We received the following open letter to the Chinese Magic Community from Inside Magic Favorite Walter “Zaney” Blaney.

We debated whether to include the domain name for the offending web site.  We did not want to give the pirates more traffic.  We can attest, however, the site is as Mr. Blaney describes.  They do indeed have David Copperfield performing Mr. Blaney’s world-famous Ladder Levitation.   The image to the left is from the listing for the knock-off hoop.  We pixelated the domain name the pirates used to prevent folks from copying their images.  Ironies abound.

We fully support Mr. Blaney in his crusade against those who steal, knock-off, copy, or even “improve” on the inventions of our best magical minds.  Mr. Blaney has always fought on behalf of all magic inventors — not just himself.

Some would suggest it is a losing cause.  We think it is one of the most important causes in our craft and well worth fighting.

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Tags: Blaney, China, Counterfeit, Magic Knock-Offs

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They did it!

According to J C Sum’s web site, he and the lovely “Magic Babe” Ning set the record for “most number of grand illusions performed in five minutes.”

The record was set on Saturday, June 27, 2009 at 9:40 pm.

Turn-out was great. And why wouldn’t it be?

J C Sum and Magic Babe Ning have taken the country by storm with well-timed and publicised stunts and apperances.

Plus, where else can one see 15 big-time illusions in five minutes?

We understand more than 3000 people witnessed the blur of illusions in the beautiful Central Promenade adjacent to Singapore River.

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Tags: J C Sum and Ning, Singapore

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Inside Magic Favorite ‘Magic Babe’ Ning Cai literally elevated the risk level of her renown straight jacket escape last weekend.

Miss Ning is famous for her signature Straight Jacket Striptease routine.  She describes the act as “Harry Houdini meets the Pussy Cat Dolls.”

Her most recent presentation, however, moved from tease to terrifying. 

Inversion saw her completely restrained by a regulation straight jacket, blindfolded, and held upside down over a very real and very sharp bed of spikes.

Magic Seen calls Miss Ning “the sexiest woman in Magic” but this latest stunt could easily have ended in a decidedly less-than-sexy manner.

Honestly, we don’t know why they (escape artists) do this type of thing (risk their lives).

If our fellow performers risk their lives for our entertainment, they can skip it because we cannot handle it.

While we admire their skill, we tend to worry.

Inside Magic Favorite Dean Gunnarson sent us a video of an insane escape that took us a couple of hours to watch.

We kept stopping the video, visited our “happy place,” recalled that we were watching an event that happened in the past, and because Mr. Gunnarson sent us DVD himself,  there was every reason to think he was not killed in the footage we were viewing.

Like Miss Ning, Mr. Gunnarson performed an inverted straight jacket escape.

Miss Ning was over very sharp and sturdy steel spikes.

Similarly, Mr. Gunnarson was high above The Hoover Dam while hanging from a free-swinging bar using only his feet; no tether, no strap to hold the top of his shoes in place as he contorted his body.

Yes it was an amazing feat, but it also brought us nightmares and an additional five weeks of therapy.  And as many know, most insurance policies refuse to cover so-called “Puppet Psycho Therapy” beyond two weeks of visits.   Our recovery was costly and left emotional scars.

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Tags: Dean Gunnarson, J C Sum and Ning, Magic Babe, Puppet Psycho Therapy Insurance Limits, Straight Jacket

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