So long, and thanks for all the Podcasts

Folks! Listeners! Bad rendition of disney tune lovers! We have some news we need to share.

Over the years The Iron Sysadmin podcast has evolved. On Episode 1 Jason and I were both working in IT ops in one aspect or another, and we started this show because we thought there was a gap in the current (or, at the time anyway) podcast landscape for content BY sysadmins, FOR sysadmins. We wanted to make a show that addressed some of the challenges in a Sysadmin’s life. Not just their day job, but topic slike work/life balance, staying healthy, and working with others.

We had 0 audio editing skills, and 0 budget. We started as cheap as possible, and grew over the years. I’ve done all of the editing myself, and coming in which absolutely no audio editing or engineering skills, it was tough. I did my best. Luckily we built a decent backing on patreon which allowed the show to expand the technology stack. Adobe audition, decent mics, the Rodecaster Pro mixer, Libsyn podcast hosting, Streamlabs for streaming, and Riverside for recording. Patreon covered all (or.. most) of that.

We’ve had some great times over the years. We’ve always tried to make this show entertaining, instead of just informative. And we’ve had a great time doing it! We’ve had hosts come and go over the years, a big thanks to Dustin, and Charles who both gave us their time, and then finally the addition of Unclemarc who’s been a staple on the show since.

So, why am I taking you on this trip down memory lane? Well, its because things have changed over the years. My role has moved further and further from daily ops, all of the active hosts have progressed their careers in fact. Marc is in management now, and Nate’s still technical but from a marketing perspective instead of an admin. And while we’ve all got a ton of industry experience, that unfortunately does not replace daily hands-on-keyboard relevance that the show really needs in order to be what we intend it to be. And that doesn’t even account for the amount of time it takes to organize a show. Figuring out topics to cover, researching them, finding news to talk about, arranging guests. It takes more time than you might think, and many times in the past 2 years or so that work was getting done hours before we went live, because we were having trouble coming up with good content. I’m sure in some shows that came through, but generally we’d call the show off if we didn’t feel like we had a valuable topic. The bulk of the show’s planning and engineering has always fallen to me. I’ve enjoyed it! It’s what I expected honestly.

But now the bad news. Every year we’ve taken a bit of a break around the US holidays of Thanksgiving and Christmas. This was mainly because show scheduling got tough with hosts having family things to attend, so we would just accept it and take an episode or two off during this time of year. And that usually meant we hit the new year feeling a bit recharged. In 2022 we’d even taken several weeks off around July when my Mother-in-law’s battle with Cancer had taken a turn for the worse. By the way, that lead to an accumulated $500 donation to the American cancer society fueled mostly by the awesome patrons. Oh, and I never got to make this public on the show, but through a program Red Hat gives me access to through my day job, I was able to DOUBLE that, for a total of $1000. Folks, have I mentioned what an awesome employer Red Hat is? But I digress. Taking these breaks usually has a recharging effect on us as the hosts. 2022’s breaks didn’t do that, and that worried me to the point where I decided to call a meeting with Marc and Jason this past Friday. Iron Sysadmin is mine, and it always has been, but these guys have given me two Thursdays a month for years, almost 6 years for Jason, and about 4 for Marc. They get to have a say in the future of the show. We decided together that it was time to end things.

Marc is now managing TAMs at Red Hat, I work in the Marketing team for RHEL, and Jason, well who knows what he’s doing, but he’s been all over the IT map for the past few years. Jason might have the most relevant day to day out of all of us, and we can’t carry the show on just one host who’s in the weeds. Personally, I’m finding it hard to be objective when my day job is to cast a positive light on one of the products we should be critical of on the show.

Patreon was paused over the weekend, I’ll close that up before the one month pause period expires. Again thank you so much to the patrons who have supported this show.

And let’s not forget all of you listeners! And our great guests! This has been an awesome ride and it wouldn’t have been possible without all of you.