January 2026 – Behind-the-scenes update (Patreon)

Hiya patrons — both new and old!

Here's your behind-the-scenes brief for January 2026.

Democracies II.

In case you've missed it, I published a sequel to my original documentary "When teenagers run virtual democracies" back in December 2025 — a sequel that, while well-received in some circles, caused the virtual equivalent of a riot in another.

In my follow-up article, "I told the Mardonian story from their perspective," I delved quite deeply into my script-writing process, including dealing with conflicting interpretations, the telling of (white) lies, and the use of allusions. If you're interested in learning about that, feel free to give that article a read!

New Year's resolution.

I'm firmly opposed to New Year's resolutions — I believe that if you have a resolution or goal in mind, you should set it as soon as possible, rather than waiting for the new year to arrive before embarking on it.

One of the goals I've set for myself, after the completion of Democracies II, was to try to make shorter videos (around 15-30 minutes long). There are reasons why I want to try this, including:

It'll allow me to make more videos. Hour-long documentaries take just so much time, resources, and energy to make — the same time and resources could be used to produce multiple, shorter videos.

It'll allow me to cover more topics. In one sense, more videos mean more topics. But in another sense, it'll allow me to cover topics that I previously wrote off because I felt they were too short and wouldn't produce a meaningful hour-long documentary. Giving myself leeway for video length would also allow me to use more research that would otherwise end up on the cutting room floor (which can be a lot).

It'll allow my videos to be watchable during other periods of the day (e.g., lunch and dinner). I know that at least one of you actually watches my videos for dinner (because you've told me). To that person, I'd like to say that other people don't usually have dinners that take 1-2 hours long. 15-30 minute videos (or even shorter) would actually allow more people to do this.

All of that said, Democracies II was completed just before 2026 rolled around — meaning that my resolution coincided with the new year. Does that make it a New Year's resolution? Or does that make it a resolution that just so happens to coincide with everyone else's New Year's resolutions? Anyway, I digress ...

Next video(s).

The next video I'm working on is about the history of the Minecraft hedge fund, Uffizi Holdings, which collapsed just after the bankruptcy of Vanguard National Bank.

In late July 2025, I accidentally published an incomplete draft article on Uffizi Holding's "accounting discrepancies," which led to it being overvalued by around D$73 million (nearly US$30,000). This, along with other interesting tidbits of its corporate history, will be covered in the video.

Assuming things go well, I'm considering making this video as part of a spinoff mini-series from the DC Short, where I cover topics that were left on the cutting room floor (since Vanguard pretty much hogged the spotlight). My hope is that a miniseries would allow me to publish a lot of the unpublished research I did for the series (it was a lot, trust me), and also to act as another "gateway" for new viewers to be introduced to the genre of Minecraft finance.

Another goal I have in mind for the miniseries is to bridge the gap for younger viewers, who have sometimes said that the series was too difficult for them to follow (which was completely understandable since I covered everything from flawed Consumer Price Index data to forex arbitrage). Covering simpler topics (e.g., "Why do companies list on the stock market?") would hopefully allow me to teach more basic financial concepts to viewers who are less familiar with financial jargon. (This is basically my way of adding aubergine/eggplant to a chocolate dessert).

Thank you.

And, of course, I'd like to thank each and every one of you for your continued support of my channel. I'm ever grateful for your vote of confidence.