Scamapalooza with Nicholas J. Johnson

How do working GPs deal with alternative medicine? These frontline healthcare practitioners have to deal with constant red tape, constant education, strict laws and pesky professional ethics. Alternative medicine practitioners, on the other hand, are so unburdened by professional oversight, rules and regulations that they can sell remedies that do not even work (and in the case of homeopathy, ofte...

OzLockCon is Australia’s first conference dedicated to locksport and physical security. From the amateur lockpicker to the professional security expert, the conference has something for everyone interesting locks. On this week's episode OzLockCon organiser Topaz talks about the event and explains how to pick a lock. https://ozlockcon.com

Why, given the constant need for people to measure everything from their personalities to their intellect, is there no test for gullibility?  Alessa Tenunisse, a pHd student at Macquarie University’s Department of Psychology, has spent several exploring gullibility and it's relationship to scams.  On this week's episode, Alessa discusses her work while Nicholas tries to strike it rich with a GQ te...

We are living in a golden age of bullshit. Nowhere is this more evident than in the media where fake news is now almost indistinguishable from the real deal. So how do you spot fake news? How do you spot it spreading? And how do you deal with that weird relative wanting to spread pizzagate conspiracy theories on facebook? On this week's episode, satirist Toby Halligan explains how to defeat lies i...

🎶It's only a paper moon, sailing over a cardboard sea.🎶 And this week's episode is only pop culture queen Sarah Baggs exploring the whimsical and heartwarming world of Paper Moon.  From the Peter Bogdanovich film to the Joe David Brown novel to the Jodie Foster starring TV series, Sarah and Nicholas explore what makes this rare con artist film a classic. 

Stephen Greenspan has dedicated a large part of his career to explaining why people act gullibly. As a psychologist and author, he’s drawn from research, literature and his own personal experience as a victim of Bernie Madoff to help explain the psychological underpinnings of why otherwise smart people do stupid things. On this week’s episode, Nicholas takes to Stephen about his work, his life and...

There are no two con artists films less alike than I Love You Phillip Morris and FOCUS. One is a true story, the other fiction. One is slick and cool, the other bright and slapstick filled. One features two men falling in love in prison while the other features a run of the mill Hollywood romance. On this week’s episode, Nicholas talks to Martin Dunlop about the differences between the two films w...

The Laborastory is a science storytelling event in Melbourne that comes to tell the stories of science – the heroes, the egos, the breakthroughs and the mistakes of genius. From forgotten history and lonely laboratories, science and scientists quite literally take centre stage. On this week’s episode, Nicholas talks at the monthly science event about his scientific hero: amatuer geologist and foss...

Anthony “Magic Tony” Barnhart is a cognitive psychologist at Arizona State University. He studies the psychological processes underlying handwritten word perception and the psychological foundations of magic and illusion. On this week’s episode of the podcast Tony discusses his work while Nicholas tries to sell Tony on his crackpot theory connecting magic and autism. http://www.mammothaudio.com.au...

Nick Mason, from the Weekly Planet Podcast, returns to help Nicholas deal with complex feelings about the 2016 film Now You See Me 2. The sequel to the surprise 2013 hit, Now You See Me 2 features more magic, more heists and more confusing plot twists than the original.

Do you remember that story about the man who sold his fob watch to buy his wife a comb while she sold her hair to buy him a watch chain? That classic twist comes from the mind of O Henry, a short story writer famous for penning tales filled with criminals and the down on their luck. Almost all of his stories have unpredictable, ironic endings. On this week’s episode, actor Tosh Greenslade brings t...

In the second part of Nicholas’ conversation with Spyros Melaris about the 1995 Alien Autopsy video, Spyros discuss the fallout from the hoax video, his falling out with his collaborator Ray Santilli and the many easter eggs hidden throughout the film. Is Spyros telling the truth? Or is he creating a conspiracy inside a conspiracy?

In 1995, the world was captivated by the Alien Autopsy video, a grainy 17 minute film supposedly depicting the disection of an alien “Grey” in Roswell, New Mexico. A decade later, the film was exposed by British man Ray Santilli who claimed he had masterminded the hoax. However, in recent years, another man, Spyros Melaris, has claimed that he was responsible for the lion share of the work. Where...

Ben and Kevin just want to play. As two members of Pop Up Playground they create fun, immersive game experiences that feel like real live computer games. So why has their latest project, Small Time Criminals, attract the ire of tabloid media and victims of crime groups. Is it an ultra-realistic bank heist simulation that mocks the victims of real robberies? Or is it a media beat up? On this week’s...

Everyone wants to be a good liar. Or at the very least, be able to spot a good liar. But what do you do when all of the books on the subject are written by authors who are experts on doing just that? On this week’s episode, Vinny DePonto talks about five of his favourite books on lying and Nicholas wonders with Mark Twain would be doing burlesque if he was alive today. http://www.mammothaudio.com....

Dom and Dumber have taken on a mammoth task, combining magic and sketch comedy into an entirely new genre. In this week's Scamapalooza, Dom Chambers and Bayden Hammond sit down and talk about their favourite comedy, magic and how you manage to jam the two of them together. #comedy #magic #scams #sketch http://www.mammothaudio.com.au/scamapalooza

Paul Zenon is the father of street magic, the first magician to take close up magic to the streets in his successful TV specials. However, Paul is also an accomplished actor, author and skeptic. His tales of his run ins with mediums, television producers and other scumbags are the stuff of legend. http://www.mammothaudio.com.au/scamapalooza

How does a psychic prove they are the real deal? For close to a hundred years, skeptics around the world have been offering cash prizes to anyone who can provide evidence of the paranormal. On this week’s episode podcaster Richard Saunders explores the world of psychic challenges from the Scientific American in 1922 to the James Randi Million Dollar Prize. http://www.mammothaudio.com.au/scamapaloo...

Orson Welles' last project before the descending into a life of frozen pea commercials and voicing Transformers was F Is A Fake. The film is a magician’s bag, full of cinematic tricks and double bluffs. On this week’s episode, Simon Caterson returns to explore Orson Well’s final great trick, a pseuod-documentary about an art forger and the hoaxer who wrote his biography. http://www.mammothaudio.co...

Jan Marshall is an intelligent woman. She’s university educated, articulate and has lived and travelled around the world. So why, in 2012, did she lose over a quarter of a million dollars to a romance scammer? On this week’s episode, Jan tells her incredible story, not just of how she lost the money but how she regained her life. And then she came face to face with an even bigger foe: the Tax Offi...

Scamapalooza returns for 2016. On this week’s episode Nicholas is flying solo as he recounts the top episodes of last year, reveals a few rejected episode ideas and reads a classic tale of gambling, cheats and beautiful blondes from card cheating expert John Scarne. http://www.mammothaudio.com.au/scamapalooza

Harry Houdini was not just one of history’s most famous magicians he was also obsessed with death and the afterlife, dedicating years to uncovering the truth about life after death. Mina Crandon was a spirit medium who claimed that the ghosts she communicated with could ring bells, float tables and throw trumpets across rooms. On this week’s episode Jon Cox from from the website Wild About Houdini...

On 25 August 1835, The Sun newspaper in New York reported that a telescope had been invented so powerful that it could see the surface of the moon. There, alien life had been discovered. Man bats, bipedal beavers and abandoned temples to forgotten gods were all described in great detail. On this week’s episode Matthew Goodman, author of The Sun and The Moon, explains how the hoax came about and ho...

Piff The Magic Dragon isn’t your usual magician. He plays Las Vegas and wows judges on TV shows like America’s Got Talent and Penn and Teller Fool Us. But, his also a fire breathing dragon with a pet chihuahua, known for sending playing cards into toasted cheese sandwiches and shooting his beloved Mr Piffles out of a canon. On this week’s episode, Piff aka John Van Der Put explains how he become t...

The Sting is the king of con artist movies and the godfather of every twist happy heist movie from Ocean’s 11 to Matchstick Men.  This week on the podcast writer Matthew Specktor talks about the incredible legacy of The Sting, a film that swept the 1973 Academy Award, reteamed Robert Redford and Paul Newman and changed film forever.  MATTHEW'S SITE: https://matthewspecktor.com/