Hi there. I'm Ellen Horn. I'm one of the producers of Radio Lab. The recent CNN YouTube debate

reminded us here at the lab of the last national election season when the question of the influence

of the internet and politics was still shiny and new. This was back before Robert Crulwich was part of the

lab, back before the lab was a national show, back before there even was such a

thing as a podcast. We thought you might get a kick out of it. Take a ride in our audio way back

machine and have a listen to our episode called Contact from January of 2004.

Before we get started, just a warning, there's one part of this podcast about halfway through

the program, which uses pretty explicit language about sex.

We just wanted to let you know.

And now to the show.

Now?

Now? Okay.

You're listening to radio.

Radio. You're listening to radio.

Technology is changing our world. Technology is changing our world. Take the Toreg.

You may have heard of them.

They recently joined the ranks of ethnic groups with their own line of cars.

Mazda Navajo, the Jeep Cherokee, and now,

Volkswagen named their new SUV after the Toreg.

Toregs are traditionally nomadic.

Traditionally, they lived in the Sahara, and they had salt caravans, so they would go between like North Africa and West Africa, thousands of miles.

According to Aaron Clark, the days of the salt caravan are long gone, and the Toreg

...