Wednesday Whalebag
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The spectators who google something: How long do you think they spend on it? My theory is that if they don’t find an obvious answer in 30 seconds, they’re going to be frustrated and stop. But you know people who have done it. How long did they spend? —PM
From my observation, and from talking to spectators and from talking to other performers, I think your estimate is just about right.
This is probably a point I should have made earlier. When it comes to googling information about a trick, people will search for information, but most won’t research something. If there isn’t an explanation of the trick or a link to where they can find it for sale in the first couple of pages of search results, then you’re generally good. Sure, some people will be more persistent, but for the amateur, you’re likely to know if that’s their personality type. So you would know to show that person things that would be much more difficult to track down.
If this is something you care about, it’s probably good to have some rule in place so the decision is made automatically for your if something is too searchable online. My general rule would be something like this…
The Jerx Rule for What’s Too Googleable
If a search of the main items used in the trick, plus the word “magic,” leads to an explanation of the trick (or where it can be found for sale) within the first couple of pages of google results, then the trick is too googleable.
For example: bill lemon magic
or
“Too googleable” doesn’t necessarily mean “completely undoable” for me (and certainly not for anyone else). But it does put a limit on the longevity of the response I would expect from such a trick. And it suggests that trick is not something you would want to build a “big” presentation around.
From the same email…
If I do my version of the cut and restored rope, students can google Cut and Restored rope and they will find the basic technique I use, but they will also find many other methods I did not use, and they have no idea what if any of it is related to anything I did. —PM
True. And that becomes kind of a grey area. There are some general trick descriptions that produce so many results that searching for it is pretty useless for the spectator. If they search predict chosen card trick, that’s not going to give them anything valuable.
Cut and restored rope is a little different. A search on that might provide them an explanation that satisfies them, even if it’s a different method. In most cases they won’t be savvy enough to realize it’s not the method you used. They’re not going to say, “Oh, wait. But he didn’t hold the rope in this exact specific way, so I guess I have no clue what he did.” They’ll just look at it and think, “Oh, I see. He didn’t actually cut the middle of the rope.”
So they might not have an explanation they would bet their life on, but it’s likely something that would satisfy them. And honestly, I just don’t want people to be satisfied. I want the effect to gnaw at them somewhat.
So in that situation I might do some sort of meta commentary on this trick and the secret. “Cut and restored rope is a classic of magic. It’s practically a beginner’s trick. If you search for how it’s done you wouldn’t find one method, you’d find hundreds. But you could read through all of those explanations and you’d never find a way to do what I’m going to show you today.” And then I’d need to come up with some supposed or legitimate rationale for what makes this different.
You may have never been proven so correct as I proved you recently. I’m a long time reader of the site. I agree with much of what you write and disagree with some of it too. In the “disagree” column would be your recent writing about trick “google-ability.” I just didn’t think it was an issue. I’d never seen someone google a trick of mine and no one had ever come up to me to say, “I found out how that trick was done.”
But in the spirit of your site I thought I would ask a few of the people I regularly perform for if they had ever tried to find the secret of a trick I’d shown them. I went to my friend and coworker Mike and asked if he’d ever searched for a secret. He said “Sure, a bunch of times.” When I asked him which tricks he said “Well… the good ones.” That was incredibly eye-opening for me.
I asked a few other people as well and they all admitted they had. And all the tricks they had searched out were ones that had gone over really well. Some secrets they had found out but they never mentioned that to me. —NN
Yeah, that’s just reality, unfortunately.
A good point made in your last line is that you shouldn’t expect people to tell you they learned the secret. Not unless there was something adversarial going on during the trick. I would guess that most of the time if they search and find the secret, they keep it to themselves. They found out what they wanted to know. They’re not looking to make you feel bad, unless you come across as a true dipshit.
I answered “Choice 3” in your original survey and I think your breakdown of why people might choose that option was a good encapsulation of my opinion. Magicians are entertainers, if the people are entertained during our performance, then we’ve done our job. What they choose to do afterwards isn’t really our issue or our business. —MK
Okay. My goal isn’t to try and change your mind, but only to offer my perspective.
Yes, a magician falls under the heading of “entertainer.” But if you went on stage, got all nervous, shit your pants, and everyone laughed at you for 20 minutes, it’s unlikely you’d walk of the stage saying, “Well, I entertained them. I did my job.” You’re an entertainer, but you’re one who entertains by creating something magical. That’s the specific thing you do.
If you give someone a profound magic experience with a fascinating mystery at the heart of it, I’m sure if you had your druthers you’d rather the trick not be exposed 5 seconds after you perform it, yes? 30 seconds would be better. And one hour would be better than that. And one week would be better still. Even if you say keeping the secret isn’t important to you, I think you’d agree to that. So it’s not that you don’t see the benefit of keeping the secret, you just don’t think the trade-off is worth the effort it requires. I get that opinion, I just disagree.
For me, the cat and mouse game of making something ungoogleable has added a lot to the impact of my magic. In the 1980s, if you showed someone a trick and you fooled them, they might think, “This guy is more clever than I am. This guy knows how to do something I don’t know how to do.” But in this age, if you show someone a trick and they’re fooled and they cant find an answers via the internet, they might think, “He fooled me. But I also can’t find any example of anything like this online. What he did… it’s not a thing that exists.” It makes the experience seem much more special.
It’s really about your perspective. As a professional it might make sense to say, “I’m here to entertain people for 45 minutes.” But as an amateur, it would be weird to come off as “the entertainment” for the evening.
I feel like the goal with magic is to create mystery and memories. That’s something magic is uniquely well suited for. Unfortunately, both mystery and memories are greatly diminished once the spectator feels they have an answer to the “how” of it all. Very regularly I have people recount tricks they’ve seen me perform. Sometimes the trick has just occurred recently, and sometimes it’s a trick from literally decades ago. And they’re still excited by the trick. But they’re never excited about a trick if they think they know how it was done. No one brings up tricks to me that they figured out a few years ago. I’ve written before that I don’t consider the trick over until the spectator has some clue of how it might be done. So that’s why making something ungoogleable is a worthwhile pursuit to me. It can turn a two minute effect into a life-long one.