"Never show anyone. They'll beg you and they'll flatter you for the secret, but as soon as you give it up, you'll be nothing to them."

-Alfred Borden, The Prestige

Ah, I see you've been watching closely.

Marked cards and other such systems have been common for decades, if not centuries; this is a variation on it.

Many tricks are more than slight-of-hand, they often are "technical" and involve special decks that are modified in certain ways; you can even buy equipment to reseal decks and rewrap them in plastic so they appear brand-new.

It's it pretty common that learning the secret of any trick has a chance to destroy the appreciation of the execution?

If you found out a magician was using this they aren't a very good magician.

If I encountered a magician who could read a barcode like this in their head I'd really be amazed!

To me the really fascinating magic tricks are the ones that use the basics like sleight of hands and misdirection to build a proper story and presentation, this is just blatant cheating, it's fascinating to know how it's done but it probably won't be part of your favorite magician's routine.

And about those tricks, I recently played the demo of a game called "Card Shark" and it does a really nice job of incorporating the more cheating-style tricks into a compelling narrative.

Aren't all magic tricks "cheating" in the end? Otherwise they would be real magic ;-)

I appreciate the feeling. Finding out how a trick is done quite literally takes away the magic.

But pretty much all magic tricks are like this. From the very simple to the extremely complex. The mechanics of a trick are only a small part of it. The story, presentation, emotional content and humour of a performance are even more important.

It's the difference between ballet and a high-jump. Both are physically impressive feats, but one is so much more than that.

Everything you listed is cool, this mechanic is cheating.

Learning about other mechanics is fascinating, learning about this one would disappointing.