As we gather today to mark a remarkable journey through the annals of Greek history, I am filled with gratitude and excitement. Together, we've traversed 83 episodes, spanning the rich tapestry of Greece from its nascent days to the dramatic onset of the Peloponnesian War. Looking ahead, I'm thrilled to contemplate the untold stories that may unfold beyond Alexander the Great's demise. It's a testament to your engagement and curiosity that we're even considering this expansion of our historical horizon. Moreover, I want to share a heartfelt thank you for your steadfast support—without which this podcast couldn't thrive. The evolution of our release schedule to a monthly episode is a move to safeguard the caliber of our storytelling, balancing the growing demands on my time with my commitment to providing you with the best possible listening experience.
Turning our gaze to the revamped Patreon offerings, we've sculpted new tiers with the aim of making our content even more rewarding and accessible. As we forge into the year ahead, anticipate a fresh rhythm of episodes—each one meticulously crafted for mid-month release, while our dedicated patrons can look forward to exclusive early-month content. I invite both our seasoned supporters and newcomers to explore the refreshed Patreon landscape, where a deeper dive into Greek history awaits. Your enthusiasm has been the bedrock of this podcast, and I'm eager to continue this shared passion for the stories that have shaped our world, as we embark on the next chapter of our historical quest.
Hello everyone, mark here and welcome to this update episode for March 2024. So I just wanted to give a brief update of what's been happening in the series and how things are looking as we go forward as well. There's been a couple of changes, so I just want to let you all know how things are going and how things are going to look in the future. So I just want to cover over things such as how things have been going in the series so far, how the series is going to look, going forward, and also some changes that have happened with Patreon. So so far in the series, I've been blown away. It's been fantastic to see the support that's come through over the years. It's been now four and a bit years since the series has been going and I've just been watching it grow and grow and more and more people come along for the ride and get interested in Greek history. It's been great seeing the messages of support coming through and also seeing all the reviews that you leave about the show. It's very encouraging and very motivating as well for me. So thank you all for doing that. So four and a bit years and also 83 episodes I think we're up to 83 now. That's seen us come a fair way so far. We've covered the early history of Greece. We looked at the archaic age, heading to the Greco-Persian Wars, spent a bit of time around the Greco-Persian Wars, and then also we spent we detailed a fair few episodes around the period between the Persian invasions and heading to the Peloponnesian War. My big motivation in wanting to do that was, through my own reading of Greek history, I often found that this period was neglected somewhat, it only being treated in far less detail. So I wanted to try and draw out as much as I could from the limited information and see what we could try and understand what was taking place in this period. So I hope you enjoyed our look over that period. It was definitely enlightening to me. I mean, I'm learning things as we go along as well. It's the great thing about doing this series. Although I've got somewhat of an understanding of Greek history, when you're trying to understand it on a deeper level, you definitely learn a lot more Then. Now this is basically soon as now come to the beginning of the Peloponnesian War, where we are now, and we're in the first sort of few years there. So yeah, it's been a great ride. I've enjoyed everything so far and I'm looking forward to how things develop in the future. And talking about the future give you a bit of a sense of how things are going to look, going forward. Obviously, content-wise, we're in the Peloponnesian War, so we'll be continuing with this period for some time and we've got a lot of episodes left just in the Peloponnesian War period. After this we've got the periods of hegemonies, where Sparta, corinth, thebes and different city-states rise to a position of preeminence. Then we'll also start looking into the rise of Macedon and their arrival south into Greek lands, and then this will then develop into the campaigns of Alexander.
Speaker 1:
Now I know when I first started out I sort of spoke about the death of Alexander being my end point in the series, though as I delve further into the series, I'm unsure that this is where I'll be ending things. Obviously, that's still a long way off. It's many years to go and many, many episodes till we get to that point. But as I continue on, I'm not convinced that's where I want to end things now. I want to keep going a bit further, but we'll see how things develop.
Speaker 1:
But the main thing that's going to change for this year about how things are going forward is that I've become a bit busier in my personal life and with work, which is putting a bit of pressure on trying to release a new episode every fortnight. I do like to spend a fair bit of time researching and getting the episode ready. So what I've decided to do because I do want to keep a regular schedule that people can rely on, knowing that the episode will be released on a certain day at a certain time I've taken the steps to releasing once a month. Now this is basically just so that I don't burn out trying to keep up with the schedule I had been keeping now that things have got a bit busier in life, and it will also allow me to stay consistent with the releases. So I felt like to stay consistent and reliable. I just needed to back off the release schedule a little bit, and I hope everyone understands and it will also help me still release episodes to the same quality that have been coming out previous. So that's the main change that's going to happen just for this year. Basically, for the rest of the year that's how I'm going to operate and then, heading into the next year, I'll reassess how things look and if it seems like I can up the pace a bit, I will. Or if I somehow manage to get a backlog of episodes, then maybe we can head back to Fortnall air releases and see how things go from there.
Speaker 1:
And the other main change has to do with Patreon and how I've restructured things over there. So everyone that's already on Patreon you would have got a message from me just describing the changes and how to go about changing to one of the new tier levels. Basically, what's happened here is all the tiers have become a bit cheaper and I've sort of lumped everything into one tier just to streamline things. So what this means is Hoplite. The Hoplite tier level. It's $2 a month. You get your ad free episodes and early access to the series episodes. So this is pretty much as it was before, just for half the price. Then the strategist level it's $5 Australian a month. This was the most popular tier before and I've dropped the price on it a little bit. Basically, you get the same rewards as the Hoplite Plus. You also get your monthly bonus episodes, reference transcripts and any other projects that do develop that become Patreon only will be featured in this level as well.
Speaker 1:
I do have a few in mind. It's just a matter of getting the time to develop them. Also here, listener involvement is encouraged. If you've got ideas of what you'd like to see covered in these bonus episodes, I'd love to hear from you. I've had a few people in the past that have reached out and some interesting episodes have developed around those discussions. So that's our strategist level. Then I've got Archon. The Archon level is $10 Australian. Basically it is the same rewards as the Strategos.
Speaker 1:
The only reason I created this one was in the past I've had some people reach out asking how they can provide a bit more financial assistance. They weren't necessarily looking for anything extra for it, but just wanted to extend a bit more support to the show. So that's why I've just created Archon level. Sitting there, you get everything the same that's in Strategos. But what I'm also going to do is at the end of every episode I'll have like a special section where I'm gonna give a bit of a shout out to all the supporters that are signed up as Archons. So yeah, no big changes. It's just three levels. If you're already on Patreon, I've sent a message that explains all the changes and how to go about changing your tier level. If you haven't signed up for Patreon previously, much appreciated if you head over just to have a look at what's on offer over there. I think there's something like 37 bonus episodes at the moment. That grows every month. And, yeah, if you've been thinking about extending some support to the show, I would be very much appreciated if you are considered supporting us that way.
Speaker 1:
Though Patreon isn't the only way to support the show, there's many other ways to do it as well. Leaving reviews for the show definitely help us out. Sharing episodes that come up on Facebook or Twitter or other social media with your friends and family Basically, anything that helps spread the word about the show definitely helps out and is very much appreciated. But, yeah, they're the main things I just wanted to update everyone on.
Speaker 1:
Obviously, the two biggest things were just scaling back the release schedule for this year. So basically, this is gonna look like one series episode a month. The plan is that this episode will come out midway through the month and then the Patreon episode will come out at the start of every month and then, yeah, the second major change was just the restructure on Patreon. So, yeah, if you're already on Patreon, there's a bit more detailed information in the message I sent you all, and if you haven't signed up to Patreon or have been thinking about it. Just head over and check it out and see what you think. But yeah, I think that covers everything we need to. But, yeah, thanks everyone for the support and I look forward to continuing on for 2024. Thank you.