Almost 6 years. 150 episodes. 34 guests. 1 Chris. 1 Badger. 1 podcast comes to an end.

I thought it fitting to write this post, about the Self-Hosted podcast drawing to a conclusion, on the very self-hosted blog that began my self-hosting journey way back in August 2013. (blog.ktz.me turned into Linuxserver.io before being recreated as blog.ktz.me again at some point).

Episode 150 airs on Friday May 30th, 2025 (I will update and replace this with an embed once the episode is out).

And since we announced the show was concluding in episode 147, we have been quite literally inundated by hundreds of messages across dozens of channels. They expressed gratitude, best wishes, empathy, condolences, and story after story about how the podcast has been an inspiration and how self-hosting has changed the writer's life for the better - be it a job upgrade, or a deeply rewarding hobby of escapism.

To all of you who wrote in - and those of you who just passively listened too - it is my turn to express gratitude.

It is not a stretch to say that self-hosting has changed my life. I do my utmost to give back as much as I can via perfectmediaserver.com, my YouTube channel and the show. I need to single out one person in particular though, who took a chance on me - a completely green, never-before-podcast-host in 2019 - who deserves special thanks. I am, of course, talking about Chris Fisher - the Head Mouth Organ Specialist at Jupiter Broadcasting.

Let's face it. 6 years is a long time to do anything. It was just time. But let's dig a little bit into the history of the show and JB in this post.

An avid JB listener myself for several years, I first met Chris at Texas Linuxfest in 2018 in the midst of an epic 3000 mile roadtrip across America with my wife - this was before we emigrated from the UK to the US. Back then, the dream of pitching a show to Chris and having him help me bring the show to life on JB about self-hosting felt unattainably big. I actually recall clear as day somewhere near Amarillo (we were roadtrippin' across the US pre-emigration) the thought occurring to me and mentally telling myself it was so unlikely Chris would want to work with me that the original plan for Self-Hosted was to have a different co-host altogether and use Jupiter Broadcasting's network effect for recognition. After all, who starts an audio only podcast these days? But, for some reason Chris took a chance on me and we launched the show in September 2019 after JB had been bought out by Linux Academy.

During this period, the shows carried no sponsors. No sponsors. Linux Academy footed the bill for JB in full - as far as I know anyway.

A while later, Linux Academy was acquired by A Cloud Guru who in turn a while after that were acquired by Pluralsight. Long story short, JB was nearly lost to the annals of history. Chris, though, was not about to lose his life's work and JB was "unacquired" (deliberately vague on details here) and became a fully independent media outlet once more. A precious, precious commodity these days.

These were dark days for JB. We didn't even know if there would continue to be a JB.

There were now bills to pay, and de-mergings to be done. Luckily, a couple of generous sponsorships came along to support the network. That was until a major one was itself acquired and pulled out, leaving JB in, once again, a precarious position. So, Chris began to find other ways to connect with the audience financially via the lightning network and "boosts".

Now. I don't personally care much for crypto and the associations it typically draws. For this reason we kept the boost "branding" to an absolute minimum on the show as a compromise and I think overall that suited us both.

I still care a great deal about Chris and JB's longevity. As such, I have never taken a single SAT directly, and did so as a matter of principle to be true to myself and my position outlined above.

Anywho, enough of all that.

As I reflect on the almost 6 years of my life, much has changed. I am now a parent. We are home owners in the USA. Self-Hosted has been wildly successful during its run amassing well over 4 million downloads to date. My career has taken me places I could have only dreamt about when emigrating 7 years ago.

Some things remain constant. My loving wife. My faithful dog Archie (named after Arch Linux) is still with us. My love for self-hosting, building and tinkering around with Linux servers (hence the name linuxserver.io btw) remains as strong as ever. As does my compunction to infect others with my complete obsession with containers and Linux. It is no accident I make my living by creating videos for Tailscale on that very topic - do what you love and you'll never work another day in your life - goes the saying. And I am so incredibly fortunate for this to be true.

That job can be all-consuming at times however and after many months of deliberation I eventually took the incredibly difficult decision that episode 150 would be my last on the Self-Hosted podcast. My daughter is young - a snortingly rambunctious and opinionated 4-year-old. She is a delight and I needed to find ways to reduce my mental workload so as to spend more precious time with her before it vanishes in the blink of an eye.

Along with work being busy I have wanted to see where I could take my personal YouTube channel KTZ Systems. The name Self-Hosted by its nature can be a bit limiting, and we have coloured outside the lines on that for a while now. The name draws certain expectations from purists who often let us know very strongly they felt that because we didn't self-host every aspect of our production chain and online presences we were hypocrites.

But I think also there is only so much one (or two) people can bring to a single topic and keep things fresh episode after episode.

It's a question of mental bandwidth to context switch between work, KTZ Systems, and the podcast, plus all my other duties. Something had to give and I know for a great many of you it is sad that it is the podcast coming to an end. I am right there with you. It's bittersweet. But, it's time.

I think that about sums it up.

I have had a total blast doing this show. I literally wouldn't be where I am today without it (Tailscale found me via the show). I've met some absolutely incredible people along the way, and made friends that will last a lifetime.

I profess hearty and abundant thanks to anyone who has supported the show in any capacity. My close friends (many of whom have guested on the show), Drew - our editor, the Discord mods, those who attended meetups, or even those of you who just plain old listened to the show passively.

Thank you.

Note that the Discord (selfhosted.show/discord) will not be going anywhere. A vibrant community with over 7000 members exists over there for you to browse and peruse as you see fit. The back catalog will remain up as a standalone body of work. Neither of us have discussed continuing the show with a different line-up either. It just wouldn't be the same if we did. I will pop by Linux Unplugged now and again for a Self-Hosted segment but the recordings being on a Sunday eat into precious family time so don't expect hyper-frequent visits.

Now, to answer one of the most pressing questions ever posed on the Self-Hosted podcast. What does SSH (as it pertains to the show) stand for?!

We teased in episode 1 our shortcode as SSH. But what does it stand for? Self-Hosted SHow of course! Totally not reverse engineered to fit the shortcode after the fact. Nope. Definitely not.

So all that is left to be said for now is:

1. Anything that is in the world when you're born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works.
2. Anything that's invented between when you're fifteen and thirty-five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it.
3. Anything invented after you're thirty-five is against the natural order of things.

• Douglas Adams