A few weeks ago, I saw a release (by someone who will remain unnamed), which looked, hmmm, questionable. What are the ethics regarding selling a classic method, and classic applications, without any type of handling modifications? i.e.: The gimmick, methods, and applications are not original.

Isn't it obvious?

Well yes, one would think so. But clearly it's largely ignored by this community, as it happens frequently - which is why I'm asking. I suppose a better way to ask would be this: What are the guidelines on re-selling an existing method? What part of (or amount of) the trick needs to be changed in order to profit from it?

I'll PM you about the thing that caught my eye. It may be okay on the seller's part, which is why I'm withholding the name from public view right now.

I am constantly amazed at how many times I see something that is advertised as new, but it is really something that has been around for a long time. Maybe it is something that is in an older book. Sometimes they "improve" it by changing something very slightly. Sometimes they give credit, but where do you draw the line? Would I be able to pick some effect from an older book and sell it as long as I "credit" the source?

I remember a guy released a method for the linking cigarettes. Well I opened my copy of The Amateur Magician's Handbook and the method was pretty much exactly the same as taught in the book. No one seemed to care from what I remember. The only difference was he did it with cigarettes and the one in the book used matches.

Well, there you go. An entirely different trick.

Right? At what point does it become okay to sell something that's been published elsewhere?

Yes, as long as the older book is "Public Domain".

At the end of the day, if people are buying it, I think the publisher did add value to the subject in one way or another. Maybe the method was only available before in print, but the author brings it up in video teaching now. That helps.

I think the problem comes if the author insist on how original it is.

A "classic," huh? I see no problem. Say someone puts together a DVD with classic methods and classic applications of the linking rings. I can't imagine why that would be a problem. Same if the person sold private lessons to learn the classic method and classic applications on the classically gimmicked, classic linking rings. If it's a classic of magic, it's by nature something we all learn along the way, and someone teaches us. Whether in person, in a book or on a DVD, I can't imagine why it would be a problem.

So... Let's say that Symphony of the Rings is a classic. Are you "ethically" entitled to make a DVD teaching it and pretty much ignoring its origin. Because that is what is happening. And yes, so many lawyers and those in the legal industry will argue " no lawsuit, no problem" while the history of magic is being eradicated by the current "mine, mine, mine" trend of cashing in on the history of magic.

The murky waters of this argument in my view distils down to two questions:

What amount of change or contribution in enough to be considered a valued derivative work?

What things are considered as public domain?

It is a very rare thing in magic to invent something 100% original without any influence of something else. With our history reportedly going back as far as 2700 BC in ancient Egypt its safe to say that our forbearers have invented just about everything there is to invent in the full sense of the word.
All we have done in the subsequent decades has been refine, add, modifie and substitute things in verying lengths and degrees.

The issue with all this is that all these things are open to interpretation, and since there seems to be no hard and fast rule as to what level of change is considered enough there will always be discerning opinions as to what is or what isn't a derivative work that stands out on it own right.

My personal opinion is that we should be safer rather then sorry when delivering credit where it's due no matter how incremental another influence is perceived, however no everyone shares the same values.

The question of public domain issue is an interesting one and something of a topic for discussion of in its own right. Definitions of the boundaries of public domain in relation to copyright, or intellectual property more generally, regard the public domain as a negative space, that is, it consists of works that are no longer in copyright term or were never protected by copyright law. In magic if something is clearly in breach of copyright then things are black and white as far as I'm concerned.

Now that is a big difference for issues of an ethical nature which lets face it is a different beast entirely. The difference between legal and ethical issues stems from the division between the core areas of law and ethics; law controls what people can and cannot do, while ethics are moral standards that govern what people should or should not do. So people can be legally right but ethically wrong and vise versa, and many of the topics of the like of this one fall into the sphere of ethics.

There are certain materials – the air we breathe, sunlight, rain, space, life, creations, thoughts, feelings, ideas, words, numbers – `not subject to private ownership, in magic we need to find our equivalent to these materials in the magic domain and have the discussion as to if the rearranging of these elements really entitles us to have a sense of ownership.

Without the specifics of TheSecretFires example I can only talk to the broader issue.

Magically

Aus