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Belson mentions receiving funding for his book The Age of Giants, in this podcast. Shown here is Belson's rough take on the book's front cover art, using one of the photos Ed Guyler took during his investigation.

During the final few months of the Giantology campaign in which the five hoaxes were published, blog author Eric Belson published four podcasts where he commented on the "discovery" of giants across the world. (An exception is the second podcast, which Belson replaced with the Arkady Simkin interview.) This article is about the third podcast.

Summary[]

Belson admits he "kind of cheated" by substituting the Arkady Simkin interview for a second podcast, and humorously promises his listeners that this podcast will be entirely his "nasal and irritating voice". After mentioning a news story about the (actual) discovery of the remains of an extinct, unusually large prehistoric ape, Belson segues into "the big news": the Arkady Simkin interview.

Belson mentions a "guest" on the radio program who was contacted a helicopter pilot that the video was a hoax (it is unknown if the pilot was a part of Arkady's team, or a member of Polarneft's "rescue team" responsible for removing Arkady from the discovery site), and that the whole video was shot by Sony in Alaska as a promotion for Shadow of the Colossus. Belson also mentions he has received a huge amount of mail from keen visitors who agree the video is not genuine. He responds by claiming that not only has he also received a wealth of information from archaeologists and scientists that point in the video's favor, but that it would be ridiculous for Sony to prank him by posing as one of Simkin's colleagues in the hopes of reinforcing a shady cover-up.

Finally, now that his blog has grown exponentially in popularity and support, Belson announces he has quit his job in order to pursue his goal of researching and writing his book, The Age of Giants. The donations and other offers given to him by his diverse visitors have also paved the way for another of Belson's goals: to travel the world in search of evidence that giants once walked the earth.


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Transcript[]

Eric Belson: Hello, and welcome to the Giantology podcast. I know I kind of cheated on my last podcast by just posting the Arkady Simkin interview, so I figured I'd devote the full podcast this time around to my own nasal and irritating voice. So bear with me.

First thing: I wanted to briefly mention an incredible news story from Monday - proof positive that giants and humans once existed side by side...for about a million years, in fact. Now, I'm going to try to get this right - the Gigantopithecus blacki was ten feet tall, weighed twelve hundred pounds, and ate bamboo. It's not quite as romantic as the giant shown in the tsunami video, but it's still pretty darn cool in my opinion.

Now onto the big news. I don't know how many of you listen, but the past Monday night into Tuesday morning, Arkady Simkin's Siberian Ice Giant was briefly discussed on national radio. I stayed up to listen, and found out that the guest, whom I will call my "esteemed competitor in the field of Giantology" was contacted by a helicopter pilot who told him that the ice giant video was faked by a team from Sony, sent to Alaska to shoot a promotion for the PlayStation game Shadow of the Colossus. Now that may very well be the case, but allow me to follow a thread of logic that might seem a little convoluted at first, but just stick with me for a moment and hopefully it'll bear out.

Boris

Boris Atlasov (pictured above) emailed Eric Belson in the hopes of posting his video of the Franz Josef Land giant.

First off, I have definitely received a lot of emails from Giantology fans who are absolutely convinced that all of the recent giant discoveries are fake. But I've also received email from a number of sources that directly contradict these claims, from researchers and archaeologists who have direct experience with finds of incredible size. Articles from old magazines have been sent to me, and I've also received offers of research assistance and funding from around the world, and I will get into a little bit of that later on in the podcast. And then there's the news story about giant apes coexisting with mankind that I mentioned earlier.

Now, second point: while debunking the Siberian video, they also dropped why we consider a tantalizing clue about so-called "real discoveries" coming out of the Franz Josef Land. This guy claimed that the PlayStation video was being used to cover up the real findings, and the basis for these claims was a helicopter pilot who's never been identified. So: one day, the Siberian video is the absolute discovery of Leviathan from the Bible, and the next day, based on an unsubstantiated report from an unknown party, PlayStation is part of an international plot to cover up the existence of giants by doing what? - making fake videos of giants and setting them in the exact location of the real discoveries. Does that make sense to anyone? And who is the phantom chopper pilot?

And then, there's Boris. Now, Boris claims to be the colleague of Arkady Simkins [sic][1]. He contacted me personally via email, asked me not to reveal his last name or email address, and promised to provide me with the 3D seismic survey of the Siberian ice giant. I don't intend to give out his email, but I have looked at the headers and tracked them, and I can say it is legitimately coming from the UK. Now granted, I haven't heard from Boris in well over a week, and Arkady has gone completely AWOL, but it just seems very strange to me; if you plot everything together according to the guy in the radio show, none of it really adds up. I mean, if PlayStation really is collaborating on some incredible cover-up - which seems completely preposterous, but let's just go with it for a minute - then why on earth are they contacting me, pretending to be a guy named Boris? What could that possibly gain them? And if this really is just a promotional campaign for Shadow of the Colossus, then again, why on earth are they contacting me, pretending to be a guy named Boris? So none of this is adding up, and I'm just not convinced that PlayStation is behind it all - unless I'm just being used as a patsy in some impossible marketing conspiracy, in which case I wouldn't mind at least getting a free copy of the game out of it! So, if anyone's listening at Sony, email me and I will give you my address.

Okay. On to personal news. So, I recently mentioned getting a book deal, and quitting my job to devote myself to research and writing. So the question is, how have I spent my first week as a free man? Well, I've done it like any good writer: I've been sleeping in, eating junk food, and watching tons of daytime TV. Well, technically, that's not all I've done. I've also been organizing our office/guest room, and I've been talking to a few people about something that will definitely help my efforts to write The Age of Giants: money! So, in addition to the research funding and the advance, I've also got a few patrons out there who are willing to donate some of their own resources to help me on my quest; there are apparently a lot of would-be Giantologists in the world.

So here's the thing: it actually looks like I'm going to be doing some serious travelling in the next few months. Where? Well, that hasn't been decided yet, but I'm looking into a few locations where there have been some unusual finds lately, including the Franz Josef Land. That said, I would definitely like your input, so to all my Giantology brethren out there, please email me or send a comment to the blog if you have any suggestions on places to look for giants - and, just try to keep it clean, because if you're gonna suggest that I check my ass, I already did that, and I didn't find any giants.

I'd also like to thank everyone once again for their friendly wishes on my book deal. I do apologize sincerely for the book cover; I agree with everyone who said it was bad, but it was just for fun, and I'll be the first to admit that my image-editing skills suck.

And on that note, this is Eric Belson, signing off for the Giantology podcast.


  1. It is unclear whether Belson meant to say "a colleague of Arkady Simkin's", or simply mispronounced Arkady's last name as "Simkins"; this transcript assumes the latter mistake was made.

External links[]


SotCFullTemplate
The Game Shadow of the Colossus ( Demo  · Pal Release  · Shadow of the Colossus HD  · PS4)
Characters Wander  · Agro  · Mono  · Dormin  · Lord Emon  · Guards  · Shadows
The Colossi I  · II  · III  · IV  · V · VI  · VII  · VIII  · IX  · X  · XI  · XII  · XIII  · XIV  · XV  · XVI
Unused Colossi ( Devil  · Evis  · Griffin  · Phoenix  · Roc  · Saru  · Sirius  · Spider  · Worm  · Yamori A  · Buffalo  · Quetzalcoatl)
Magic Sigil  · Hard Mode
Colossus Arenas Temple  · Proto  · Arena  · Kirin's Hill  · Canyon · Canossa  · Lakeside  · Underground  · Geyser  · Gravewind  · Leo's Cave  · Poseidon's Lake  · Desert  · Ruins  · Parthenon  · Sanctuary
Unused Arenas ( Badlands  · Cave  · Crater  · Devil's Plain  · Dune  · Hillock  · I1  · Labyrinth  · Sluice  · Stonehenge  · Valley )
The Forbidden Lands Shadow creaturesSave shrinesFruit treesWhite-tailed lizards

The Shrine of Worship
Umbral GladeStone Arch GorgeDried MarshNorthern SpanDesert FortressMisty FallsRavine EntranceHalf-moon CanyonWestern PlainRound Stone HillLair to the WestStone Bridge CliffCliff PathLair on the MesaWestern CapeArch Bridge PlainBlasted LandsAutumn ForestEastern BluffValley PlainSouthwestern CapeSouthern PlainGreen CapeThe Broken Seal

Soundtrack Roar of the Earth
Walkthrough Time AttackGolden Coins
Other media Nico  · Official artbook/guidebook  · Collectible figurines  · Film adaptation
Giantology campaign
Hoaxes Jebal-Barez skeletonTamil Nadu tsunami giantSulu Sea eel statuePolarneft conspiracySayre family vacation
Characters Eric BelsonCasper ShillingEd GuylerArkady SimkinBoris AtlasovAndrew and Ellie Sayre
Media Giantology podcasts (FirstInterview with Arkady SimkinThirdFourth) • IPICP memo


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