Dustings #51
/One more week remains to get your entries in for The Jerx AI Contest. Normally I get 100s of entrants in a contest, but that’s because the entry requirements are usually, “Send me an email.” With this contest, where the requirement is: “Get off your ass and do some work and entertain me,” I’m expecting maybe two entrants. If that. We’ll see. You have until next Friday to submit.
Ellusionist sent out an email recently that stated:
We often get accused of over-hyping things - and we're definitely listening to feedback. Expect a slower, more open approach from now on.
I hope that’s not true. I enjoy the stupidity of their ad copy.
But I’ll give credit where it’s due. Their recent email told the story of them being contacted by the Zippo company regarding the Nicholas Lawrence effect Plasma, because Zippo has the patent on that lighter shape. Ellusionist caved to the pressure and let go of their remaining stock at half off. (It’s now sold out completely, I believe.) It was a much more interesting email than we usually get from Ellusionist.
I was a little disappointed they caved so easily though. I expected them to put up more of a fight against Zippo. Here’s what they should have responded:
Dear Zippo,
Lick our balls. You own a patent on a lighter. This is not a lighter, it’s a magic trick, you fucking dunces.
By the way, do you know who runs this company? It's Brad Fucking Christian, that's who. Do you want to start shit with Brad Christian? Do you want to have him do ninja on you? Because that's how you get him to do ninja on you.
I'm not even 100% sure the story Ellusionist told in that email was true. Maybe it was just a way to dump some stock of a trick that wasn't selling as well as they hoped. Who knows. I guess we'll find out if they try it again. "Oh no! The Acme Dildo Company says our Fiddle Sticks are infringing on their patent. We need to let our stock go for half off or they're going to take us to court!" Sure. Nice try, Ellusionist.
Joshua Jay’s new book came out.
He seems to be taking a lot of credit for it, which is odd considering he gave me $200 to write it for him. I barely put any thought into it and shit it out over a long weekend (as you’ll be able to tell when you read it). He's going to deny it, but I have the receipts.
Over on my non-magic sister-site, I recently posted about some favorite live music performances, for those who are interested.
In response to last week’s series on AI and, specifically, in regards to the this outline the AI created…
Pete M. sent along the following email:
I am just dying to know what the Makeup Drop is. I think it would be awesome to give an AI the challenge of inventing a new move, just based on the name.
BTW if you are interested in more specific details about why Writesonic sucks so utterly, I recommend “You Look Like a Thing and I love You” by Janelle Shane. A good overview of AI and Neural Network learning written for non AI experts.
Pete got me intrigued as well. What is, “The Makeup Drop?” Let’s find out! I had Writesonic write the article using that outline. How do you think it turned out? Do you think it produced a great article that explained a really interesting move called “The Makeup Drop”? Or do you think it’s actually the dumbest article yet? Place your bets!
Holy Moly… this shit is bonkers. Check it out…
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Confessions of an Amateur Magician: How to Perform Magic Tricks at Home
I'm an amateur magician, and I'm going to share with you my dirty little confession about how I perform magic tricks at home. The professional magician has a stage to perform from. That gives him instant credibility. As an amateur, I don't have a stage. I've got the part of my room the futon is in, and the part of the room the tv is in. And then I have the kitchen that I share with Trent. But he doesn't like me performing magic in there. So really I just have the futon and TV area. And I CERTAINLY don't have Trent's room. That's off limits. So here's how I perform magic tricks at home.
How to Perform Magic Tricks at Home
And I'm going to share this step by step. Because this is how I learned to perform magic tricks. When I was a kid. I was a horrible child. I was a bratty kid. I was a teenage bratty kid. And when I was a teenager, I had this on-again off-again friend named Pascale. She liked to write horror and Gothic fiction stories and plays and stuff. And I liked to perform magic tricks. I spent a lot of time at her house. I even had the bed next to hers. I spent a lot of time hanging out with her. Because we didn't go to the same school, we didn't have the same friends, and it was a weird "we have the same sense of humor" thing, and also we both had small kids at the same time. So we'd do crafts and go to the park. Or I'd just hang out and we'd hang out. Pascale and I had a ritual.
What You'll Need
How I Perform Magic Tricks at Home (In order of how much this costs me) Thermometer - I bought a cheapo digital thermometer to give a reading for Trent's body temp. I bought it at the dollar store, but the brand is Magician Thermometer . They're small, and cheap. I know Trent is probably a man, but even if he's a woman I'm sure that he is warmer than 99% of the human population. My husband, who makes fireballs in his mouth, is always warm to the touch. This was $4. - I bought a cheapo digital thermometer to give a reading for Trent's body temp. I bought it at the dollar store, but the brand is . They're small, and cheap. I know Trent is probably a man, but even if he's a woman I'm sure that he is warmer than 99% of the human population.
The Basic Moves
First thing is first, you're going to want to build a secret area that no one else will know about. That way you don't have to do magic tricks around anyone else who might see you and be like, "Hey! Is this the secret passageway Trent used for the bathroom?" Instead you're just doing your magic tricks in a room of your own. You need some room to hide all the magic tricks you'll have to do at home. I use a room I never go into, the same room that has the futon couch in it. That way if I ever want to watch TV or play video games I can use the futon. Which, now that I think about it is where my magic is done. I do most of my magic there, and it doesn't matter if I never go into Trent's room. I'm going to ask Trent to do something, and he'll probably watch me do it.
Sleight of Hand
So as I've mentioned, I'm an amateur magician. This means I don't have to be a master of manipulation like a professional magician does. I can make some pretty simple tricks. I have used my sleight of hand to get myself beers, and coffee, and candy bars. I've also taught myself how to pull off card tricks with coins and paperclips. You should check out Magic for Dummies, by Roger Kadushin. He's a master of sleight of hand, and he's written a book all about it. The Pitfall Let's say you have a magic trick and you want to perform it for Trent. You have a few different options here: Ask Trent for permission to perform the trick. Don't ask. Just do it. Don't ask. Trust that he will not say yes. Let's say you have a magic trick and you want to perform it for Trent.
The Cut
You'll need a pen, glue, and a newspaper. First off, you need to draw a circle on the newspaper that fits the contours of the palm of your hand. The Glasses In my first two tricks, I use glass. To make sure that the magic trick is fully feasible, I will only make the glasses appear once in the magic trick. The Softball I only use a softball in this magic trick. I know, I know. You may have heard that you shouldn't use a ball in magic. I have two reasons for using a softball instead of a ball. First of all, I am an amateur magician. And I'm very clumsy. I wouldn't want to risk hurting my magic wand. Second, softballs don't take up much room. My magic wand is a real bastard to carry around. And I hate carrying anything when I go out.
The Makeup Drop
So here's my technique for pulling off the makeup drop. I look in the mirror to decide how much makeup I'm going to put on my eye lids. If I've got a really long eyelash, I'm going to put my makeup on one of my eyes. If I don't have a long eyelash, I'm going to put my makeup on the other eye. It's almost always the left eye. Next, I'll grab a wad of toilet paper and put it up under my eye lids. And I put the wad of toilet paper up above my eye. Now I'll lower the toilet paper to the bottom of my eye, kind of the pointy end, and then go over it, like a stamp on an envelope. Just kinda lift it off and down and down and down. And I'm going to take my upper eyelid off and lower it down so that my lower eyelid is the one that's lower than the toilet paper.
Conclusion
I'm no professional magician. At least not yet.
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Well… there you go, Pete. I hope that was worth everyone’s time and effort.