Kraut_and_Tea

We are going to Ancient Greece

The topic of the next video, which will be the first short video, and probably around 17 minutes long, will be Ancient Athens. Specifically we will be confronting the romantic myth of Ancient Greece being an "ancient liberty" and show how it is actually untrue. Then we will use Ancient Athens as an example of how a tribal society evolves into a state society, through the creation of political insitutions and laws.

Short videos are happening

I just finished the recording of the audio for the first short video (18 minutes) on my channel in 2 years. I have to be honest, I am very nervous. I don't know how you guys will like, or even be ok with a transition from long into short content. But I basically have to do it for at least the next 8 to 9 months. Once I have healed my channel up a little in the algorythm, and saved up enough money to pay a group of artists a fair wage, we will return to a long 4 hour series again.

The full 4 hours

I am again very sorry for the mistakes I made in picking the date of premiere in the publication calendar. For those of you how started watching and now can not. Here is a link to the full 4 hour video with all parts edited togeter. If you remember where you were yesterday, you can now continue watching :)

Sorry I made a mistake in publishing

Ok. Because I made a little mistake in the planning the premiere is today instead of tomorrow. (I got the date wrong)

So, join us today at 8pm central European time for "The Mexican American Border | From War to Wall" the final part of this 3 part series! 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uek04Jw15kY

And if you have questions about the video and want to ask me those, or discuss the video,...

You are always welcome!

I'm again receiving emails by some of you who are appologizing for being unable to pay out your patreon pledge for the recent video. I posted this the last time and I will post it here again. 

 Please, do NOT appologize!

I am greatful for your contributions, you are under no obligation whatsoever to support my channel. You can just as well watch my videos for free. The fact that you decided to make a contribution, even if it is just a dollar, is extremely kind and genero...

Patreon Stream about the video

I missed out on the last two Patreon streams. Sorry for that, I was so close to finishing the video in both these cases that I postponed them. However this friday, I would like to do a stream right after the video ends, and hear you opinions, thoughts, criticisms, suggestions, and questions about this recent video. All 10$ plus Patreons will be welcomed on :)

The Mexican American Border | From War to Wall

In 1911 Mexico underwent an enormous transformation through revolution. But the Republic born that promised to end inequality and authoritarianism dragged Mexico into further poverty and authoritarianism… all of which leads to an important question: What went wrong?

Just a one day delay.

So the video is finished, it is up on my channel as unlisted. But I can not give you the link to it yet. That is because I need to wait for the approval of the Sponsor to put it out there in any way, and I did the rather silly thing of forgetting that most companies don't work on sundays.... lol. So there was nobody around to give me the final approval to publish the video or share it with Patreons. I have to now unfortunately wait until that company opens up again on monday, and someone ther...

I am posponing the merch store

The video is finished, all that is missing is to set up a merch store. And i dislike waiting for that process to be finished. I have therefore made the decision to pospone the merch store. I will probably give you patreons early access to the video tomorrow, then publish it on friday. I will work on the merch store afterward. 

What big series comes in 2022?

We will make short videos after Mexico, for at least 6 months. That means that there will not be any long videos whatsoever until 2022. BUT, I am determined to make 4-5 hour long series that are more in-depth about a topic again. Therefore I would like to ask you to vote on the next 4-5 hour long video series. That way i can keep pressure on myself, and know that I will have to do this. And it will also make me happy to know that I have to work on this, and I can start researching and writing...

First Patreon Stream Tomorrow

Hey! I want to do the first Patreon live stream tomorrow. I would like to do it between 8pm central European time to 10 pm, or possibly even until 12 pm. If you wish to take part, please join the public server: derserver.xyz and the bot should automatically assign you a role. I will do an announcement when we stream and will set up a system by which Patreons will be invited onto the stream. I will be streaming it on twitch.

Patreon Streams, when?

I finally managed to create a stream schedual!!! I will be streaming every thursday and saturday. Which one of these would you like to have as the Patreon stream with the 20$ plus patreons?

Thank you. Alp Mapper.

For a year I had the great pleasure of working with the Turkish Artist  Alp Mapper

He joined me in January 2020, when I was dog-headed and stubbornly trying to make a 4 hour long series about Turkish history on my own.  Alp Mapper  was one of a group of artists who convinced me that I needed to stop, relax, and entrust other artists with drawing artwork for my videos. Since then he has contributed to finishing the Series about Turkish history, and the first two parts of t...

No need to appologize

Hey, so a few of you sent me emails that you are not able to pay me out for the last video.

That is perfectly ok :)

I think I posted this before, you do not have to appologize to me when you have a rough month or a few rough months and need money. Or when you have to cancel due to financial difficulties. It's ok :)

2 Months of Stress and hard work incoming.

Hey, I wanted to take the time to tell you about the plans for this channel within the next couple of months and the rest of the year.

I have been taking a close look at my channel analytics and I can tell that you all really like the long video format of 4 hour-long series divided up into 1 hour-long videos. I enjoy doing these too. They are great. And they are different. And the fact that I managed to make these cheaply with a small team of artists is also a point of pride for me. The...

The quest for a monetized video.

I'll tell you a little secret, I have not had a video fully monetized on my youtube channel in over 3 years. Mostly the topics are just not deemed as ad friendly by youtube. Sometimes videos just get claimed. For example, the "Trump's biggest Failuire" China video was claimed by a record company whose music was uploaded and falsely presented to me as "royalty free". Because of that the estimated 4 000 to 15 000 dollars in ad revenue that this video made with it's 3 million views went in it's ...

The Mexican American Border | Manifest Destinies

As announced, you now get early access to the video :)

The Premier will be tomorrow.

The 19th Century was an important era in the shaping of relations between Mexico and the United States of America. Expansions West and North formed the foundation for an Imperial war of expansion between the two countries that would shape their modern border. We will deeper examine the origins of this conflict, as well as tell the story of Texan independence and how it shaped Mexican-American cult...

Patreon pre-publish access

I am thinking of giving you all early access to the video before it premiers. Would you like that? I would make it a Patreon perk if you would enjoy that.

I am a business now, and what it means for the future.

I registered my youtube channel as a company today. This might look small, but I believe it comes with responsibilities. A big one among these being to explain to you why I did this, and what this means for this channel, and the videos it will produce going forward. I intend to do so here.

First: Honest Taxation

I never made a lot of money with youtube. I have run a youtube channel for almost 5 years. And when you add up all the money this channel made in these 5 years it is a tot...

Full disclosure on Sponsorship

I have received a Sponsorship worth 3000 dollars for the next video. I wanted to disclose this information with you in it's entirety. These 3000 dollars, together with 1000 dollars from patreon, will be added into a pot to be used to pay out the artists who contributed artwork for the next video. Meaning the earnings of the next video will be divided 50/50 between me and the artists. I want there to be financial transparency between us.

After Mexico

I am halfway through the second part of the 3 part Mexico series. At this point, it would be time for me to start working on the video series after Mexico. 4 months ago we did a poll that concluded with you voting for a video about Franceafrique. Unfortunately, another content creator made a video on this topic in the time. However, what is good for us is that the vote was 49.9% to 49.8% split on the topic, with the other possible topic being about the instability of political institutions ac...

Anti Asian Racism

I have by now received a lot of emails, comments and messages by Asian subscribers who are angry about the depiction of Asian countryballs with slits as eyes. As some of you may know it is part of the polandball rules on various forums and subreddits that Asian countryballs are depicted that way. However to people who are new to polandball this can be extremely offputting or just outright racist. And to be very frank with you, the several emails I have received about this at this point, in pa...

Delay due to health issue

I had a dental accident today that I think may have shattered the crown of one of my teeth. The pain is quite significant and as much as I try to concentrate on work, I was only able to get half as much done as I would usually today. It will take me a few days to get to the dentist as I have to make an appointment and lost my social security card which I have to find). So I believe there will be a substantial setback and time delay in work because of this. I am terribly sorry for this. Yours....

A Question about Work for you

This may be a bit unexpected but I wanted to ask you all how you would feel about me maybe quitting my job in August, September, or October and making Youtube a full time thing? How would you feel about that? Do you think it would be wrong?

Thank you.

I just checked my mailbox and found that one of you has sent me this book from ym wishlist (I don't know if I have your approval to mention your name, but thanks for the thank you note) Thank you a lot for sending me this book. I want to eventually make a video about how much the Franco dictatorship negatively impacted democratic and economic development in Spain, and a colleague with who I studied history recommended this book. But I have to say, since you already are patreons, there really ...

An exceptional donation, that requires an exceptional thank you.

You all voted for Franceafrique to be the next topic after the Mexico-American border series and I will make this as soon as the Mexico series is done. However there is something for what comes after Franceafrique that I need to inform you of. A man who apparently really liked the first mexico video, decided to donate 1000 euros last night.... just... yeah.... I was kinda shocked when I saw that. I feel like I need to thank him. I therefor offered him to pick the next video after Franceadriqu...

Informing you of possible upcoming Artist sponsorship

After the Mexico series is done I will be returning to shorter 25-40 minute long videos again. A result of this though is that I will no longer need volunteer artists to help me with the artwork, as the work will be manageable. I will however still hire Turkbud for his amazing thumbnails. But until I return to a large project, I won't be needing contributing artists. I would like to therefore let you know that I will be looking for a sponsor for the last two parts of the Mexico series. I woul...

Artist's payout

I have just now, about 20 minutes ago, taken a third of what the last video made in revenue, and divided it up amongst the artists who contributed artwork to this video. I hope you are ok with this. I agreed upon this with the artists. And intend to do so with future videos in which art is contributed by artists as well.

Yours. Joe.

Lending a helping hand

Over the past months I have worked with a Mexican artist called Nomadstar. He drew several scenes for the Turkey and mexico videos. And he got inspired to open a channel similar to mine. He will be doing polandball history, and economics videos. I will be lending him support. Draw artwork for his videos. Help him with research and help him where ever I can. I hope you don't mind that.

You can find his channel and twitter here:

2021-01-06 14:27:28 +0000 UTC View Post

Patreon got back to me

Patreon just got back to me and confirmed that raffles and lotteries are not allowed.

I read through the reasons why this is the case, and have to say, that yes, it makes perfect sense why that is the case. I will be changing it from my tier reward soon. And will be thinking of something new.

Yours. Joe.