Bicycle Weapons - gaffed playing cards

[CBJ]

Came across this on Penguin Magic for pre-order
http://www.penguinmagic.com/p/S19639







CBJ

[Don Boyer]

Thanks for this listing!  I moved it to the Magical Cardistry Bonanza - it's a deck of all gaff cards, after all.

[Magic_Orthodoxy]

video link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_p2tFZEz5uk

From the add copy

WEAPONS is the BEST Gaffed deck to come along in years!

The WEAPONS deck contains the BEST gaff card tricks and tools to have ever been released ALL IN ONE DECK!

Gaffs that will kick your card magic up a few levels!

Now you can get all these pasteboard miracles in one deck!

Each deck contains red AND blue Bicycle Rider Back gaff cards!

The Weapons deck contains classic gaffs (some long off the market) and a bunch of NEW ideas!

Contributions from Eric Ross, Garrett Thomas, Wayne Houchin, Dan Hauss, Dan White, Doug Conn, and more!

[Don Boyer]

video link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_p2tFZEz5uk

WEAPONS is the BEST Gaffed deck to come along in years!

The WEAPONS deck contains the BEST gaff card tricks and tools to have ever been released ALL IN ONE DECK!

Gaffs that will kick your card magic up a few levels!

Now you can get all these pasteboard miracles in one deck!

Each deck contains red AND blue Bicycle Rider Back gaff cards!

The Weapons deck contains classic gaffs (some long off the market) and a bunch of NEW ideas!

Contributions from Eric Ross, Garrett Thomas, Wayne Houchin, Dan Hauss, Dan White, Doug Conn, and more!

And you sound very excited!  Because you're shouting everything, and using exclamation points on every sentence!  Like this!  And you're putting every sentence on its own line, like it was a paragraph all to itself!  Not like this, but like that! 

(Just kidding around - it's good to be excited about it, if you think it's that great of a product.  Try not to get too hyperbolic, though.)

[Magic_Orthodoxy]

That is the add copy from the retailer, I just clipped and pasted

[Worst Bower]

Is it sold without the video?

[Don Boyer]

That is the add copy from the retailer, I just clipped and pasted

You might want to indicate that next time - the way you posted it, it looked like your words, not anyone else's.

Is it sold without the video?

The YouTube video directs people to magictrickstore.com, where a little searching leads you to this page:

http://www.magictrickstore.com/weapons-deck-video-eric-ross-p-45791.html

...which indicates that it comes with video training.  If I had to guess, I'd say it's a downloadable video - it's becoming the preferred format these days because of the much-lower production/distribution costs over DVDs.

[SwissArmyTenor]

I just received this yesterday.  The tuck box has sticker on it with the web address (Murphy's Magic) and password for the video tutorial, which can also be downloaded.

There is, apparently, some question as to whether Eric Ross had permission to use some of the gaffs that he did.  He admitted to some misunderstandings, but seemed to think all should be ok.  Haven't heard anything else since this issue flared up a few days ago, so maybe all is well. 

[Don Boyer]

I just received this yesterday.  The tuck box has sticker on it with the web address (Murphy's Magic) and password for the video tutorial, which can also be downloaded.

There is, apparently, some question as to whether Eric Ross had permission to use some of the gaffs that he did.  He admitted to some misunderstandings, but seemed to think all should be ok.  Haven't heard anything else since this issue flared up a few days ago, so maybe all is well.

The only possible legal issues I could think of would be if he performed alterations to any of USPC's trademarks, but if that were the case, the deck would never of been made. I'm not 100% sure on this, but I do believe that you cannot copyright a gaff card, in much the same way that you can't copyright card faces, though you can copyright the artwork, if it is adequately unique. Then again, I am not an intellectual property lawyer.

[SwissArmyTenor]

Don, the conversation I read focused around ethical issues involved with taking the work (unique gaffs) of another creator(s) and adding it/them to a project without permission.

Some of the creators were involved in the conversation, as well as Eric.  The conversation was eventually deleted, and I've seen nothing more.  It doesn't appear that the deck has been pulled, so I suppose everything was worked out. 

I ordered the deck, and then that very evening saw the conversation going on.  I actually wondered if my order would be cancelled!  The deck is ok.  I prefer it to some others in that it doesn't have so many of the wildly (not the best term, but...) printed cards.  There are a few - among others, there are unfocused pips, cards with a coin printed on it, and of all things, a king and a queen with scrunched faces reacting to a cloud of fart gas - no kidding!  I remember one of the Ellusionist gaff decks had so many of the non-standard gaffs, I didn't care for it.  This one has a better balance.  Also, many of the gaffs in this deck are repeated - you get them in both blue- and in red-backed cards.  So that lessens the variety one might have had the deck been available in both a red-backed and blue-backed version, but it offers some flexibility in return, in that you'll be able to use both red and blue-backed decks. 

[Don Boyer]

Don, the conversation I read focused around ethical issues involved with taking the work (unique gaffs) of another creator(s) and adding it/them to a project without permission.

In which case, it would have been very unlikely that the deck would have been pulled from being offered.  While it isn't a pleasant thought to consider, ethics and law don't necessarily work hand in hand - sometimes, what's legal to do isn't what's ethical to do, but because it's legal, it gets done.

[SwissArmyTenor]

True, Don.  While I have seen effects pulled by a creator for ethical reasons from time to time, it doesn't happen often.

[Magic_Orthodoxy]

"While it isn't a pleasant thought to consider, ethics and law don't necessarily work hand in hand - sometimes, what's legal to do isn't what's ethical to do, but because it's legal, it gets done."

I believe Jack Sparrow said it best, "The only rules that really matter are these: what a man can do and what a man can't do."

[Don Boyer]

"While it isn't a pleasant thought to consider, ethics and law don't necessarily work hand in hand - sometimes, what's legal to do isn't what's ethical to do, but because it's legal, it gets done."

I believe Jack Sparrow said it best, "The only rules that really matter are these: what a man can do and what a man can't do."

Sounds right in spirit, though I wouldn't go quite that far.