June28
Like Me On Facebook
I’ve dragged myself into the new millennium and set up a Facebook page.
Now, you can Like Me and write LOL and Epic and Fail etc.
Confessions
June21
How To Get Out Of A Speeding Ticket
This was emailed to me by a listener of the Scam of The Week radio show.
A police officer pulls a guy over for speeding and has the following exchange:
Officer: May I see your driver’s license?
Driver: I don’t have one. I had it suspended when I got my 5th DUI.
Officer: May I see the owner’s card for this vehicle?
Driver: It’s not my car. I stole it.
Officer: The car is stolen?
Driver: That’s right. But come to think of it, I think I saw the owner’s card in the glove box when I was putting my gun in there.
Officer: There’s a gun in the glove box?
Driver: Yes sir. That’s where I put it after I shot and killed the woman who owns this car and stuffed her in the trunk.
Officer: There’s a BODY in the TRUNK?!?!?
Driver: Yes, sir.
Hearing this, the officer immediately called his captain.
The car was quickly surrounded by police, and the captain approached the driver to handle the tense situation:
Captain: Sir, can I see your license?
Driver: Sure. Here it is.
It was valid.
Captain: Who’s car is this?
Driver: It’s mine, officer. Here’s the owner’ card.
The driver owned the car.
Captain: Could you slowly open your glove box so I can see if there’s a gun in it?
Driver: Yes, sir, but there’s no gun in it.
Sure enough, there was nothing in the glove box.
Captain: Would you mind opening your trunk? I was told you said there’s a body in it.
Driver: No problem.
Trunk is opened; no body.
Captain: I don’t understand it. The officer who stopped you said you told him you didn’t have a license, stole the car, had a gun in the glovebox, and that there was a dead body in the trunk.
Driver: Yeah, I’ll bet the liar told you I was speeding, too
June17
Three Disk Monte
I know, I know.
I’ve been promising the Three Disk Monte DVD and disk set for months.
After we reshot the DVD, we then shot some bonus material designed particularly for magicians.
The final cut is done and we are just waiting for our producer to return from the US so we can send the DVDs to print.
Once the DVD is finished, I can begin work on my other new project. A resource dedicated entirely to the Ten Card Poker Deal.
Watch this space.
June17
No Good Lying Werewolf
I have a confession to make.
Every couple of weeks I get together with a group of my friends and play the game ‘Werewolf’.
For the uninitiated, Werewolf is a party game in which two of the people in the room are secretly werewolves. This role is randomly selected by picking names out of hat. The rest of the group are villagers. It is the goal of the werewolves to kill as many villagers as possible and the goal of the villagers to stop them.
What I do for fun.
At the beginning of each round the werewolves choose a player to slaughtered. By the end of the round, the villagers must choose which of the group are the werewolves and lynch one person. If all of the villagers are slaughtered or accidentally lynch, the werewolves win.
There is no board or pieces or turns. Essentially, the game revolves around a group of adults shouting rash accusations and spouting paranoid theories at one another trying to decide which of the group is really a Twilight extra.
But that is not the confession.
The confession is that I am not very good at Werewolf.
I am almost always slaughtered in the very first round of lynching.
The problem is that my friends assume that I am liar. After all, I’m Australia’s Honest Con Man. I lie and cheat for a living. I’m supposedly an expert on such matters. I clearly can’t be trusted.
If my defense is weak, my friends see this as proof that I am lying and hang me up by my metaphorical neck.
If my defense is convincing, my friends see this as proof because, only a really good liar would make such a compelling argument.
Regardless of what I do, I always find myself sitting out the rest of the game.
Just a little game among friends
So what’s the lesson? Am I just a terrible liar? No, I’m quite a good liar. Outside of the game, I convince my friends all sorts of ridiculous stories. For example, I’m currently trying to spread the rumour that Chinese people eat Venus Fly Traps but, due to pollution in China, the species is dying out leading to a growth in the Australian Venus Fly Trap market. After all, we have so many flies here.
In reality, people see a lie when they are looking for one. Regardless of whether the person is telling the truth or not. According to a study by Richard Wiseman in his book Quirkology, most people’s ability to spot a lie is no better than luck. But if we believe someone is lying, we find all sorts of evidence to prove that claim. We see twitching fingers, darting eyes and sweaty brows because we need to.
It’s why, when we hear about the latest scams and swindles that we can’t believe someone would actually fall for that lie. We are looking for the lie and so we see it clearly.
In short, I’ll never be good at Werewolf because my friends know I am not to be trusted. And without a solid lead or piece of evidence to go on, they do what everyone does in that situation, they lynch the dodgy looking guy.
I’m not a werewolf, I’m a scapegoat.
At least, that’s what I want you to believe…
Besides, I don’t have the six pack to be a werewolf
June16
Lawrence Leung’s Unbelievable
Around eighteen months ago, comedian Lawrence Leung had me as a guest on his radio show.
At the time, he mentioned that he was working a new, top secret television show for ABC television.
Since there, I’ve heard whispers about the show from those involved.
Mentalist Banachek said he had a small role. Magician Tim Ellis admitted to being involved in a scene in Thai restaurant. I kept getting updates from Lawrence saying he was in San Fransisco and then Las Vegas and then Scotland.
After his last, TV series, Choose Your Own Adventure, I was excited.
Now, finally, the show has been revealed, it is called Unbelievable and it’s a six part comedy series in which Lawrence investigates psychics, UFOs, haunted houses and magic.
I went to the launch party last night and the crowd went wild for it. The show screens every Wednesday at 9:30 on ABC.
If you love the show, you might also enjoy my show about critical thinking for high school students, The Bad Science Show.
June6
The Variety Collective
I’m hosting a fantastic show on Wednesday night Open Studio in Northcote.
The show features the following great performers:-
EL BELLA - Who promises to bring her staple gun.
JACK DAN - Who promises NOT to do his one man naked ukulele act.
LUKE HOCKING - Who promises to perform some awesome magic.
TOSH GREENSLADE - Who promises to be very funny.
The show kicks off at 7:00. All Tickets are $10.
May24
Scambaiting & Parrot Selling
Everyone hates those pesky Nigerian swindlers.
Except the scambaiters. Scambaiting is the art of wasting con artist’s time.
For example, check out the video below and see exactly how far the scammers will go to get the cash.
May20
Playstation Network - The Full Story
As we all know by now, the Playstation Network was hacked a few weeks ago resulting in millions of customers personal information going missing. The question is, while we’ve been playing games with our PS3s, has Playstation being playing games with our data?
Here is the timeline.
September 21, 2006:Playstation announce downloadable content will be available on their new network for a small fee.
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2006-2011: Millions of gamers hand over names, addresses, credit card numbers and other personal information to Sony to access the content.
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17 April, 2011: Hackers gain access to the PlayStation network.
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20 April, 2011: Sony announce that “certain functions of the PlayStation Network are down.”
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22 April, 2011: Playstation admit an “An external intrusion on our system has affected our PlayStation Network.”
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27 April, 2011: PlayStation finally reveal that 75 million users have had their personal information stolen.
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2 May, 2011: An additional 24.7 million users are revealed to have their information stolen. Reuters call it the “the biggest Internet security break-in ever.”
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15 May, 2011: PlayStation network is back online in some countries. Also, every gets two free games including “LittleBigPlanet” and the ever popular “Seriously? Two free games? In exchange for all my data?”
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18 May, 2011: Spoke too soon. The network is offline again.
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19 July, 2012: The new PlayStation Network becomes self aware. Sony admits it was mistake to enlist Cyberdyne Systems to rebuild the network.
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16 August, 2012: Judgment Day. The machines strike back. The missiles are in the air.
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3 March, 2029: Resistance leader John Connor sends Kyle Reese back in time to stop the PlayStation Network. Also to see what he can do about the Super Mario Brothers Movie.
There is no fate but what we make.
April6
Today On ABC
This afternoon on ABC Statewide Drive, we’re going to be talking about:
- Have you been swindled online in a ‘romance scam’? Met a man or woman on the net who turned out to be a con artist?
- A new scam designed to swindle twitter users.
- Victorian businesses that have been conned out of $5 million in a telecommunication scam.
- Graham Hoy has been jailed for 13 years following the Hoy Chartwell scam.
- Melbourne IT have reported a rise in ‘cyber squatting’.
Tune in to ABC Statewide Drive in your area at 3:30 to listen in. Callers always welcome!
March28
Pop Haydn’s Radio Medicine Show
One of the most popular types of scams is identity theft.
And if there was one man whose identity I could steal it would be Pop Haydn.
There is no one in the world who knows more about The Shell Game and Three Card Monte than this guy.
Not only that, but he is also a talented magician and comedian.
His new radio show is out now and is definitely worth a listen.
In Pop’s words the show is:
The music on the show is eclectic Americana, with Old Time music, cowboy, blues, jazz, jug band, string band, ukelele and eccentric music from the 1890’s to the 1930’s.
Each selection is chosen for its medicinal qualities, creating a perfect prescription for healing the stress and purging the infelicities of the 21st Century.
