I alredy had made a similar thread to this one, It was pretty short and as the essay forums are not to coolest place on penguin, I wonder why because you dont have to pay a book to read insightfulls essays.

Digital imposters
I jump on penguin like I do on a regular basis, I pop on and I look at the new threads... I see AGAIN numerous threads about new users asking for advice that end up locked because of the spamming and the idiocity, well say ingnorance of the person who created the thread and just ignore everything and come back to bash saying they have been in magic for longer then you and you dont need your advice. And please! please! dont come back at me saying that im talking about this person or another, Im talking for a group of person. Some people might be offended in this essay too, but dont take it personal, im just trying to give out some ethics those person should have.

Before asking for advice
If youre goal here is to look like a profesional magician, please be one or die trying. The frustration close your eyes, even tho you try to mask youre ignorance and youre immaturity and make a over-experienced magician digital image of yourself, A lot of people here understands, and can spot a mile away those kind of people. Even if you have took classes for over 500 years on impersonation you cant teach and old monkey how to make weird faces. They'll spot you and try the best they can to correct your mind, even tho they look like they are bashing you, they are giving you theire most sincere tought on what you say.

Beside this forum is not a popularity contest, its a group of people who likes one thing ; magic. I tought it would be nice to tell it, because a LOT of people tend to forget this, even elderyest members.

And its easy to tell that when a '' expert master of all magician that has performed 200 time this year and have made 5 millions '' ask an advice its not credible, Its not edible... ;

How to ask advice effectively
Before you even try to push the ''post topic'' button, hold youre first finger a second, beside if you are using you're pinky... you are weird... *caugh* off with humor now, back to topic. Stop trying to fix your post, find ideas on how you can tweak what you said to dont look like a newbie. Because if you are seeking for advice, and you say that you know everything, im sorry to tell you but you wont get any piece of advice at all, until you write a post and read it to get some advice ... Strange but true. Ask what you need, get the piece of advice, say thanks and move on.

A classic post of this kind
A few more toughts : Most of the spammed threads that goes along the lines of : « 0kay, im going to do a gig in 2 weeks, I need some trickz to do for kidz, I tought I could do some card tricks and mentalism. I have a lot of stuff that I TOTALLY got down i wont miss it. »

Points:
1- Much of the information he/she gives is totaly wrong and not in the ethics. First he/she got booked for a gig that he will do shortly, in this case 2 weeks, While he is asking for tricks, Which he CANT put together in two weeks, its impossible. If you say its possible you are right, but it might just be a totaly screwed up act on wich I would throw a lot of my sacarstics line on... He also says that he we do card an mentalism for KIDS wich is just plain impossible, about 99.9% of people knows that kids dont understand card tricks, mentalism either. And he says that he mastered everything down.

2- In about 101% of the case the first post will be : « PLEASE! cancel the gig !! » And in about 101% of the cases the reply will be :

3-« You dont know what you are talking about, I have been doing magic for long, and made a lot of kid shows, and made a lot of money » : So strangely as they where asking for advice now they change they're mind and they say they are the best and you suck. If that case happen, dont even reply to this, let the thread dye, becuase in much of the case the thread will end up locked after 40 pages of spamming and calling names.

As you see you can see them coming from miles away, If you try to help him and you get the few first post in the thread, PLEASE! dont say only ''dont do this gig.'' Try to get more information without trying to boost his ego nor trying to offense him. If you cant handle that please dont even post and let the thread die.

I know in much of the case it end up being funny and a lot of people throws out random sacarstic stuff, but those kind of post are no more funny and are getting me on my nerves as well as a lot of magicians here who dont even takes the time to reply to these kind of post beaucause they alredy know how it will end up, Because much of the time these (kids) will offence you lowering you by saying that you never perform and blah blah blah with evidences that are upside down, then you get angry and lower to their level.

So hope anyone will ever reply to these kind of post but with this kind of post : « please read this post you will get good advice ( direct them here ) »

Hope it helped,
~blizt

Bumped for emphasis.

Completely agree. edited, this may be post of the year.

no, this is the post of the year right here.....



What do you do if you come across an elephant in the jungle.......










































Wipe it off and tell it your sorry!!!!





I told ya!!!!

I'm pretty sure some of you will get that one.

INAPPROPRIATE!
lol

Yeah, I don't get involved in these kind of threads because I know they're pointless, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy reading them. Sometimes I actually feel like I'm going to die laughing at some of the things that are said. Still, you're right, it would be easier if no one responded at all, so the whole thread would just be stillborn. It's not like they're hard to spot. They all start exactly the way you describe, and someone tries to be kind and offer them sincere, helpful advice that they don't really want, and it snowballs. Good eye, but I don't think it'll stop anytime soon. Loved your essay, though.

We do have alot of these lately. Heck we had one even today, just a few hours ago. You had to go spoil the fun and lock it.
I am just glad you left it open long enough for me to add my "two cents."

The main post could use a little work. But the main point of it, is what matters and it gets across.

Ya,you sure showed told that guy a thing or two.When I say that you posted back after a couple hours I just had to read the whole thing,I was laugh'n to myself the whole time.I used to think you were 2 harsh on people but now I just enjoy reading you posts.

glad you liked it! I was somewhat bored of seeing those kind of threads around everywhere and i wrote it fast, I could revise it a little bit more.
~blizt

Edit: a few more tought, remember then most of the thread of these kind in my opinion are not true, they are not even going for a gig, most of the time they just seek some attention...