April Fool's Day Contest

Sorry, the Contest is over.

April Fool's Day Contest Results

BeLight Software and the independent judge, Bob "Dr. Mac" LeVitus are happy to announce that the first place goes to Stephen M. Sebeny from Cuyahoga Falls. Stephen will receive our Grand Prize, an iPod mini.

The second and third places go to Javier delBarco-Trillo from Memphis and Tim Thompson from Missoula respectively. Javier and Tim will both get Business Card Composer boxed edition.

Our congratulations to the winners!

iPod Winning Story - Stephen M. Sebeny:

"A magician by the name of Michael Close does an amazing trick with business cards. While working at a restaurant he will visit a table and begin the trick by asking where on the street the people live — on a corner or cul-de-sac, in the middle of a block, near a fork, etc. Then he draws a picture on the back of one of his business card depicting their house and the road they live on.

Next he describes problems he has had with potholes he had on his street. And by way of illustration uses a hole punch to punch a hole through another business card right in the middle of the drawing of the street in front of this house. Then Michael will demonstrate how a magician might deal with problems such as potholes — he literally grabs the hole punched through the card and visibly drags it down the street and leaves it in front of his friend's house. All the time you can see through the hole punched in the card and out the other side. Next the magician down the street will transport the pothole back to in front of Michael's house, etc.

Then Michael gets the idea to move the pothole to someone else's street. So he picks up the card with the drawing of the street of the audience member and he drags the hole off of the first card and onto the the second card down their street and leaves it in front of their house. The spectator gets to then keep this card as a souvenir.

The best part is that after the performance Michael would check with the reservation system of the restaurant he was working and call the audience member's home pretending to be a city sanitation worker apologizing for the pothole in front of their home and assuring them it would be repaired promptly. You can bet that after that trick, and the hilarious follow-up call, that those people will never give up that card. One of the best uses of business cards in magic I've ever seen."

Bob "Dr. Mac" LeVitus:
"I've been a card-carrying member of the IBM for most of my adult life and though I've tried several times, I never found a satisfying way to integrate magic into the presentation of a business card. I'd venture that I've spent at least $100 trying to come up with the perfect magical presentation, but nothing was as clever or cute as the technique described by Stephen Sebeny in his first prize-winning entry.

By the way, the IBM I'm a member of has nothing to do with computers. I am a member of the International Brotherhood Of Magicians. I'd tell you more, but they're a secretive bunch and I'd hate to have to kill you..."

Runner-up - Javier delBarco-Trillo:

"In our group of friends we have one person who two years ago was bragging about how he had never been fooled in April Fool's day, and how he would never be. "The trick is to be suspicious of everything", he said. He was, as only he can sometimes, very annoying.

So last year we decided to test him. We know he is crazy about caviar (I don't know why, but he is, I guess he must have some problem with his sense of taste). Anyhow, we thought that caviar might be a weak point of his that we could attack.

I know a "crazy Russian" guy (he is actually an university professor, and quite crazy indeed). We made up a business card in just a question of minutes in which you could read: "Markus Morsikov, International Caviar Trade Inc., 'If you want the best caviar, we have it...' , ended by a real address in a crappy industrial area in Memphis.

The crazy Russian professor and I managed to have a 'casual' encounter with my "I will never be fooled" friend early in April Fool's morning. As soon as I presented the Russian professor as an important salesman of caviar, my friend's eyes popped out and almost yelled that he loved caviar so very much. The Russian professor (alias Markus Morsikov by now) handled the faked business card and told my friend that he was very very lucky indeed (with his deep Russian accent). There was a shipment of caviar leaving Memphis that same day. If my friend was able to pass by the address indicated in the business card 'Markus' would easily take a 2-pound can of caviar (that is a lot of caviar) out of the shipment and give it to my friend for free. Right after saying that, 'Markus' said that he had to hurry to start preparing the shipment, so we left.

Some of my friends and I met in the "caviar address" (really a crappier area than we thought it would be), and waited there around four hours, just drinking beer and hoping that noone would kill us. We were really thinking that our friend had realized that all the caviar thing was just a sophisticated joke when we saw his car slowy approaching and finally stopping by us. There was a surprise look on his face that lasted maybe two seconds, then he realized that he had actually be sophisticatedly fooled. Because we are friends after all, I approached him and handled him a very tiny can of caviar (the smallest, and cheapest I must say, that I could buy; I am quite poor after all). On his face appeared the best smile I have ever seen."

Bob "Dr. Mac" LeVitus:
"I love an elaborate April Fools joke; this story had me rolling on the floor, laughing my butt off."

2nd Runner-up - Tim Thompson:

Bob "Dr. Mac" LeVitus:
"Take one look at that face and you'll know why I declared this entry a winner...
(By the way, what the heck is that thing? Is it a duck? A platypus? A woodpecker? A goose? I mean, what the heck do I know? I'm a city kid through and through.)"

The Official Rules

By entering the drawing you agree to the following terms and conditions.

• Participants should send their stories by e-mail to and include full name and postal address.
• Participants can submit several stories to increase chances of winning.
• Winners will be notified by email, on the address from which we received a story. Please double-check your name, shipping address and phone number, which you put in the e-mail, as the prize will be sent to the address you state in the e-mail.
• BeLight Software reserves the right to publish the names of the winners and submitted stories on www.belightsoft.com without additional permission.
• The Grand Prize Winner will receive a 4GB iPod mini (valued U.S. $199).
  Two runner-ups will receive boxed edition of Business Card Composer (valued U.S. $40).
• The winners will be the people who submitted the most original, funny or unusual stories from March 31st to April 21st 2005, winners will be determined by the independent judge Bob "Dr. Mac" LeVitus and BeLight Software on April 25th, 2005. All decisions of Bob "Dr. Mac" LeVitus and BeLight Software are final and binding.
• The winners will be notified by email within 5 business days of the contest end and will be announced on www.belightsoft.com. BeLight Software is not responsible for and shall not be liable for any late, lost, or misdirected notification, or for winners' unsuccessful efforts to claim any prize. Watch your spam filters!