Magicians sue over revealed tricks

[malbright]

Just saw this on the wire:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070501/ap_ ... agicians_1

Assuming they were to win, the 49 magicians will be splitting $16,000, which works out to about $325 each. When I think of being deprived of my assets, which I try not to do too frequently, I usually have a bigger number in mind. I guess it's the principal of the thing.

Here's the story:

TOKYO - A group of Japanese magicians sued TV broadcasters on Tuesday for revealing closely guarded secrets behind a series of coin tricks, a news report said.

Forty-nine magicians are seeking $16,000 in damages from Nippon Television Network Corp. and TV Asahi Corp. for airing shows last year that revealed how magicians perform tricks involving coins, according to Kyodo News agency.

In a suit filed with the Tokyo District Court, the magicians claim the programs infringed on their common property, Kyodo said.

The broadcasters "instantly deprived professional magicians of their assets," built up through the accumulation of ideas and long-term practice, magician Shintaro Fujiyama was quoted as telling a press conference.

Fujiyama apparently refused to talk in any further detail about the tricks that were exposed.

[Guest]

Interesting claim of property. Yet when we have Shoot Ogawa teaching kids how to do the muscle pass and Jay Sankey teaching tricks on a Canadian show and Criss Angel explaining tricks on Mindfreak it seems a tough sell on precedent or ethical context.

[Guest]

$16,000 worth of coin tricks?

On a related note...Richard, I thumbed through the Angel book and I'm surprised you gave up Clippo.

P&L
D

[Richard Kaufman]

Dee, if you actually read the book you'd see that I didn't explain "Clippo," but a far superior mentalism effect using a strip of newspaper that, I think, was created by Al Koran. Harry Lorayne previously explained it to the public under the title "Line o Type" in The Magic Book in the late 1970s.

[Guest]

D'oh! You're absolutely correct. I mis-labelled the trick.

You're also correct in that Line-o-Type is FAR superior.

P&L
D

[Brian Marks]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070501/ap_ ... agicians_1

[Guest]

Brian, is that your way of asking us to get back on topic?

BTW, thought of like a game, this does not look winnable.

Imagine what would happen if they visit here or the caf and find all those posts saying "the secret does not matter cause it's all about entertaining..."

It might be short term good publicity for the claimants though.

Predictable :mad:

Tiresome

Sad.

[Guest]

I predict that, in order to Ilustrate this story, the world media will show the very things that the Japanese magicians wish to keep secret.

(by the way, is this something to do with the last story on Japanese magicians and gaffed coins? The one where they could be arrested for using forged currency?)

[Guest]

It's a sting to find the magicians that use gaffed coins, then smack-em with the currency laws.

[Guest]

Yeah, this is related to the magicians who were arrested last November for punching holes in coins.
As part of the "news" coverage, programs exposed the cigarette through coin trick, and then proceeded to reveal the workings of Scotch & Soda, shell coins, folding coins etc.
I still don't know what became of the arrested magicians, but I know these guys who are sueing don't have a chance in hell of winning.

[Guest]

are they not opening themselves up for a possible counter charge of handling forged goods?
Its all very odd, and no good will come of it, what ever happens.

[Guest]

Now if it were me, Id do a bit of homework, and get the people who invented these coins to join in their cause. They are the people who's intelectual property has been stollen, and abused.
And , in the case of scotch and soda, ( which started off with hopping halves), and flipper coins, the inventors are very much still alive!
and, as a side note, might even relish their inventions and their names, being made public to a wider audience.

[Guest]

Now if it were me, Id do a bit of homework, and get the people who invented these coins to join in their cause. They are the people who's intelectual property has been stollen, and abused.
And , in the case of scotch and soda, ( which started off with hopping halves), and flipper coins, the inventors are very much still alive

As it happens several of the parties are no longer with us to address their side of the issue. Phil Postma, inventor of the flipper coin gaff passed on about a year ago. T. Nelson Downs, inventor of the dime/penny (sun-moon and scotch and soda gaff), also passed on some time ago. The earlier discussion back in November with the gaffed coin sting included the "Karate Coin" gaff and its mutilation of currency. The "karate coin" trick and gaff was described in Ponsin's "The Latest White Magic Revealed" back in 1858.

However... Presley Guitar, inventor of the modern cig-though-coin gaff and one of the innovators for the copper silver brass gaff is still with us and may wish to say something about folks making his gaffs without permission and publicly exposing data which ordinarily would require a patent search to find.

[Guest]

It'l be worth involving anyone who is still around, If only to hear a japanese reporter pronounce "Presley Guitar"..... :)

[Henley]

Hello
I'm digging up this old thread because after 1 1/2 years, the Tokyo District Court's decision on the case came down yesterday.
Plaintiff's claims rejected! ...no big surprise there...

http://www.asahi.com/national/update/10 ... 00412.html
(Japanese only)

This is basically what the judge said:
"From the past it has been possible to generally obtain magic secrets from books, etc. ...

One cannot say that the main purpose of these (t.v.) reports was to reveal magic secrets. Even if secret methods were temporarily exposed (demonstrated), it is not recognized that this caused the magic instruments/tools to lose their value."

They're planning to appeal.
Here are a couple video clips of Fujiyama-san's press conferences:
http://video.mainichi.co.jp/viewvideo.j ... 216421.flv

http://fnn.fujitv.co.jp/news/headlines/ ... 43257.html