Any info on which is the one to buy would be appreciated. I'm mainly interested in the scan quality and ease of navigation.

Thanks in advance.

https://www.lybrary.com/jinx-p-29013.html

https://store.conjuringarts.org/product/jinx-magazine-pdf/

Conjuring Arts comes as a zip folder with PDF files and a .pdx index. The scan quality is excellent, and it includes all five of Annenmann’s Jinx Programs and his 6-issue series collecting the material of Charles Jordan, The Sign of Exceptional Magic.

I don’t have Lybrary’s version, so I can only speak based on what I have bought from Chris in the past. Your account has a “digital shelf” where all your purchases can be accessed along with an E-reader, in addition to having the pdf files for download to your computer. Some of the books are made clearer by changing the typeface, which makes readability better. However, while the content is complete, some of the charm of the original design or font is lost. I suspect the typeface is not changed with The Jinx because my Heirophant files seemed to be actual scans that were cleaned up so the background was white rather than a yellow tint as you might expect when scanning an older publication.

For your specific needs, Lybrary might be the route to go. However, I’d strongly suggest looking into a membership for Conjuring Art’s Ask Alexander library. The amount of information you have access to is incredible. The Jinx is just one of the many periodicals and books available with a membership, but that is just a fraction of what is offered.

I know Chris is active on the forum sometimes so perhaps he can shed light on a more informed answer to your question. Can’t go wrong with either company though. They are both wonderful.

I am more than happy to answer any questions.

A bit of background information may help you make your decision. I was the first in magic to digitize old books and magazines. I literally created the category. I started in 1999 and I am putting a huge amount of effort into digitizing journals and have done so for more than 23 years. My process is a lot more rigorous and involved than simply scanning and running it through OCR software. We manually clean up every page as much as possible, and we have developed proprietary image processing algorithms to achieve better OCR results. In other words, we put a lot of effort into the digitization process. The differences may not be immediately apparent but many customers have told me over the years they like my digitizations best.

The Jinx in particular is totally underpriced at $15 compared to the work I put in. You also get a new index I compiled on top of the original index.
Lybrary.com is known for the large selection of journals we offer. If you want to browse look here https://www.lybrary.com/magic-conjuring-......_36.html There is nobody in magic who can offer the selection I have from the old and collectible journals to more recent ones such as Magic Menu, Minotaur, Magic Magazine, Genii, Magicseen, etc.

A comment on subscription versus purchasing titles. I personally prefer to build my own library with titles I own in perpetuity. It is in the long run cheaper than a subscription and you have full control over the access to what you own. Online archives may be unavailable due to various problems online with your Internet connection or the server of the archive going down for various reasons. And once you stop paying you lose access to everything. Yes, it is enticing to have access to a lot in one big swoop but you can't read everything at the same time. You can only study one item at a time. It is therefore a lot better in my opinion to buy title by title what you are interested in and build that way your own digital and searchable library of which you are the master. Even if you stop spending money on it you will have access to your library permanently. With a subscription, you will have to pay and pay for as long as you want to use it.

If you simply want to be able to search through a huge archive you can do so for free in the Magic Knowledge Base on Lybrary.com. For details see https://www.lybrary.com/magic-knowledge-base-help-a-6.html

Did something happen to Lybrary in the past week? Because when I go there now there's a generic empty website page for a domain that was just registered.

It is still there when I followed both the link and my saved bookmark.

Seems to be working now even though nothing has been changed. I guess some temporary issue with the website. With such errors, it is best to email me directly because I might not see these notes here on the forum for some time.

Thank you for the background and explanation, Chris. I appreciate the dedication and time that you have put into making Lybrary a treasure trove of incredible titles and resources for magicians. I wholeheartedly agree that it’s important to have a personal library rather than depending solely on a subscription. The latter is a great resource to supplement purchased titles as opposed to existing in lieu of one’s own copies of important titles.

T.J.

After a lengthy hiatus from magic, brought on by family and work, I rekindled my interest in the hobby a few years ago and only today stumbled across lybrary.com. What an amazing resource!



I also prefer to own select information in perpetuity. I tend to read and reread certain books, magazines and manuscripts over and over.

Thanks for your efforts!

Nick

I love Lybrary.com . Thank you, Chris, for this amazing resource.

I do appreciate the Ask Alexander/Conjuring Arts site, but I agree with Chris that owning the digital files and storing them as backed-up copies on my own hard drives (as well as having access through my Digital Book Shelf on the Lybrary website) is preferable to the monthly subscription fee.

And I love the Lybrary.com Knowledge Base search engine. Just one reason is to be able to search through Genii magazines because the Genii digital archive search engine is more or less unusable. (Genii subscribers get access to a digital library of all past issues, plus all past issues of Stan Allen's MAGIC magazine, which is great ... BUT the search engine is very limited and slow.)

Anyone knows more details about these books? They are called “The Jinx Complete Collection”
It says they are the anastatic reproduction of the original issues.
I’ve found only vol.2 and vol.3. Cannot find vol. 1.
Anyone has them?

(Volume 2)
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Jinx-complete-c......2&sr=8-2

(Volume 3)
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Jinx-complete-c......2&sr=8-1

Bought both and I really like these books. I hoped to find any Information about the seller, but there is no declaration next to „Printed in Poland by Amazon Fullfillment“.
Would be great if someone could provide some Information about these books.

Yes, it makes no sense that volume 1 is missing. I contacted Amazon directly to try to get some information about the publisher but they couldn’t provide me with anything at which is very odd.