Gary’s Q&A

Listener question & Gary’s response · Transcript passage

The final question comes from Steve Augustino, who asks, As this podcast has grown, how has your choice of topics evolved? Do you choose fewer US-centric topics to accommodate an international audience? What changes do you hope to implement in 2025?

Believe it or not, the percentage of listeners in the United States has actually increased over time, not decreased. A few years ago, the United States comprised about 50% of my audience, and today it is 75%.

I’m not consciously considering the audience’s demographics when selecting shows. My biggest concern is how difficult will this be to write and how good is the episode going to be.

If there are more episodes dealing with American history, that is a reflection of me and the stories I come across more than anything else.

I would like to do more episodes on India, China, Africa, Central Asia, etc., and I will be doing more of them in the future. However, that requires me to roll up my sleeves and do more research. I have an episode on the Indus Valley civilization that I’ve been wanting to do for a long time, for example. Likewise, one on the Mali Empire.

The only thing I am consciously doing when selecting episodes is trying not to do this same general topic in a row. With a few exceptions, such as Monster Week last year around Halloween, I try to mix things up. If someone isn’t interested in Roman History for example, if there is an episode on that, you can be sure that there probably won’t be one about that the next day.