{"podcast":{"title":"The James Altucher Show","slug":"the-james-altucher-show-745332","podcast_index_feed_id":745332,"rss_url":"https://rss.art19.com/the-james-altucher-pod","website_url":"https://art19.com/shows/the-james-altucher-pod","image_url":"https://content.production.cdn.art19.com/images/34/a7/46/11/34a74611-c0da-4a44-a715-4ccb112a1d8f/c3513d8cddd4964783e1bce38371b4fb8c71e6c742d348637b90ce97ebe7b7b14d61a2b1851e37b7e4ff22c9a9b1b7515c002298a4f73bad9a8e34bef76bd848.jpeg","author":"James Altucher","episode_count":1427,"summary":"James Altucher interviews the world's leading peak performers in every area of life. But instead of giving you the typical success story, James digs deeper to find the \"Choose Yourself\" story - these are the moments we relate to... when someone rises up from personal struggle to reinvent themselves. The James Altucher Show brings you into the lives of peak-performers: billionaires, best-selling authors, rappers, astronauts, athletes, comedians, actors, and the world champions in every field, all who forged their own paths, found financial freedom and harnessed the power to create more meaningful and fulfilling lives.","last_synced_at":"2026-08-02T06:21:27.954438+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-james-altucher-show-745332"},"episode":{"title":"The Viral Chess Cheating Scandal with Anal Beads: Ben Mezrich Reveals the Full Story","slug":"the-viral-chess-cheating-scandal-with-anal-beads-ben-mezrich-reveals-the-full-story","published_at":"2026-06-02T07:00:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-james-altucher-show-745332/the-viral-chess-cheating-scandal-with-anal-beads-ben-mezrich-reveals-the-full-story","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-james-altucher-show-745332","url":"https://art19.com/shows/the-james-altucher-pod/episodes/f80aab81-b561-4ed0-b609-a38097133286","audio_url":"https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/prfx.byspotify.com/e/claritaspod.com/measure/arttrk.com/p/PDPN1/pscrb.fm/rss/p/rss.art19.com/episodes/f80aab81-b561-4ed0-b609-a38097133286.mp3?rss_browser=BAhJIg90cmFuc2NyaWJyBjoGRVQ%3D--952c5701c84ad333c69d5faa668f8177091704f0","summary":"A Note from James: Oh my gosh, one of my favorite guests ever: Ben Mezrich. Ben wrote Bringing Down the House , which became the movie 21 . He wrote The Accidental Billionaires , which became The Social Network . And now his latest page-turner, Checkmate , is about one of the most explosive scandals in modern sports: the Hans Niemann chess cheating controversy that took over the world. You remember the story. Magnus Carlsen, the greatest chess player of all time, loses to this completely arrogant, egotistical 19-year-old bad boy of chess. Then Magnus accuses him of cheating. This had basically never happened before at that level in chess. What followed was a viral meltdown: the infamous anal beads tweet, death threats, lawsuits, chess.com, Netflix documentaries, and a chess world at war with itself. Ben spent over a year with Hans Niemann. He got access to Magnus’s camp, chess.com, and the drama behind the chessboards. So we talk about whether Hans actually cheated that day, the insane rise of online chess during COVID, the world of prodigies, the generational clash inside elite chess, and how one suspicious game nearly destroyed a young player’s career. So welcome to one of my favorite guests, Ben Mezrich. Episode Description: James talks with bestselling author and screenwriter Ben Mezrich about Checkmate , his new book on the Magnus Carlsen–Hans Niemann chess cheating scandal. It’s classic Mezrich territory: brilliant young people, high-stakes competition, huge money, a gray area between genius and rule-breaking, and a story that becomes much bigger than the facts alone. The conversation is especially strong because James knows the chess world firsthand. He was a master-level player, helped build early internet chess infrastructure, knows many of the top players, an…","meta_description":"A Note from James: Oh my gosh, one of my favorite guests ever: Ben Mezrich. Ben wrote Bringing Down the House , which became the movie 21 . He wrote The A…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":3588,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/the-james-altucher-show-745332/episodes/the-viral-chess-cheating-scandal-with-anal-beads-ben-mezrich-reveals-the-full-story/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-james-altucher-show-745332/the-viral-chess-cheating-scandal-with-anal-beads-ben-mezrich-reveals-the-full-story.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}