The Facebook community I talk about is at https://www.facebook.com/groups/293630102611672/

The post for asking Q&A questions is here

The Patreon post for Q&A questions is here

Hello and welcome to the start of 2022’s Pledge Week.

For those of you who don’t know, this podcast is my full-time job, and I can only do it because of listener support, and the best way people can support me is to set up a regular donation through patreon.com, and to reward those supporters I do short bonus podcasts that only backers can access, as well as doing occasional other bonus things for them.

Now, I have been very, very, lucky when it comes to people backing me. For the first couple of years of the podcast I had to take on additional work because this wasn’t paying enough, but now I have enough very generous backers that I can pay my mortgage, buy all the books and CDs I need for the research, pay Tilt for his time editing the podcast, and generally do the work without worrying about my finances the way I had to at first. This has been especially useful in the last year, when as you may have gathered everything *else* went wrong in my life — to have that basic financial security because of people’s generous donations has literally saved my life.

I’m making that clear now because I don’t want anyone to give a single penny they can’t afford. If my Patreon donations continue at the same level they have been, I can continue making the podcast indefinitely without worrying, so don’t give me money you can’t afford. But, of course, the only way I can keep the donations at the same level is to remind people occasionally that the Patreon exists — otherwise, the levels will slowly go down, as people lose their jobs or retire and can’tafford that extra dollar a month, or the podcast gets past the era of music they’re interested in, or I say something that causes offence, or they just decide the podcast isn’t for them any more.

So, every year or so, for a week I do a pledge week, where every day for a week I put up one of the old backer-only ten-minute or so podcasts, that Patreon backers have had access to for a year or so. There are well over a hundred of these now, and only a tiny selection of them get posted in these Pledge weeks, so if you want to hear the rest of them you have to subscribe for as little as one dollar a month — or ten dollars for a year.

Again, I want to emphasise — as long as donation levels stay around where they are now, the main podcast will always remain free, and will have no ads or any of the other things people do to monetise their podcasts. Nobody is under any obligation to pay me a penny, and you should only give what you can afford after looking after yourself and your loved ones and any charitable donations or so on. There are many more important uses for your money than my podcast, especially in difficult times like this, and I don’t begrudge anyone listening for free. I’m making enough, and while it’s always nice to have more, there’s no pressure on anyone.

But if you have a little spare cash left over after all that, and you want to help out, for the next week you’ll get a taste of what you can get.

Also, two weeks from today I will be doing two question and answer podcasts. One will be for backers only, and will be answering questions on a Patreon post I’m going to make, which only backers will be able to access. The other will be for the general public, and will be answering questions posted in the comments for the admin post I made a couple of weeks back. I’ll link both posts in the notes to this episode.

Also, while I’m here I’d just like to mention that my friend Shawn has set up a Facebook discussion group for the podcast, which I’ll also link. I’m not on Facebook myself, and while I’m not looking at it myself, Shawn will pass on anything she thinks I should know about the discussions there — but you can also use it to talk about my podcast without worrying that I’m looking over your shoulder.

Anyway, for the next seven days, enjoy these old Patreon backer bonus episodes.