Pony Effect has two preview videos of a set of magnetic brushes and two metal brush holders: a frame, and a panel. It looks super cool. But is it a coincidence, a ripoff, or a license of the Rae Morris magnetic line? I don’t know, there’s no answers anywhere, but this is all veryyy interesting.

The first video is a hidden link on YouTube:

It was posted on Instagram, but has now been deleted, as you can see below:

A video posted by 포니이펙트 PONY EFFECT (@ponyeffect_korea) on Apr 8, 2016 at 9:10pm PDT

I will admit that the design for both the Pony Effect and Rae Morris versions are quite simple and it’s easy to arrive at that design. But when placed side-by-side, I have to admit they are a little too similar.

A Google search will tell you that this has already been a Thing for a couple of years now. The Rae Morris magnetic line has been covered on InStyle (June 2014), Popsugar (January 2015), Into the Gloss (Dec 2015), and also the excellent makeup brush blog Sweet Makeup Temptations (February 2014 and February 2015).

Pony Effect, Metal Brush Frame

40,000 krw (45 aud)



Rae Morris, The Rae Frame

75 aud



Secondly, the smaller plate.

Pony Effect, Metal Brush Plate

25,000 krw (28 aud)



Rae Morris, The Rae Plate

35 aud



Pony Effect’s line is available on Memebox.com and also on the US Memebox site, and will begin shipping on April 18, 2016. Presently, you can only buy them in sets, but individually, the prices are listed from 17,000 won for the Small Eyeshadow Brush, to 40,000 won for the Metal Brush Frame.

Copyright issues aside … admittedly, even with the current exchange rate, Pony Effect’s near-identical version is much more affordable. The whole thing is a mess, but even with the social media fallout and ethical/legal problems, I think that the Pony Effect version will sell very well here in Korea. It’s so much more affordable, and it ships from a location in Seoul, instead of all the way from Australia.

Personally, I already have a bunch of non-magnetic brushes that I’m not about to give up, and I can’t be bothered to rig magnetic tips to them. The magnetic concept is gorgeous though, and I wouldn’t have minded having something like that for myself. It’s a great gift for someone who could use a new set of brushes, or wouldn’t mind having a new set.

An option is to buy the metal brush frame and six brushes from Memebox’s Global Gmarket store.

Searching eBay for the terms “Pony Effect brush ” should work, too.

And of course, there’s the original Rae Morris magnetic sets and brushes.

Update, April 21

On this post on Instagram, two days ago (April 19), this is what Rae Morris had to say. Her reply is somewhere in the comments, so here’s a screenshot:

Pony has written a statement on Instagram about the issue. The statement states that they studied the features, pros, and cons of magnetic brush sets all over the world (where are these products by the way, I want to see?), including Rae Morris’, and improvements were made. This research resulted in the Pony Effect set. The statement also states that the team went through the legalese, design patents and rights etc., and concluded that the Pony Effect set was legally cleared for release in South Korea.

tl;dr? “We totally didn’t copy it; ours is better. And anyway, it’s not illegal.”

And a word-by-word translation by someone on Instagram: