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Netflix to Shut Down Last Datacenter

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Re: Netflix to Shut Down Last Datacenter

#61

Post by p1esk »

adventured wrote: post #50
p1esk wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, I don't get it - why would you consider using cloud servers if you don't have significant spikes in your traffic? Regarding hardware failures - it's not that hard to arrange proper redundancies in your systems, and it will certainly be cheaper than outsourcing it to Amazon. Cloud only becomes cost effective when your spikes are several times larger than your normal traffic, and you must maintain good QoS at al…

Because sometimes cloud servers are very cost effective, easy, and fast to deploy: Digital Ocean for example. $40 / month for 4gb of ram, 4tb of transfer, and two cores, is very cost effective. Linode is also very reasonable. If all I need is that scale of computing, what should I use instead that makes sense other than cloud services? Setting up colo or a dedicated box for that would be more expensive and a much lar…

Well, I admit, those prices are pretty good. I looked at AWS pricing 3 years ago at a SaaS company with steadily growing traffic, and at the time it didn't make sense. It might now.

Re: Netflix to Shut Down Last Datacenter

#62

Post by msiebuhr »

anotherangrydev wrote: post #10

Do you think they have a special deal w/ Amazon? Otherwise I imagine that's a really expensive bill. Do you think they're doing it because its cheaper when you account for things at a larger scale? Like, reduced liabilities, payrolls, CapEx, whatever? Or is it more expensive but still "easier" and they go with it? I really REALLY would like to hear everything from everyone about this, because right now I'm facing tha…

Another perspective; location and staffing.

Last first: Getting enough competent people to whatever you have. Just getting people that knows the difference between rm -rf / and rm -rf ./, not to plug both ends of a cable into the same switch/router, ... can be quite hard. If you have a premium product running on a few hundred machines, AWS doesn't actually eat that much margin compared to having your own 24/7 staff & all that entails.

And when the company then decides to open up "somewhere over in that big asian market", you've got to do it all over again. You can get a lot done with "remote hands" and whatnot, but again - something that eats your margin, just as AWS does...

Re: Netflix to Shut Down Last Datacenter

#63

Post by jules »

p1esk wrote: post #36
anotherangrydev wrote: post #10

Do you think they have a special deal w/ Amazon? Otherwise I imagine that's a really expensive bill. Do you think they're doing it because its cheaper when you account for things at a larger scale? Like, reduced liabilities, payrolls, CapEx, whatever? Or is it more expensive but still "easier" and they go with it? I really REALLY would like to hear everything from everyone about this, because right now I'm facing tha…

The question is, do you need as much elasticity as Netflix does?

Is elasticity really an advantage of EC2? Dedicated is so much cheaper that you can just overprovision massively and still come out cheaper than EC2.

Re: Netflix to Shut Down Last Datacenter

#64

Post by kika »

anotherangrydev wrote: post #10

Do you think they have a special deal w/ Amazon? Otherwise I imagine that's a really expensive bill. Do you think they're doing it because its cheaper when you account for things at a larger scale? Like, reduced liabilities, payrolls, CapEx, whatever? Or is it more expensive but still "easier" and they go with it? I really REALLY would like to hear everything from everyone about this, because right now I'm facing tha…

It depends on your IT architecture and more importantly on your software architecture. I did this IRL and I did it both ways and I'm doing it again. If you want some ideas or guidance or want to ask specific questions - feel free. My email is in my profile, "about" section.

Re: Netflix to Shut Down Last Datacenter

#65

Post by mdpopescu »

p1esk wrote: post #43
anotherangrydev wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not like in "I had a surge in traffic of millions of visitors" But yes like in "Some hardware failed, but yeah that's not my problem anymore!"

Sorry, I don't get it - why would you consider using cloud servers if you don't have significant spikes in your traffic? Regarding hardware failures - it's not that hard to arrange proper redundancies in your systems, and it will certainly be cheaper than outsourcing it to Amazon. Cloud only becomes cost effective when your spikes are several times larger than your normal traffic, and you must maintain good QoS at al…

I worked at a company where the whole server room was flooded. They had to replace everything and restore stuff from backups.

Two weeks later, they had to do it all over again because something went wrong with the air conditioning and the servers got cooked.

I kept recommending going with AWS because of that... I no longer work there, but as far as I know they're still running their own servers.

Re: Netflix to Shut Down Last Datacenter

#66

Post by Wingman4l7 »

function_seven wrote: post #35
fiberoptick wrote: post #30

I've never understood why so many companies are comfortable giving Amazon such leverage over their business infrastructure. Could someone explain why this is a good move in spite of the risk that Amazon could jack their prices up in the future?

Total guess on my part, but I'd imagine Netflix has locked-in long-term pricing. Of course, there's the opposite danger of the rest of the world getting cheaper...

Reminds me of how airlines have been bitten in the butt with a similar future-speculation method that they use to purchase fuel.

Re: Netflix to Shut Down Last Datacenter

#67

Post by lukebennett »

fjarlq wrote: post #52
nchelluri wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

May I ask how you did that?

This "Come From Google" (CFG) paywall bypass bookmarklet usually does the trick for me: https://umur.io/paywall-bypass-bookmarklet-come-from-google/

Thanks for the heads up on CFG - sounds useful, though it doesn't seem to work for me.

Re: Netflix to Shut Down Last Datacenter

#68

Post by RobAley »

function_seven wrote: post #35
fiberoptick wrote: post #30

I've never understood why so many companies are comfortable giving Amazon such leverage over their business infrastructure. Could someone explain why this is a good move in spite of the risk that Amazon could jack their prices up in the future?

Total guess on my part, but I'd imagine Netflix has locked-in long-term pricing. Of course, there's the opposite danger of the rest of the world getting cheaper...

If they're savvy, they'll have locked in long-term maximum pricing. Something along the lines of "prices will at most be the minimum of this discount price, or x% above the standard retail price".

Re: Netflix to Shut Down Last Datacenter

#69

Post by deanCommie »

jules wrote: post #63
p1esk wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The question is, do you need as much elasticity as Netflix does?

Is elasticity really an advantage of EC2? Dedicated is so much cheaper that you can just overprovision massively and still come out cheaper than EC2.

Disregarding the fact that the E stands for Elasticity...

Yes, Elasticity is THE advantage for Netflix when it comes to using EC2. Consider the vast differences in usage they have in North America during the evening after dinner vs during the middle of the night. I can only imagine their fleet capacity goes up and down drastically every single day. This amounts to huge savings over having the bare metal.

Re: Netflix to Shut Down Last Datacenter

#70

Post by icebraining »

mdpopescu wrote: post #65
p1esk wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, I don't get it - why would you consider using cloud servers if you don't have significant spikes in your traffic? Regarding hardware failures - it's not that hard to arrange proper redundancies in your systems, and it will certainly be cheaper than outsourcing it to Amazon. Cloud only becomes cost effective when your spikes are several times larger than your normal traffic, and you must maintain good QoS at al…

I worked at a company where the whole server room was flooded. They had to replace everything and restore stuff from backups. Two weeks later, they had to do it all over again because something went wrong with the air conditioning and the servers got cooked. I kept recommending going with AWS because of that... I no longer work there, but as far as I know they're still running their own servers.

Why AWS and not just co-locating the servers somewhere?
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