Hey everyone! We have some big changes coming to Into the Aether in the near future and we wanted to talk through them a bit.

To avoid burying the lede here: We’re leaving the Pickaxe podcast network and returning to complete independence. This has actually been in the works for a little while, but we wanted to only share the news when all of the boxes were checked.

This is not a decision we made lightly, but we’re confident it is the right decision for us and for all of you.

To be clear, we have no ill-will with Pickaxe and there are no hard feelings either way. This was entirely our decision. As breezy as the process of joining was, the process of offboarding has been equally breezy. We want to extend a huge thanks to the team over there for taking a chance on us and being so cool over the last few months. It’s not often you’re given as much creative control as we were in situations like this.

Immediate Changes:

1) No more programmatic ads 

The first and most obvious change will be the removal of programmatic advertising in the podcast. We hugely appreciate the feedback from you all regarding the inclusion of these ads. While we’re happy to have tried this method out — it clearly didn’t work for us, the vibe of the show, or the values of Aether as an entity.

This change will affect the entire backlog of the podcast as well, so all episodes will return to being ad-free – with the exception of our host-read ads from before the Pickaxe era.

We’ll share more about our plans for returning to host-read ads at a later date, but for now: If you’re currently backing the show at the $10 tier, we completely understand if you’d like to downgrade or cancel your membership for the time being. While we will be returning to an advertising model that feels better to us and focuses on lifting up bands and games and projects we can get behind, the reality is that those ads won’t be present in the show until August at the earliest. We hope to have you back, but also understand if you need to pull your support for the time being. 

2) Chapters are back!

Another welcome change (cue the applause sfx) is that chapter markers are back on the menu. The move to Pickaxe unfortunately wiped the chapter markers from all episodes of the show, meaning you all needed to rely on the written timecodes in the episode descriptions. While this wasn’t the end of the world, it also wasn’t intentional or desirable on our part. 

We’re happy to say that chapter markers should be working in the entire backlog, including the episodes which were produced during the Pickaxe era.

The Future:

We have some other big changes and ideas in the works that we’ll be announcing on the PSP retrospective episode (which we will be recording on August 2nd). These changes are all positive and double down on our desire to keep the show independent for the foreseeable future. We’re excited to share them with you!

We’re immensely proud of what Into the Aether has become over the past seven years (!!) and want to make sure its future is sustainable and bright as an indie show on TWG. The reason we are able to try all the things we do and push ourselves further is entirely due to all of your support. So just another huge thank you to everyone for listening and giving us the confidence to try and make this show in our own way.

If you have any questions, feel free to post them here in Discord or email us at [email protected].

Thanks again,

BB + SH