A special update (and thanks)

G'day all,

Just wanted to share something of a personal update since it owes a lot to you all.  It has been a genuine privilege to operate the channel over the course of the last 16 months. The reception has been incredible and I like to hope it's made some small difference in the wider information space.

It's also been a huge amount of work, both in terms of background OSINT work and preparing the episodes themselves. That coupled with keeping up my regular job to a high-standard has also made this last 16 months exhausting.

I'm now looking at adjusting my work arrangements to give me a bit more breathing room week by week. Not confirmed yet what exactly that looks like but that's where things are now headed.

I will obviously continue to work (a lot) outside YT, if for no other reason that it's important to me to be active in the sector if I'm going to be speaking on it. It's also because some of the work out there is genuinely important and very worth doing. But this should give me the chance to strike a more sustainable balance.

The support here is the main driver in giving me the confidence to make any change. Adsense revenue is never going to be particularly reliable and can disappear almost overnight (I reckon nearly every UA related creator has been demonetised at least once and some are still dealing with issues) and I've talked before about my approach to sponsorships and charity. So Patreon is the safety net, and it's giving me the option I'm now taking.

I add this note here for two reasons:

1 - to say thankyou for your past and ongoing support

2 - in an effort to be transparent about what your funds are being used for. Some will still be used to pay for sound work, equipment etc. but it's also buying me sleep, research time, and everything else in-between.

I'm not sure exactly how things will evolve in the future, but if support here holds up there are also some more exciting things I would like to be able to do relating to the channel in the future....but for now just let me say thank you for getting me to this point.