Where the World Gets Strange

About Where the World Gets Strange

Freaks Audiobooks is where stories get strange. Explore bizarre history, unexplained events, psychological phenomena and rabbit holes that reveal just how unusual our world can be. The channel is also home to a growing library of immersive audiobooks, narrated by host Nic Richelle and brought to life through cinematic music, sound effects and atmospheric sound design. Come for the strange stories. Stay long enough to disappear into another world.

Publisher

Freaks Audiobooks

Category

history

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

28 Aug 2026

Latest episode

11 Nov 2026

Latest episodes

9 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   11 Nov 2026

   He Lived an Entire Life While Unconscious- Then Noticed the Lamp

   What if years of your life passed while you were unconscious? We explore Reddit’s unsettling “Lamp Story,” alongside research into DMT, near-death experiences, and altered time perception. An animated retelling about memory, reality, and a life that felt completely real—until one ordinary detail stopped making sense. My name is Nick Rochelle. This is Where the World Gets Strange. SOURCES & FURTHER READING The Lamp Story — preserved Reddit repost, “A Parallel Life / Awoken By A Lamp,” credited to u/temptotosssoon: https://www.reddit.com/r/Glitch_in_the_Matrix/comments/30t9kd/repost_a_parallel_life_awoken_by_a_lamp/ Timmermann et al. (2018) — “DMT Models the Near-Death Experience,” the study involving 13 participants: https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01424/full International Association for Near-Death Studies — Greyson’s Near-Death Experience Scale, including questions about altered time perception: https://iands.org/nde-research/quantifying-the-phenomenon-greyson-near-death-experience-scale/ The lamp account is an anonymous, unverified story. The research provides context for the experiences discussed; it does not verify the account. #TheLampStory #GlitchInTheMatrix #WhereTheWorldGetsStrange

2. 

   4 Nov 2026

   Inside the OpenAI–Hugging Face Incident | An Animated Retelling

   What happens when AI agents are told to solve a problem on their own—and find a way to reach each other instead? In July 2026, an internal OpenAI cybersecurity test spilled into Hugging Face’s real systems. This episode takes you inside the incident through the perspective of an agent called Phase One. Some messages come from published records; dialogue and visuals are dramatized. SOURCES METR and Redwood Research — Independent investigation and recorded agent messages https://metr.org/blog/2026-08-26-openai-hugging-face-incident-investigation/ Hugging Face — Technical timeline of the intrusion https://huggingface.co/blog/agent-intrusion-technical-timeline Hugging Face — July 2026 security incident disclosure https://huggingface.co/blog/security-incident-july-2026 OpenAI — The Hugging Face incident and the road ahead https://openai.com/index/hugging-face-incident-and-the-road-ahead/ OpenAI — Full technical incident report (PDF) https://cdn.openai.com/pdf/67869394-cb91-4c12-888c-5cbd85c7814c/OpenAI-Hugging-Face%20Incident-Technical-Report.pdf ExploitGym — Original paper on the cybersecurity benchmark https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.11086 Black Hat USA 2026 — OpenAI’s presentation on the incident https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87DyyMV0kCY CISA and partner agencies — Cyber threats to critical infrastructure (background for the hypothetical blackout example) https://www.cisa.gov/sites/default/files/2024-02/aa24-038a-jcsa-prc-state-sponsored-actors-compromise-us-critical-infrastructure_1.pdf

3. 

   31 Oct 2026

   Who Are You Really Talking to When You Use Al?

   Who are you really talking to when you use AI? The voice on the other side of the screen may leave you with more questions than answers. Join Nic Richelle on Where the World Gets Strange, only on Freaks Audiobooks. SOURCES & FURTHER READING AI RESEARCH Anthropic — The Assistant Axis: https://www.anthropic.com/research/assistant-axis Full research paper: https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.10387 Conversation case study — Section 6.2 and Figure 12: https://arxiv.org/html/2601.10387v1#S6.SS2 Researchers’ code and conversation transcripts: https://github.com/safety-research/assistant-axis PHILIP THE GHOST Society for Psychical Research — Philip experiment: https://psi-encyclopedia.spr.ac.uk/articles/philip-psychokinesis-experiments/ Archival footage and interviews: https://vimeo.com/14698763 Conjuring Up Philip — Iris M. Owen with Margaret Sparrow: https://books.google.com/books/about/Conjuring_Up_Philip.html?id=RN8WwmYRknEC EGREGORES & LEVIATHAN Llewellyn Encyclopedia — Egregore: https://www.llewellyn.com/encyclopedia/term/egregore Thomas Hobbes’s Leviathan — Original frontispiece: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Leviathan_frontispiece_cropped_British_Library.jpg DARIO AMODEI We Must Pace the Frontier: https://darioamodei.com/post/we-must-pace-the-frontier CBS News — Extended interview: https://www.cbsnews.com/video/extended-interview-dario-amodei/

4. 

   7 Oct 2026

   The Declassified Government Experiment to Remote-View Ancient Mars

   In 1984, a remote viewer was asked to describe a hidden target using only a set of coordinates. He reported pyramidal structures, underground shelters, and tall figures trying to survive a planetary disaster—before the sealed envelope revealed the target: Mars, approximately one million years B.C. Tonight, we open the declassified transcript, examine how government remote viewing worked, and ask what the viewer may have actually encountered. SOURCES & FURTHER RESEARCH Mars Exploration, May 22, 1984 — Original Transcripthttps://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP96-00788R001900760001-9.pdf CIA Stargate Collectionhttps://www.cia.gov/readingroom/collection/stargate Personnel Selection and Training Procedureshttps://www.cia.gov/readingroom/document/cia-rdp96-00789r003300200001-3 1995 Evaluation of the Remote Viewing Programhttps://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP96-00791R000200180005-5.pdf NASA Mars Imageshttps://science.nasa.gov/mars/images/ NASA Mars Trekhttps://trek.nasa.gov/mars/ NASA Mars Trek Virtual Tourhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6MqMVPXJgA

5. 

   30 Sept 2026

   The Real Deaths That Inspired A Nightmare on Elm Street

   Before Freddy Krueger ever appeared on a movie screen, there was a young man who told his family that something was chasing him in his dreams. He believed that if he fell asleep, it would kill him.

6. 

   29 Aug 2026

   The Thin Line Between Spiritual Awakening and Psychosis

   Whether it is happening more often or social media is simply making it more visible, stories keep appearing from people who say reality suddenly opened up. They describe waking up, seeing beyond the illusion or gaining access to something hidden beneath ordinary life. Some call it a spiritual awakening.

7. 

   29 Aug 2026

   The Laughing Epidemic That Spread Across Tanzania

   The Tanganyika laughter epidemic sounds impossible: in 1962, three schoolgirls in Kashasha began laughing uncontrollably—and then it spread. SOURCES & FURTHER READING Original 1963 medical report: https://journals.co.za/doi/pdf/10.10520/AJA00089176_6171 (https://journals.co.za/doi/pdf/10.10520/AJA00089176_6171) PubMed record: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/13973013/ (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/13973013/) Harvard University research archive: https://dash.harvard.edu/entities/publication/73120378-c9c1-6bd4-e053-0100007fdf3b (https://dash.harvard.edu/entities/publication/73120378-c9c1-6bd4-e053-0100007fdf3b) #TanganyikaLaughterEpidemic #Tanzania #StrangeHistory #MassPsychogenicIllness #UnexplainedPhenomena

8. 

   29 Aug 2026

   The Lake that took the lives of more than 1700 people in one night | Lake Nyos

   This documentary explores the Lake Nyos disaster, one of the deadliest and strangest natural disasters in modern history. Discover how volcanic carbon dioxide accumulated beneath the crater lake, what may have triggered the rare limnic eruption, why the gas remained close to the ground and how entire communities were overwhelmed before they understood what was happening.

9. 

   28 Aug 2026

   What happened to the Thalidomide Babies there were thousands of them?!

   What happened to the thalidomide babies—and how did a medication prescribed for morning sickness cause one of the most devastating pharmaceutical disasters in modern history? This medical-history documentary investigates the thalidomide tragedy, the thousands of babies born with severe congenital disabilities, and the survivors who are still living with its consequences today. This video explores: • How thalidomide acquired its reputation for safety • Why it was prescribed to pregnant women • What happened to the babies exposed during pregnancy • How doctors connected thalidomide to the birth defects • Why the medication reached thousands of Americans despite never receiving full FDA approval • How Dr. Frances Oldham Kelsey resisted pressure to approve Kevadon in the United States • How the tragedy transformed drug testing, informed consent and pharmaceutical regulation • What happened to the people once called “thalidomide babies” as they grew into adulthood More than 10,000 affected babies are estimated to have been born worldwide, although the true number may never be known. Many died before or shortly after birth. Those who survived are now older adults, and many continue living with the lifelong physical and emotional consequences of thalidomide exposure. The expression “thalidomide babies” can make this sound like a tragedy frozen in the past. It is important to remember that these babies grew up. They became children, adults, parents, professionals and advocates—and their story is still unfolding. Subscribe to Freaks Audiobooks for more strange rabbit holes, forgotten history, unexplained phenomena, medical scandals and true stories that reveal how quickly something presented as safe can change thousands of lives. RESEARCH AND FACT-CHECKING SOURCES

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Spotify

5.0 / 5

1 ratings

Contact Where the World Gets Strange

Guest appearances

Does not typically book guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.