What is the purpose of this site?

Many people have been asking about the origins of certain products recently released in the magic community. We have done some research and found that many items are not exactly what they seem. We advise all readers to respect the rights of the inventors, and buy only the "original items".

Penguin Magic say, in their 'Guidelines for Ethics and Innovation': "When bringing a new idea into the field, it's important to recognize where the inspiration and founding principles of the effect came from. Additionally, magical principles and sleights involved in the methods of magic tricks should be properly cited to give credit to the inventor. It is the responsibility of the inventor of a magic trick to properly cite all relevant sources of information. A properly cited effect will contain a reference to the original sources, principles, moves and sleights involved, who discovered them, as well as where the originating effects can be found (DVD, book, notes or retail product)."

We agree 100% with their statement, and that is the main purpose of this page. Many new effects do NOT cite their inspirations at all. Our rule of thumb as to whether a new item is a "copy" or not is to ask the creator "Where did you get your idea from?" Generally, if they released the trick to cash in on the popularity of another trick that is virtually identical, they won't be able to answer the question. Sometimes they will try to justify their "new item" by arguing that the other trick is not original at all and has its roots and inspirations in many older effects. Often this is true, however the other trick credits those effects and has usually spoken with the creators of the earlier effects to get permission to build on their research. The "new item" invariably has not.

This site will be undergoing constant modification and additions, so please feel free to email us with information, comments and corrections at tim@magicunlimited.com or for comments about a specific item simply leave your thoughts in the comments section under the relevant listing.

So go to it! Click on the name of any trick to learn more about it.

If you'd like to find out who invented some of the more popular effects in magic go here Inventors.

Hopefully, there will be no need for this page in the near future. Don't believe everything you read, educate yourself about the history of magic.