With 25 emails left until I reach 500 the end is nigh for the Internet of Public Service Jobs newsletter. Even before more recent medical misadventures and the decision to step back from my side projects and ease back, I had already decided to bring it to a close because it had become increasingly expensive. It costs me about £500 annually between Ghost Pro ‘Publisher’ – £360/$480 and the .jobs domain – £138. Now of course you could do it cheaper…but not easily without some technical work due to the amount of emails (just short of 2500). The .jobs domain is an extravagance though 😀. I’ve just never really been comfortable or successful raising the money to cover it through ‘tips’ or sponsorship – and honestly I never wanted it to feel like a hustle. It has also been a community contribution not a career move.

It has also just become a bit of a PITA to do if I am honest. Since the demise of Twitter I get far, far fewer direct ‘leads’ for jobs to include (and fewer emails from hiring teams as well). Additionally since the rise of the ‘AI-all-in era’ lots of the job boards have gotten even worse.

Currently the newsletter has 2,488 active subscribers with a 62% open rate and an 11% click rate. Growth has been flat for a while (though I had a weird burst of subscribers yesterday!) and the other stats are down a little this year from last but it is still pretty successful I think. Not a bad thing to go out in a good place rather than wait for it to fall apart!

I never really automated anything – the point always felt like it needed the blood, sweat and tears of curation to make it valuable. I still spend a couple of hours on each edition. Most of the sources are pretty obvious – CS Jobs, LinkedIn, The Guardian, NHS Jobs, Charity Jobs, jobs.ac.uk, Mind the Product and then I still get a few things from Bluesky and direct. Being terminally online means I do see more than most I guess and I’m always looking.

The question has been raised – by Alex most recently – about whether I have some kind of succession/handover plan. The answer is no. I’m not comfortable handing off the mailing list built up over 11 years to anybody else and I also suspect there are some data protection/GDPR issues with that as well.

Also I just feel like the ‘brand’ of Internet of Public Service Jobs is intrinsically linked to me/Jukesie Jobs. Maybe that is vanity and I should get over that.

Like I mentioned in my weeknotes I am transferring the domains of Web of Weeknotes (weeknot.es) and Product for the People (productforthepeople.xyz) to Mr Messer and perhaps I could/should do the same with the newsletter…but I am unconvinced as it stands.

Should I endorse a ‘successor’? Does anyone even want to do it? I suspect if I encouraged subscribers to move to someone continuing the spirit of the newsletter it would make it easier to get started than going from zero like I did originally.

What do people think? Should I look for someone to carry on the legacy (ha!) or let it fade away?