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Matlana Media is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.
Matlana Media’s mission is to revive the human skills that travel once required. Through our video podcasts we celebrate humanity and all that arises when we dare to unplug and connect directly with curious, playful, idiosyncratic humans.
Ian & Justine backpacked through 100 countries on a small budget, communicating with hundreds of people from all walks of life. In the pre-digital era they navigated with the help of strangers, their own common sense, paper maps, phrasebooks and cash. Analog travel sharpened their instincts, broadened their minds, tuned their intuition. Uncertainty kept them humble, and attentive. They learned to improvise, and to communicate with their hands, gestures and words. They got good at reading the room and reading faces.
Those aren’t just travel skills. Those are human skills and they’re not exotic. They’re the skills behind a productive conversation, an apology, a collaboration, a flirtation.
We believe that our programs will inspire audiences to relearn these time-honored human skills.
Why now?
Today, social trust is fraying, screen time is soaring and loneliness is now a measurable cause of death. The WHO’s Commission links social disconnection to an estimated 871,000 deaths a year, and finds that one in six people worldwide is lonely. The rates are highest among adolescents and young adults—the first generation to grow up with a screen in their hands. Human interaction is fundamental to our mental health.
Before smartphones, a journey unfolded at its own pace. Boredom wasn’t something to escape; it gave the mind space to wander. A long bus ride could send us into our imagination; a wrong turn could become an adventure. We weren’t constantly documenting ourselves or checking in with the outside world. We were anonymous, undistracted, and left to our own devices. There was room to notice where we were, who was around us—and what was going on inside us.
The Globe Trekker archive deserves a second life
Tens of millions from around the world grew up with Globe Trekker and are eager to see it again. We are bringing the Globe Trekker archive back to life, not as nostalgia but as a new model. This archive is not merely a travel archive, it is also a behavioral one: the footage documents humans being together in ways that have nearly vanished in a single generation.
While the series is no longer available for streaming, Matlana Media enjoys privileged access to the Globe Trekker archive: hundreds of hours filmed during the pre-digital era, showing humans navigating the globe with the help of strangers, maps, phrasebooks, and their own common sense. Matlana Media is in a position to incorporate select footage from the Globe Trekker archives into the video podcast episodes. If Matlana Media were not working with this treasure trove, it would be gathering dust in a storage unit.
We're not anti-technology
The technologies that distract and divide us are also our distribution channels. We don’t scold the audience for holding a phone. We hold one too. We just don’t want it to become a third appendage.
Our Looney Planet aims to bring balance to the table. We just think it's important to remember that an unmediated world still exists and we are here to celebrate that place and our role in it.
Donations fund the production of our long-form work—the video podcast series—alongside two social media clips a day. Without nonprofit support, we'd have to allocate more of our resources into social media marketing churning out four or more clips per day.
We are not beholden to the machine
As a nonprofit, the majority of our funding comes from foundations and individual donors—not advertisers. Independent funding allows Matlana Media to create entertainment that inspires you and your family to put your screens away. Nobody pays us to keep you glued to our channels.
The audience is finding us
In our first year, from the start of Season 1 through August 24, 2026, fan engagement has been stellar. Within that timeframe our YouTube Channel has reached 68 countries and our podcast has reached 66 countries. On Instagram our engagement rate by reach is 19.59%, against an average of 4–6%. On YouTube our engagement rate by views is 5.96%, against an average of 1–3%. And on TikTok our engagement rate by views is 9.55%, against an average of 5–10%.
Before we launched Our Looney Planet in October 2025, neither Ian, nor Justine, nor Globe Trekker had a social media profile. Since then, thousands of messages have poured in from India to Latin America to Europe to the USA, astounding us with their warmth and enthusiasm for this new project. Our Kickstarter raised $25,000 from nearly 200 backers.
Season 2: six video podcast episodes and a new video series
Hello Again Globe Trekker (3 video podcast episodes)
Ian & Justine reunite with the intrepid team behind the making of the iconic ’90s travel series Globe Trekker, intercutting their stories with footage from the Globe Trekker archives. Each one hour episode took four weeks to shoot, and back in the Stone Age—before cell towers dotted every landscape—getting the job done meant relying on analog travel skills: reading a paper map upside down in a moving jeep, haggling in sign language, knowing which tour guide to trust, and packing the van with socks stuffed with coins (in case we happened upon a working pay phone) and whiskey (for bribing anyone who might have a line on a helicopter).
Hello Stranger (3 video podcast episodes)
Ian & Justine chat with someone they’ve never met and know nothing about. No briefing, no bio. Ian & Justine know only one thing about their guest: the city they live in. Our producer does the matchmaking, then steps back and we all find out who this person is together. The conversation starts from zero, the way it does when you find yourself sitting next to a stranger on a bus, or a train, in the bleachers, or on a plane.
Personal Geographies (videos)
Where Globe Trekker was made by a mostly white Western production team, Personal Geographies inverts that model and hands the camera to the people the show once filmed: a local who takes us through their city in their own voice, chatting with locals and tourists, meeting up with friends, steering us to favorite spots. Those voices offer a multiplicity of perspectives on a single location. The pilot is in production.
Season 2 is up to you
Season 1 was funded by the Khosravi Family Foundation and contributions from individual donors.
Season 2 launches in September 2026. Thanks to 188 Kickstarter backers we were able to go into production on the first two episodes of Season 2. To complete production of the full Season 2, Matlana Media needs to raise and additional $250,000.
If you’ve ever gotten lost and a stranger helped you out then you already understand what we are trying to protect.
Welcome to Our Looney Planet. We are grateful for your participation.
Donate today.
$50 covers coffee for the team for 1 month.
$150 covers one month’s software subscription fees
$350 funds the sound mix on one video podcast episode.
$600 funds the edit on a week’s worth of social media clips.
$1,200 covers one month’s rent
$2,500 funds one episode of Personal Geographies
$4,000 brings one episode of Hello Stranger to life.
$6,000 brings one episode of Hello Again Globe Trekker to life.
If would like more information please don’t hesitate to contact us: hello@ourlooneyplanet.com.
Justine reads every email.
Donate online or mail a check to:
MATLANA MEDIA
1442A Walnut Street, #202
Berkeley, CA 94709
United States of America
For grants, major gifts, donor-advised funds, stock, or wire transfers, please contact us at hello@ourlooneyplanet.com.
MATLANA is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. EIN: 39-4114517.
Contributions are tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law.
Board Members
Justine Shapiro, President and CEO
Jena Resner, Secretary
Jocelyn Leroux, Treasurer
Deirdre English, Director
