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Show HN: Pipedream. Develop any workflow, on any trigger, with auth and no infra

pipedream.com

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Re: Show HN: Pipedream. Develop any workflow, on any trigger, with auth and no infra

#41

Post by dylburger »

zocuments wrote: post #27
todsac wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We believe anyone should be able to run simple, low-volume workflows at no cost, sharing their workflows with the public so everyone benefits from the work of others. We also want to foster a positive community where people feel good about sharing their work and where everyone can learn from one another. In the future, we may offer features available on paid tiers which would be logical enterprise features such as si…

What framework/template are you using for docs.pipedream? They look great. PS: On Desktop, the left third of the Pricing content/copy is rendered behind the menu.

Thanks for letting us know, I just rolled out a fix to the hidden content. Can you let me know if you're still seeing the issue?

We use Vuepress for the docs and it's awesome!

https://vuepress.vuejs.org

Re: Show HN: Pipedream. Develop any workflow, on any trigger, with auth and no infra

#42

Post by dastbe »

todsac wrote: post #38
tmikaeld wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You need to address the cost of scalability, free isn't a price and there's clearly a price somewhere along the line.

If you do not need enterprise use cases (single sign-on, higher level SLAs, shared authentication, etc) and your scale fits within our defined constraints, then free is the price.

The OP was asking what the price is when they do have an enterprise use case or their scale grows beyond your defined constraints.

Re: Show HN: Pipedream. Develop any workflow, on any trigger, with auth and no infra

#43

Post by arthurcolle »

dylburger wrote: post #40
LyndsySimon wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FYI, your docs don’t display properly in Safari on iPadOS; the content is hidden behind the navigation, which doesn’t seem to be collapsible. Here’s a screenshot to show what I mean: https://imgur.com/a/d0SjEVt Reader view exposes the content fine, so that’s a valid workaround for now.

Thanks! Just rolled out a fix for this. Would you mind taking a look again?

Not OP but I just checked - yes it works now on iPadOS (on Safari & Chrome).

Re: Show HN: Pipedream. Develop any workflow, on any trigger, with auth and no infra

#44

Post by LyndsySimon »

dylburger wrote: post #40
LyndsySimon wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FYI, your docs don’t display properly in Safari on iPadOS; the content is hidden behind the navigation, which doesn’t seem to be collapsible. Here’s a screenshot to show what I mean: https://imgur.com/a/d0SjEVt Reader view exposes the content fine, so that’s a valid workaround for now.

Thanks! Just rolled out a fix for this. Would you mind taking a look again?

Works great now :)

Re: Show HN: Pipedream. Develop any workflow, on any trigger, with auth and no infra

#45

Post by slowmovintarget »

dastbe wrote: post #42
todsac wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you do not need enterprise use cases (single sign-on, higher level SLAs, shared authentication, etc) and your scale fits within our defined constraints, then free is the price.

The OP was asking what the price is when they do have an enterprise use case or their scale grows beyond your defined constraints.

Most vendors that aim for enterprise contracts take a "contact us" approach. Contracts can be negotiated. Pricing may vary.

(I am not affiliated with this vendor, I just deal with software vendors a fair bit.)

Re: Show HN: Pipedream. Develop any workflow, on any trigger, with auth and no infra

#46

Post by haggy »

todsac wrote: post #32
haggy wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't an answer to how they might monetize this service and quite frankly I've seen the OP/Co-Founder post their "answer" to this question on multiple other comments and it's extremely hand-wavy. I currently have little to no faith that this product isn't going to leave anyone that uses it stranded in a year or so when they have to shutdown due to lack of revenue.

Haggy - we have no plans to charge individual developers for low volume workflows that fit within our defined constraints. Our revenue efforts will be focused on enterprise use cases. I have no desire to be hand-savvy so please ask whatever questions you have and I will do my best to clarify.

How would you envision supporting 10X the usage that you have today 1 year from now if all that usage is falling under your "free" plan constraints?

Re: Show HN: Pipedream. Develop any workflow, on any trigger, with auth and no infra

#47

Post by masukomi »

todsac wrote: post #38
tmikaeld wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You need to address the cost of scalability, free isn't a price and there's clearly a price somewhere along the line.

If you do not need enterprise use cases (single sign-on, higher level SLAs, shared authentication, etc) and your scale fits within our defined constraints, then free is the price.

to me that translates as "WARNING! TRAP!" because I may decide I like your thing, and then my users may decide they like _my_ thing, and then suddenly I find out what your price is for my scale and "oh shit! I'm going to go broke OR have to recode everything"

ESPECIALLY since this would become a key part of the infrastructure / how my app gets its stuff done. Replacing your service with a competitor or something homebrew would be a major pain, especially when I find myself unexpectedly popular.

there is NO WAY I would ever use or recommend a service that refuses to tell me what my potential long term costs are up front.

It's too much of a gamble with a business or worse, a hobby project that isn't making me any money to compensate for this unexpected "balloon payment".

Re: Show HN: Pipedream. Develop any workflow, on any trigger, with auth and no infra

#48

Post by gbear605 »

slowmovintarget wrote: post #45
dastbe wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The OP was asking what the price is when they do have an enterprise use case or their scale grows beyond your defined constraints.

Most vendors that aim for enterprise contracts take a "contact us" approach. Contracts can be negotiated. Pricing may vary. (I am not affiliated with this vendor, I just deal with software vendors a fair bit.)

Vendors that are aiming at a split workflow, with a free tier and a paid tier usually have some set paid tiers and then a “contact us” for beyond that. For example, Slack gives you prices for the Standard and Support plans, and then lets enterprises contact them for negotiating prices. The problem with Pipedream is that non-enterprise customers will want to use their so-called enterprise plan.

Re: Show HN: Pipedream. Develop any workflow, on any trigger, with auth and no infra

#49

Post by zocuments »

dylburger wrote: post #41
zocuments wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What framework/template are you using for docs.pipedream? They look great. PS: On Desktop, the left third of the Pricing content/copy is rendered behind the menu.

Thanks for letting us know, I just rolled out a fix to the hidden content. Can you let me know if you're still seeing the issue? We use Vuepress for the docs and it's awesome! https://vuepress.vuejs.org

Looks good now!

Re: Show HN: Pipedream. Develop any workflow, on any trigger, with auth and no infra

#50

Post by alttab »

LyndsySimon wrote: post #23
cpursley wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So basically, people are going to build on top of your service and if yall don't figure out a revenue model, you'll need to close down shop, leaving people scrambling to migrate somewhere else... No thanks, I've been there before. You'd be better off just charging from the get-go. Otherwise, this should be 100% open source.

The workflows are Node.js code. If you need to transition away, building an abstraction layer for the stuff they provide that you use shouldn’t be too hard. It would be even cooler if they committed to open sourcing their implementation if they discontinue the service... The risk here seems small.

The risk isn't small compared to the value add, especially if all they are doing is providing an abstraction layer that isn't "too hard."

The value seems to be free hosting for the polling and scheduling.

This isn't too different than IFTTT abstraction-wise, and is easily reproducible in AWS using data pipelines and lambdas.

Why take an external dependency if what they are doing is rather simple?

I'd argue you are right about the complexity. The hook of the service seems to be easy integration and lack of infrastructure requirements.

At scale, a freemium model won't work. But it would provide initial traction for small use cases. This can be funded for a while without major rounds.

The advice to monetize now versus building community and getting users / crowd sourcing plugins is solid if the aim isn't to open source it.

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