His alter-ego “newguy” has been around for 20 years now.

Now, I don’t begrudge any known magician who wants to post in a public forum under a different name. But here’s the problem…You may start off with the best intentions. Maybe you just want to take part in the discussions while still maintaining some privacy. I get that. But the temptation to add some information about yourself and your products where it’s applicable will be too strong. And that will transition into complimenting yourself and your work. And that will soon transition into this:

And when you get to that point your actions are shady at best and unethical at worst. So Weber deserves the hits he’s taking on this.

As “newguy,” Michael cleverly hid his identity and created a rich alternative life where he could get lost in the character of… someone who was a Michael Weber fan and happened to know every detail of his business dealings. Look, I don’t want to take away anything from the people who exposed Weber here… it was a good catch. But he didn’t do the world’s greatest job of disguising his identity. If you read three newguy posts you will come to the conclusion: Either this is Michael Weber or he has an enthusiastic, gay stalker who intends to “Talented-Mr-Ripley” his ass and take over his life. The detective work needed to unmask Weber could have been done by this guy.

So what should you do if your sock-puppet account is revealed on the Magic Cafe? You can’t really run from it or deny it. It’s usually just too obvious. I think you have to embrace it.

Using Weber as an example, the best way to handle it would be to go comically sock-puppet. Start posting in threads for tricks that have nothing to do with you: “I wonder if Michael Weber has a version of this? I bet that would be killer. He’s a genius!” Or go into the section for kid’s magic and say something like, “Did you read that article about the kid’s show Michael Weber performed in 1992? They followed those kids’ lives for the next 30 years and now they’re all CEOs. How does Weber do it?”

When someone calls out your true identity, you violently deny it while still praising yourself.

“I’m Michael Weber?!?!?!?! Uhm… yeah… sure. I wish! First off, I’m a lady. But thanks for assuming my gender and my identity. But it’s actually very complimentary that you think I’m him. I wish I had even half his brains. Not to mention his charisma! What aspect of being Weber would I not want? His history of putting out amazing effects? His successful career in and outside of magic? The way animals and children adore him? His kindness towards the elderly? And, as a woman—which I most definitely am—what I wouldn’t give to get my hands on that famously girthy cock! 💦”

Then change your profile picture to this: