The internet is a dumpster fire. Are you a firefighter? Or an arsonist?

This episode is a cracker. Sacha Judd is an expert on internet subcultures. A former lawyer, she has become something like “the Mark Cuban of New Zealand” - a smart, left-wing investor in high-growth startups; advisor to businesses; and fierce commentator on Big Tech.

Sacha wants to bring back the “good internet”: a place fueled by genuine community, creativity, and connection.

She and Josh wrestle with online conspiracy theories, artificial intelligence, social-media content moderation, whether platforms like Substack have a “Nazi problem”, and whether Mark Zuckerberg just wants to say the R-word.

They get into a few fascinating arguments about free speech, transphobia, A.I., and whether Twitter’s content moderation was ever ‘woke’. Don’t miss this terrific chat.

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For more on the Australian election, check out Josh’s Livestream with Peter van Onselen here.

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Do nuclear weapons protect Western civilisation? Or are they an insane error that humanity should undo? Is nuclear power worth the cost and risk?

Dave Sweeney co-founded the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), which won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2017.

Dave and Josh debate the risks and rewards of nuclear weapons and nuclear power in an unstable world, and discuss whether environmentalism is antithetical to progress.

To hear every bit of this fascinating, two-hour-plus conversation with no ads, subscribe here. And follow Dave's work at the Australian Conservation Foundation here.

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Have indigenous Welcomes-to-Country gone too far?

On Friday, far-right hecklers disrupted the Welcome to Country (i.e. the land acknowledgment, in North American parlance) of a profound Australian national event, the Anzac Day Dawn Service.

The protest has sparked a national firestorm about race, racism and remembrance.

Josh shares his thoughts about the coverage of the controversy, and then debates its deeper implications with the Indigenous scholar Tyson Yunkaporta.

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