name	scott-newsletter
description	Drafts or improves scottspence.com monthly newsletters in Scott's voice. Use when creating newsletter/YYYY-MM-DD.md, summarising recent posts, GitHub activity, talks, tools, or preparing monthly email copy.

Scott Newsletter

Use this skill for monthly scottspence.com newsletter emails.

Quick Start

Build evidence first, draft into newsletter/YYYY-MM-DD.md, keep it personal and conversational, then validate with Prettier and cspell. Never send the newsletter unless Scott explicitly asks.

Workflow

Read recent newsletters in newsletter/ to match structure and voice.
Pull fresh production data when needed using nopeek for INGEST_TOKEN; never read .env directly.
Update production rollups before downloading the DB when current stats matter: update_posts, update_embeddings, update_related_posts, optionally rollup_analytics, then backup_database.
Back up local data/site-data.db, remove WAL/SHM files, then download production DB via /api/ingest/download.
Query data/site-data.db with mcp-sqlite-tools for recent posts, GitHub commits/PRs/releases/issues, subscriber counts, and sent newsletters.
Use repo history and nearby posts as receipts before making claims.
Draft the newsletter with sections for the month’s main story, posts, open source, talks/client work when relevant, and a short sign-off.
Validate with pnpm exec prettier --check <file> and pnpm exec cspell <file> --config cspell.json --wordsOnly.

Voice rules

Scott-like, informal, blunt, technical, and reflective.
en-GB spelling. No em dashes.
Prefer concrete details: repo names, PRs, posts, talks, numbers, shipped tools, and trade-offs.
It is fine to say “Right, so,” “vibes,” “waffling,” “dogfooding,” or similar when it fits naturally.
Avoid generic marketing copy, corporate polish, and fake neutrality.
Keep private/client work anonymised unless already public.

Newsletter shape

Use frontmatter:

---
title: 'Short Human Title - Month YYYY'
date: YYYY-MM-DD
published: true
---

Default structure: hook, one or more main sections, Blog Posts, Open Source or related project updates, Fin. Add  for project/tool names rather than changing prose.

Safety

Do not read, print, grep, or paste secret files or secret values.
Use pnpx nopeek load .env --only INGEST_TOKEN when production ingest access is needed.
Do not send via newsletter_send or production APIs unless Scott explicitly asks to send.

Scott Newsletter

Use this skill for monthly scottspence.com newsletter emails.

Quick Start

Build evidence first, draft into newsletter/YYYY-MM-DD.md, keep it personal and conversational, then validate with Prettier and cspell. Never send the newsletter unless Scott explicitly asks.

Workflow

Read recent newsletters in newsletter/ to match structure and voice.

Pull fresh production data when needed using nopeek for INGEST_TOKEN; never read .env directly.

Update production rollups before downloading the DB when current stats matter: update_posts, update_embeddings, update_related_posts, optionally rollup_analytics, then backup_database.

Back up local data/site-data.db, remove WAL/SHM files, then download production DB via /api/ingest/download.

Query data/site-data.db with mcp-sqlite-tools for recent posts, GitHub commits/PRs/releases/issues, subscriber counts, and sent newsletters.

Use repo history and nearby posts as receipts before making claims.

Draft the newsletter with sections for the month’s main story, posts, open source, talks/client work when relevant, and a short sign-off.

Validate with pnpm exec prettier --check <file> and pnpm exec cspell <file> --config cspell.json --wordsOnly.

Voice rules

Scott-like, informal, blunt, technical, and reflective.

en-GB spelling. No em dashes.

Prefer concrete details: repo names, PRs, posts, talks, numbers, shipped tools, and trade-offs.

It is fine to say “Right, so,” “vibes,” “waffling,” “dogfooding,” or similar when it fits naturally.

Avoid generic marketing copy, corporate polish, and fake neutrality.

Keep private/client work anonymised unless already public.

Newsletter shape

Use frontmatter:

--- title: 'Short Human Title - Month YYYY' date: YYYY-MM-DD published: true ---

Default structure: hook, one or more main sections, Blog Posts, Open Source or related project updates, Fin. Add  for project/tool names rather than changing prose.

Safety

Do not read, print, grep, or paste secret files or secret values.

Use pnpx nopeek load .env --only INGEST_TOKEN when production ingest access is needed.

Do not send via newsletter_send or production APIs unless Scott explicitly asks to send.

scott-newsletter