Ok here is my view on what a professional is. A professional is someone who makes money from performing. He does not necessarily have to be a phenomenal sleight of hand artist or even have a high skill level. He just has to make money from it. And I must disagree with the point made saying that you are a professional if magic is the ONLY source of income. If you do magic and get paid for it you are a pro.
Hypothetically speaking, What if I was making 60,000 a year doing magic and lets say 40,000 grand running a business? Would that make me not a pro because I have another source of income? You know that alot of pros do not do perform EVERY day. What if in between those days that I am not performing I work part-time does that not make me a pro, or would I have to quit my part-time job which doesn't affect my magic performance schedule at all?
What I am trying to say is that you can be a pro if you make money doing other stuff too. But you can't be a pro if your NOT making money doing magic. YOu can be at pro-level (whatever that is) but not really a pro. Its just like sports there are many atheletes who are not pros that can compete with the pros.
OK, that is a valid point. I guess I should rephrase and say that if magic is your "primary" source of income, or rivals your primary source of income, then I would consider you a professional magician.
You say "If you do magic and get paid for it you are a pro.". I would disagree with this slightly. If you are performing, and someone tips you, that doesn't necessarily make you a professional. Taking it one set farther, even if you have a gig doing restaurant magic a couple times a week in the evening, I still wouldn't consider that professional. True, you are getting paid for doing the 'job', but it still isn't your primary source of income. I'm in a band that gigs on the weekends, and I hold a regular job through the week. I would consider myself a marketing professional, who has a side job playing music. Now, if I performed music 5 nights a week, and that was my primary source of income, I would call myself a professional musician.