Do they...deserve it???

[Lord Magic]

OkayOkay, so this is about You Tube magicians.

And this requires a small:: DISCLAIMER:- NO ONE here is going to bring up tutorials or ethics of learning magic thru YT. Why? Because this thread is NOT about that. So stay away from that huge controversial topic which triggers every magician here and turns the thread into a debate show on CNN or any news channel. Thank you.

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First off...as everyone here knows (and if someone doesn't, they prolly don't have an internet connection, in which case they can't see this, in which case the previous 22 words I typed were unneccesary and I am just wasting my time)...the more subscribers someone has on You Tube, the more popular they are. More subscribers mean people like you more than others who do the same stuff.

Now, I was checking out some magicians online. And I saw that some magicians had, like, more than a million subscribers, and they deserved it. The problem is that, I saw some (*read* many) magicians (add some adjectives synonymous to good-looking) who have, like, BLOWN UP in the sub count! I mean, like, they have 10 million subscribers or more!!!
So naturally, I checked out their videos, expecting grace like Michael Ammar, or brilliance like Eric Jones, or creativity like Sankey, or a genius mind like Dai Vernon, or just a personality like Mac King...SOMETHING which justified the HUGE sub count.

What I saw was...trash.

Now hold up...I am in no position to criticise people, because I might be trash myself. I might be the worse magician of the millenium. But that doesn't change the fact that...well...

Let me give you a small overview of what I saw:-

A magician, who is EXTREMELY dramatic. Who DESPERATELY CRAVES you to think it is magic. It seems as if you don't marvel at his work, he might just cry and die (DISCLAIMER 2:- not promoting deaths. But the thing is, that they um...don't care abt promotion). It was laughable! The tricks and effects themselves were fine, in fact, they were genuinely GOOD tricks, looked impossible. But, I guess we all agree that...

MAGIC is not knowing how a trick works, it is doing a trick.

So how the hell do these over-dramatic magicians whose performance style is not that great, get SO many subs?
Juat because they appeared on some popular talent show? THAT'S IT?

Like, there's no consideration of how great a person's style is? It is all about appearing on shows and stuff now?

Sorry for the rant...honestly.

But my problem is that, the T.V. culture is dropping real fast today. So the road to success like other famous magicians of past is now a really amazing You Tube channel, with lots of views, likes and subscribers! I don't even care abt tutorials, I am just talking about performers! What is happening? Are the laymen so dumb that they keep on crediting the wrong person???

Is there nothing anyone could do to change it? Other than appearing on, I dunno, AGT or something?

PS:- The magician who triggered me has a HOST of different videos on his channel. He has DIYs, challenges, pranks, and stuff. There is an occassional magic video (performance), VERY 'occassional'. And then people credit him for being a YT magician when half of his videos are like, not related to magic any more than I am to Lincoln ( I am actually related to him...oh no...truth got out...anyways, pay me respects you mere mortals)! And people say he is the best magician on YT! And I am like, what?!? So that's what triggered me actually, even though it is not that guy's fault directly.

PPS::- Sorry for being kinda emotional here and sorry again for ranting, just wanna know why this is something that happens to every single art (or would-be-art) form in the world. Do the true best not deserve it any more these days?

 

[JoshL8]

Having many subscribers doesn't actually mean they are a good magician, just that they can market themselves to the audience well. A huge amount of followers is just an ad populumn measure of something, not necessarily the magicians skills versus other magicians skills.

I see plenty of people I know share videos from a certain magician whose internet videos are bad psychological tricks at best. Generally they are "gotcha" moments more than it is magic. The magician I am referring to doesn't do the same type of entertainment as other magicians and their audience is likely different in many ways, so comparing his followers/magic style to others is really a bad comparison most of the time; apples and oranges.

These performers may not be a magicians magician for sure, they may not even share much of the same audience of subscribers as other magicians. There may be some overlap between the subscribers but likely one has more of the casual watcher of magic rather than the connoisseur of fine magic.

Now does this magician "deserve" his followers? Depending on what qualifies the word "deserve" sure he does. He is some peoples cup of tea even though I am not sure the performance really qualifies as magic most of the time.

 

[WitchDocIsIn]

"Deserves" is kind of a bad word choice, in my opinion. It implies there's some kind of cosmic balance that rewards certain people, and there's not.

Subscribers doesn't equal talent at all. It means the person running the channel knows how to get subscribers. Just like being a professional magician doesn't mean you're any good - it just means you can sell the show.

The guys who have lots of subscribers understand how to work the system. Some guys are super blatant about it - like Rick Lax. He uses a classic busker approach. He builds up the trick, then pauses the action and tells people to like and subscribe before he does the finale. Just like a busker saying, "If I'm going to do this dangerous trick, you better pay me now to make it worth my while."

Chris Ramsay does a lot of the same kinds of things where he's asking questions or doing 'contests' that are purely designed to build his numbers. He doesn't care about the questions in a lot of cases, he just wants to show engagement so he can keep his monetization.

But my problem is that, the T.V. culture is dropping real fast today. So the road to success like other famous magicians of past is now a really amazing You Tube channel, with lots of views, likes and subscribers!

The chance of a YT channel being successful is so minuscule that planning to reach success through YT doesn't even qualify as a plan.

 

[Lord Magic]

The chance of a YT channel being successful is so minuscule that planning to reach success through YT doesn't even qualify as a plan.

Um...do you mean only in respect to magic? You prolly do...
Unfortunately, it often does :-(
(also, fortunately too, in some cases, but this is intended to indicate at the negative side)...

 

[WitchDocIsIn]

I am referring to anyone who's thinking they're going to be the next YouTube star. It's not easy to do, and most people will fail to make any serious headway.

For everyone making a living off YouTube there's thousands and thousands who will never get a cent from it. And with the new requirements, one has to have a pretty serious channel to even qualify for monetizing any more. Which means if someone thinks they are going to become a YT star and make a living from that, they're going to have to basically take on a more-than-full-time job doing that, except it will be working for free until the channel is big enough to monetize.

It would be a much smarter strategy to do local performances and make some videos on the side. Build a local fan base that pays for tickets and merch if possible, and just let the channel build organically in the process. Once the channel is able to be monetized, then and only then focus significant energy on it, and building the online fan base.

But I guarantee you someone will make more money, faster, in the real world than doing videos - unless they are extremely lucky/talented at building a viewer base.

 

[RealityOne]

YouTube magicians.

Oxymoron.

"It implies there's some kind of cosmic balance that rewards certain people, and there's not.

There is, but it isn't always immediate.

But I guarantee you someone will make more money, faster, in the real world than doing videos.

Are you inferring that YouTube is not the real world? You must be over age 30.

 

[obrienmagic]

I will go on record of saying if you understand the algorithm and have the time to consistently upload your channel will blow up refuardless how good of anmagician you are.

There are some amazing performers with 40 subs on their channels simply because they don’t upload enough or have a consistent game plan.

I upload 3 times a week and get about 40-50 subs a week depending on the content.