Tip for your next podcast: The Habbo mystery
Did you also listen with reference to “Looking for Marlotte?”? Okay, I already read online about people who had comments, but right or left: it is a true story that I listened to with fascination. Wonderful. This is also immediately why I was looking forward to the next one. And maybe you are too. This tip is already more than a year old, but if you haven't listened to it yet, please start tonight. Because this one is just a bit different, but at least as intriguing: ‘The Habbo Mystery“. Really a recommendation. I certainly couldn't stop listening again. And that says something…
Below are some details + what you can expect.
What is ‘The Habbo Mystery’ about?
It is a Dutch podcast series (love it) with 6 episodes, produced by Algemeen Dagblad and regional newspapers.
The story revolves around Anja van der Zwan from Scheveningen, a super nice friendly woman in her late 50s who grows up in a very close-knit loving real Scheveningen family. Anja comes into contact with the computer game Habbo Hotel through a family member.
Habbo is a virtual social world where players can chat, build rooms, play games, and collect virtual items. It’s all about social contacts and connections.
Through this online game Habbo Hotel, a friendship develops between Anja and a Belgian woman. That friendship later also develops outside the online world. They text and call a lot and meet each other in real life as well. But after a while, it escalates: Anja becomes increasingly detached from her family, suddenly moves, changes her will, and ultimately dies. Her family is confronted with many questions about what exactly happened.
The podcast raises questions about manipulation, free will, how much influence online friendships can have, and whether there is abuse or involuntary dependency.
Why it is worth it
It has a really special approach: a digital game world (Habbo) plays a big role in a story that takes dramatic turns in real life quite early on. That makes it different from “standard” true crime. The journalism is carefully constructed: according to reviews, reporter Jorina Haspels knows how to build tension well and keep you questioning continuously.
But it also raises moral and societal questions: namely, what is “free will” when someone completely detaches from family? What is the role of online communities?
If you, like me, enjoy podcasts with a light tone AND tension, then this one is really easy to follow and truly intriguing.
Just pay attention
This podcast is presented as ‘true’ and even as ‘true crime’, but there has of course been criticism about that: the Council for Journalism ruled that the series is “one-sided and tendentious” due to late rebuttal and that a crime has not been proven. True, but all parties have been extensively heard, interviewed, and invited to tell their own story.
Listen here The Habbo Mystery.
Do you have any tips for me? I am looking for the next fascinating podcast, so let me know.
