Welcome to a new year, a new world, a post-Trump, nearly almost maybe post-pandemic, reawakening, an opportunity to lift our gaze from the flickering lights of our phones and our Netflix marathons to crawl out of the squalid morass of online arguments

with their algorithmic distractions and their comforting outrages.

And to slough off the fake news and take a deep breath of the real world,

of real zoomless hangouts with flesh and blood friends

who you can talk to and reason with and at long

last have face-to-face conversations with and are generous and unruly and loving and spirited and maybe

hopefully a little bit uncomfortable. Welcome to the first show of the new season of uncomfortable conversations

with me, Josh Zepts. This is the safe space for unsafe ideas. And the good news is that

after a short hiatus, which you will notice we've had,

this is something with which my long-time podcast fans will now be somewhat familiar,

you patient little darlings, you. The show has been picked up by a podcast network,

A-cast, which was actually the first network that ever picked up We, the People Live, back in the day.

So I'm coming back home, baby.

Chicken's coming home to roost.

And I'm delighted to be part of Acast again.

What that's going to mean for you is more regular episodes, occasional ads,

and ultimately the opportunity to avoid those ads and get even more great content by supporting

the show, as so many of you did with We the People Live.

So lots of great stuff coming up in 2021.

I deleted the Twitter app and the Facebook app off my phone this week.

It felt like a mini-triumph.

I wonder if you've done it.

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