I went back and listened to the final
Disneyland podcast of 2017 right before Christmas break. They were looking at the calendar and seeing how the Sundays would fall, joking holding a podcast on News Years Eve would be a hot mess and decided to come back 1/7. Clearly, the team had zero knowledge of any hiatus.
Based on what has been said, it's "rebranding" according to Craig/Ryno(
YouTube comments) or "re-imagining" according to Tom (Facebook.) That makes me think some pretty serious changes.
They were about 10 weeks from hitting episode 750!! That's astonishing. they went YEARS without missing a weekly podcast until last summer. The team called in from some of the zaniest of places to participate each week. Frankly, the DL version is/was the most reliably consisted of all the Disunplugged podcasts, posted first thing Monday without fail. I almost took it for granted it would there for my Monday commute.
I really, really wish we could have had a send off "season finale" episode before they went into hiatus. The team is made of lovely people and I would have wanted to honor their incredibly passionate work so far. I would have wanted their friends in Mixlr to have given them the celebration and the gratitude they deserved before taking an extended break. The time, the extensive research, the constant awareness that not a single change at DL was made without the team noticing. They are VERY true DL fans, I remember a few months ago, some WDW vs DL issue came up in a new story, and it was hilarious what a forgone conclusion it was on where they stood, they couldn't even pretend to debate it. I so appreciated their loyalty. I honor them with my loyalty
I don't exactly know what the changes are, so it seems inappropriate to speak conclusively, but Pete, I can't help but feel the whole team deserves some kind of season finale to the original format.