Legal Protection Found!!!

[Maaz Hasan]

So you guys know how people are always "exposing" products on the market? I think I have found a loophole that might be able to protect marketed effects! I made this post on an earlier thread, but have now built on it and wish to give it it's own thread!

Basically, It's utilizes the trade secrets act. Basically, it says you can't go and learn the secret recipe of a top end bakery and then just go out and release it to the public. Essentially, this is something I read about it (the exact example given, paraphrased a bit). "You Can't become Copperfield's Assistant and turn around and reveal all of his secrets to the public without getting massively sued".

Easiest thing to do is put a little box like this in the terms and uses, or just put it at the end of each purchase (or at the start of each DVD).

"By watching [and/or learning from] this product, you are considered an [assistant or whatever word fits here. Student, assistant... learner?] of this intellect under [Company or Teacher], created by [Creator]. By continuing to watch [and/or learn from] this product, you hereby agree to not reveal the intellectual [or entertainment, or whatever] secret taught through this product to the public, without first having gained consent from [the company, or the creator or whatever]. Furthermore, if you privately teach this effect to a 3rd party, they too consent to these terms. Protected under the Trade Secrets Protection Act."

Now obviously that would have to be revised and find more things to put and stuff, but it's a start.
I'm going to make another thread for this just to get my point across!

This should be able to cut stealing of products down significantly. The only remaining issue would be if someone sees someone perform it on TV or YouTube and makes a "R3V34LD!!!!" Video about it. Easiest way around that would be to say "TV and Internet Performance rights not given. For permission please contact [company or creator]". That's what Shin Lim does, and that's why very few of his products get exposed. Furthermore, you could put fine print in the trailers saying "By watching this trailer, you agree to [blah blah blah]".

Finally, you could give performance rights to people who actually buy the product at the end of it! It's a definite start, I hope we can get this to the major companies and get things protected ASAP.

Thoughts?

Side note: Should I send this to the support teams of Various Companies?

 

[obrienmagic]

While i think that these are good ideas, say someone ignores it and puts it out anyway. The amount of legal struggle it would take to take it down may not be worth it.... Maybe if you were as big as coper field with good lawyers haha but little Mikey O'Brien who makes $50 a week off his downloads may not have the resources to sue someone over copyright infringement.

 

[Maaz Hasan]

While i think that these are good ideas, say someone ignores it and puts it out anyway. The amount of legal struggle it would take to take it down may not be worth it.... Maybe if you were as big as coper field with good lawyers haha but little Mikey O'Brien who makes $50 a week off his downloads may not have the resources to sue someone over copyright infringement.

First off, I doubt a guy who buys tricks and gives them away for free would have an platinum level lawyer lol

This law was made specifically for everyone who specializes in a trade. This includes sole-proprietorships, entertainers, small businesses, etc. That being said, I believe this means that it is set up so that people who can't hire top end lawyers can still manage to defend themselves easily.

The good news is this: When these effects get stolen like this, they are generally the big name effects that major companies put out. These companies have the money to hire good lawyers and stuff, and wont end up harming themselves if they loose. If a smaller/self-published effect gets revealed, then the effect would be big enough for other companies to eventually take interest, and I'm sure the community could help (someone's gotta be a lawyer and a magician, right?).

Eg. You are going on AGT soon, right? Let's say, hypothetically, you perform your Invisible Purse, which gets exposed on YouTube (hopefully not). If this act was in place and being used by companies, you could easily go and ask the community for help. We could all pitch in to help get a good lawyer, or maybe even one of the major Companies could help in exchange for something (or maybe for free, who knows?).

Since it is a protection act, it will be pretty hard for the offender to even remotely come close to winning. Especially since you have all the proof you need (he provided it himself). So even if no one helped you at all, you would probably still win.

Next, the only time this would be a problem is if the "REVEALED" video gets super big. Normally, these things get like 1000 views TOPS, unless its like a national performance, or something DB did, or something that blew up on Insta. Even then, only about 300 of the 1000 even actually watch the video. If the video somehow ends up getting super big, you can easily mess them up too. You simply teach your own product for free and in a full on session, and simply put in plugs to compensate for the losses (or promote something big).

Finally, I believe that the act falls under protection of intellectual property, and thus you could probably negotiate a claim with YouTube (or even the guy himself), and get it taken down.

So if the act was used by magic companies and magicians, you can severely reduce the stealing and exposing of many of the marketed effects out there.

 

[ChrisJGJ]

(4) "Trade secret" means information, including a formula, pattern, compilation, program, device, method, technique, or process, that: (i) derives independent economic value, actual or potential, from not being generally known to, and not being readily ascertainable by proper means by, other persons who can obtain economic value from its disclosure or use, and (ii) is the subject of efforts that are reasonable under the circumstances to maintain its secrecy.

I put in bold the parts that matter. The method cannot be readily ascertainable by proper means. Proper means is defined under the act as:

2. Discovery by "reverse engineering", that is, by starting with the known product and working backward to find the method by which it was developed. The acquisition of the known product must, of course, also be by a fair and honest means, such as purchase of the item on the open market for reverse engineering to be lawful

The problem here is that the product...is the method. Nobody has to reverse engineer it. It is sold already reversed. You can't do that and try to protect it as a trade secret. In order for the product to be valid as a trade secret, it has to "not be readily ascertainable by proper means."

The second part states that you have to take reasonable efforts to maintain its secrecy. Selling the method is by no means reasonable...

 

[RealityOne]

The second part states that you have to take reasonable efforts to maintain its secrecy. Selling the method is by no means reasonable...

This is the fatal flaw in the idea. Good idea, but it won't work. When the method is a product it cannot be a secret.

Easiest thing to do is put a little box like this in the terms and uses, or just put it at the end of each purchase (or at the start of each DVD).

What you are proposing here is more contractual. There are two significant problems here. First, to sue someone for breaking that contract you have to prove damages -- which means demonstrating that you lost sales because of what they did. Even if they have 10000 views, you would have to prove how many of them would actually have purchased your product but for the video. That is not an easy thing to prove. Even if 10% would view it, and you earn $3 per view, you would get back $3,000. My guess is that it would be $25,000 in legal fees. The second issue is that the person checking the box is most likely under 18 and cannot legally enter into a contract.

That being said, if you are selling a $100,000 illusion, a contract with a trade secret clause that is written properly and signed would be effective and is used.

 

[Maaz Hasan]

Fair enough. I knew there would be complications going in, but I'm sure eventually something can be found, maybe even using this as the base.

Honestly, I dont think it is even that big of a problem due to the small amount of views they get. I mean the problem is definately there, but we as magicians really do exaggerate about it.

 

[Josh Burch]

My favorite way to protect magic is by flooding the market with red herrings. The idea is to create false reveals of magic tricks with crazy solutions so that when the tricks are searched the actual methods are harder to find. Rick Lax and Rob Anderson have some very funny videos along these lines.

 

[Maaz Hasan]

My favorite way to protect magic is by flooding the market with red herrings. The idea is to create false reveals of magic tricks with crazy solutions so that when the tricks are searched the actual methods are harder to find. Rick Lax and Rob Anderson have some very funny videos along these lines.

Oh yeah definitely. Those are fun to watch too lol
I know @Justin.Morris has quite a few.

 

[DisasterTheory]

Even if they have 10000 views, you would have to prove how many of them would actually have purchased your product but for the video.

Out of curiosity, would it not be fair to assume that if the person watched the video, they wanted to learn how it was done and may have purchased the product to find out, if not for the video? Just wondering.

 

[RealityOne]

Out of curiosity, would it not be fair to assume that if the person watched the video, they wanted to learn how it was done and may have purchased the product to find out, if not for the video? Just wondering.

I suspect that most would not buy it because those folks that view those sort of videos don't buy any magic. If the video wasn't there, they would just find some other free way to learn magic.