We’ve finally made the decision to close down VirtualPairProgrammers. It’s a sad decision, but long overdue. We can’t keep offering subscriptions while making no new content.
The original plan was to run a “sunset” period: stop new sign-ups and let existing subscriptions run for a year. But with so few active subscribers, it makes more sense to fully close things down more quickly — we’re aiming for Friday, 26 September 2025, which conveniently ties in with our accounting year-end.
IF YOU HAVE AN ACTIVE SUBSCRIPTION, DON’T PANIC!
We’ll contact you directly with the details, but the plan is to give you everything you need to access content offline. We realise this might inconvenience some people — if that’s the case, we’ll of course offer a full refund.
Here are some questions that haven’t been asked yet, but probably will be:
1) Will there be more courses on Udemy in the future?
The main reason we’ve been able to keep the site running at roughly break-even over the last 7 years is because we (reluctantly) offered our latest courses on Udemy. We’re grateful for that. They owe us nothing — it’s been a good run — but… let’s just say current market conditions aren’t ideal.
There’s a good chance both of us have retired from course creation, at least for the foreseeable future. Personally, my short-term plan is to finish renovating my house (due May 2026), and then maybe — just maybe — give it one last go and test the market. Failing that, I’m now a professional builder/joiner/electrician/gardener/handyman.
Until AI takes over those jobs too.
So the answer is “maybe.”
2) Will the courses stay on Udemy?
Yes — though only our latest ones (K8s and Istio in my case). Some older ones like Docker and Spark are still there but will have to be retired soon.
K8s and Istio are still maintained and supported. A new edition of each is quietly created every year, and this will continue for the foreseeable future.
3) I was planning to subscribe for access to archive material — is all that content lost?
We’ve been tossing around ideas for what to do with the archive. There’s some great stuff in there — sure, some version numbers are ancient, but we’ve always focused on core principles. And the core of Spring Boot (or whatever) today is pretty much what it’s always been.
I’d love to preserve the archive somehow. We looked at offering a one-time purchase option where you could download everything — but I’m not sure the numbers work. There’d be the admin burden of running a “shop,” plus the ongoing hosting costs — and it could easily be a big fat turkey. Neither of us has the time (or energy) to gamble on that.
I might upload my older material to YouTube or something similar.
There are possibilities.
4) Why not release the older courses, like Spring, on Udemy?
They’d just vanish into a sea of competing courses. Plus, they’d need major overhauls — people hate seeing ${BoringFrameworkName} ${x} when the current version is ${x+0.5}.
And no, I’m not spending months of my life being a human grep machine.
(As far as I know, AI still can’t do this properly for video.)
5) Can I get a refund?
Yes — as long as you have an active subscription. We’d rather you download what you need, but the option’s there. Check the site for details.
6) I don’t have the bandwidth to download what I need — I preferred streaming. What can I do?
Sorry for the inconvenience. You can either request a refund or contact me directly for help (details on virtualpairprogrammers.com — please use that route rather than the blog, as I often forget to check comments here).
7) Enshittification sucks, doesn’t it?
It sure does.
8) You sound like a bitter old man.
I sure am! I’m much fatter too, thanks to the comfort eating.
I won’t even mention the drinking.
But I enjoyed it while it lasted. Thanks for joining us — you won’t know how much it meant to me.