What to do When your Magic is Pirated

Well said. Thank you for standing up to this!

I don't know where you manufacture or print your tricks and books, but if you are doing it in China--or any other country that does not enforce intellectual property, you are putting your IP at risk. If you are printing your books in those countries, it is nothing for someone to scan them or keep the original plates or files before the book is even available for sale. If you are manufacturing a trick, you are giving up the secret to the manufacturer and the employee who, if located in a country with a track record of non-enforcement of IP protections, you are asking to have it pirated.

Manufacturing in countries with strong IP protections won't solve the problem in and of itself. If someone in a weak IP area buys the prop and copies it, you will still be pirated. But at least you will have taken steps to a) not just hand your IP over to pirates as a part of the manufacturing process and b) at least have your merchandise in hand and up for sale through legit channels before the pirates start undercutting your sales.

Thanks Andi, this will help me for all my future projects i plan to release!!!

Thanks for taking care to the topic.

I hope for the reprints of older books/dvds and/or the movement to download formats. I was really happy to find that I could buy a PDF of a harder-to-find book directly from a magician recently. Not as nice as a physical book - but it came within my budget and helped me support the creator.

It's saddening to me that certain out of print books sell for £100+ but can be obtained for small change illegally. One of those prices is significantly out of reach for many students of magic.

I know "just reprint old books" isn't the easiest solution - there are contracts, printing costs, and many other factors. But the one good thing that comes from these piracy sites is we know there is a market out there for the harder-to-find stuff.

Most of the magic market is just reselling the same (limited) old ideas over and over again, and even "legal" magic often steal their ideas from others. Also, magic vendors are seldom honest with what you actually get with the trick and describes a dream of what they believe the audience will see when you perform it, when it in reality doesn't live up to it at all. It's become an art to desipherthe lies of the marketing magic creators use to promote their material, which often is stolen from someone else. That kind of marketing does not make you want to pay your hard earned cash to "support the artist". Also some wendors screws the creators. My point is not that piracy is okay, but magician often set themselves up for it by extremely high prizes for (at best) mediocre tricks and false marketing. An honest market would go along way to make people feel that they get value for their money and make them want to support creators. Also, maybe not every idea is worth selliejust because you can... At least not if you consider magic to be an art...

I have reported people on eBay that were selling copied disks
I wish things were different but it seems the problem is not going away anytime soon
As far as magic goes I unfortunately have to agree with the fellow that says sometimes we are sold things that don’t live up to the description so if you are going to sell magic to other magicians be honest and give them good value l don’t want to feel like I bought a scam from a 70s comic book

Andi looks so mad!!

Wow, is it possible if there is a Vanishing Inc release and its pirated in another country can you stop it? Because i have found a local store that sells a pirated video of your masterclass session in my country. It would be nice if it can be stopped with legal action

One issue that adds to this: most countries' laws and sites like Youtube or ebay do not allow or empower (potential) buyers to report piracy. Happened to me, and it is frustrating when you just get replies in legal slang that translate to "we don't care, even if you're right with your suspicion, because you may not report."

I reported an Ebay user who was selling three of one of my favourite author's works as ebooks. Firstly, because he was just describing them misleadingly as "books" and didn't correct this when I asked him and he agreed to; and secondly because the original publisher has never made them available as ebooks, only physical copies. I also reported it on the author's website. Never heard back from either of them! I still feel like I did the right thing, but not sure I'd bother doing it again in light of the lack of interest.