Ouch. So let's all move workloads to Hetzner
Tell HN: DigitalOcean is doing layoffs
231–240 of 264 posts
Re: Tell HN: DigitalOcean is doing layoffs
#232Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Why handicap yourself in the future just to make one quarter look better? Surely if you have faith your stock options will be worth more if you play the longer game? Is this specifically in reference to "I really don't understand cutting stuff like technical writers etc during these periods." ? If so, do you think technical writers are important business value wise?
do you think technical writers are important business value wise? If they aren't, why were they hired in the first place?
Offset writing duties to enable x higher output. (x = duty that is not writing). Probably could have worded the question instead as: "do you think technical writers are important business value wise to enable a full time position?"
I've hired out technical writers full time and part time. And I've found it's far better to hire a technical writer part time or on contract vs. full time. The value to cost ratio is not comparable to technical roles.
Re: Tell HN: DigitalOcean is doing layoffs
#233Earlier quoted context omitted.
Never lose your 2FA backup codes or you're locked out of your account forever if you lose your 2FA device - despite support having a verification process to remove 2FA in the event you lost your codes - the support tickets are ignored or unmonitored. I was also a happy DO customer for the last 5 years or so. But now I'm locked out of my account. My fault for losing my codes (DO are the only backup codes I can't seem…
> Never lose your 2FA backup codes or you're locked out of your account forever if you lose your 2FA device In the case of digital infrastructure, I'm actually kinda ok with this. Would be better if it was a policy or if you could prove ownership of the payment account, but at the very least it's much harder to social engineer someone out of an account. Of course, the lack of support isn't good.
It seems like a good case for putting an exorbitant charge on it with huge warnings about that upfront. Charge a $1000 recovery fee or something like that and make people check a box agreeing to it. I would imagine thoroughly vetting the request is pretty onerous on DO support (and it should be), but they should make the customer pay for it since it is ultimately the customer's responsibility.
This is my greatest fear with my 2FA stuff and why I try to make sure and always have an available backup.
Re: Tell HN: DigitalOcean is doing layoffs
#234Hearing that a lot of Community teams were let go, including the teams responsible for tutorials. Seems obvious DigitalOcean doesn't care about developers anymore. But this has been obvious for a while now. I guess their value "Our Community is bigger than just us" only matters when profits are up. Pour one out for DigitalOcean. It's the end of an era.
Yes, I was a technical writer on the content team. I am hearing that our entire team was laid off. It just isn't a big money-maker in these trying times. More of a cost center, I suspect. It's too bad, as DO tutorials and content have been respected for so many years by developers and sysadmins. The end of an era.
Just want to add my 2c that DO tutorials are pretty damn amazing and I've got a number of them bookmarked for several common tasks. Even for such mundane tasks as wiping one's machine of stale docker containers/images.
This is really sad to see it go. I wonder if this could have been handed over to a better home. e.g. I love how Mozilla hosts a lot of pretty good content explaining basic web concepts.
Re: Tell HN: DigitalOcean is doing layoffs
#235Earlier quoted context omitted.
Just imagine an absurdly overheated economy where a few million workers are doing something of really marginal or negative value, like cold calling seniors to sell them dogecoin. That’s not our economy today, but that’s ultimately what the Fed is looking out for, and it’s what you’d get if you have too loose money for too long.
If negative social value work is lucrative, people will do it. If it's not lucrative, people won't do it. This has no relation at all with the employment rate.
It’s not the social value it’s the economic value, and as interest rates rise riskier and less productive use of capital becomes less attractive.
Re: Tell HN: DigitalOcean is doing layoffs
#236Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think poverty is necessary, that problem could be solved by redistributing these returns, e.g. through a higher corporate tax and UBI. The alternative to monetary policy is a cycle of boom and bust that is much larger and more disruptive. Fundamentally though, we do not want people to be employeed in jobs that produce little value, and when interest rates are too low a lot of that starts to happen.
> that problem could be solved by redistributing these returns, TBF, we already have redistribution via progressive taxation which funds "social safety nets to ensure the poor are at least housed, clothed, and fed." (to use GP's words). Trick is to ensure that we do not do too much of it, else people will not have any incentives to work harder.
We have progressive taxation in theory, however the reality is we have a virtual aristocracy able to pay to have tax law written in their favor, to the point where as a percentage of income the extremely wealthy aren't paying nearly as much of a portion of their income in taxes as the middle class who are only a couple of missed paychecks away from life-altering changes in lifestyle.
Also, the Laffer Curve has been thoroughly debunked time and time again. You may want to pay attention to what happened to wealth distribution since the start of the Reagan Administration and its adherence to "voodoo economics" - the very same economic theory plaguing us to this day.
Re: Tell HN: DigitalOcean is doing layoffs
#237the entire SRE and reliability platform teams are laid off with no plan on what to do about it
Re: Tell HN: DigitalOcean is doing layoffs
#238Hearing that a lot of Community teams were let go, including the teams responsible for tutorials. Seems obvious DigitalOcean doesn't care about developers anymore. But this has been obvious for a while now. I guess their value "Our Community is bigger than just us" only matters when profits are up. Pour one out for DigitalOcean. It's the end of an era.
That's a shame given the quality of their content. I wonder what this means for CSS Tricks.
Add me to that watchlist!
Re: Tell HN: DigitalOcean is doing layoffs
#239you could not imagine how little responsibility, care, and general competence was displayed by leaders on the all-company call today.
We were told that reliability issues will be fixed by going slower. Feature delivery targets are not changed though. The amount of engineering time planned for reliability work is 0%.
Re: Tell HN: DigitalOcean is doing layoffs
#240I don't really get the motivation for this beyond personal greed on behalf of executives that are only seeking to prop up the share price in the short term. The market forces at work will force all technology companies down in valuation pretty much regardless, what is the difference of a few extra million market cap to handicap your ability to grow during the next expansion phase? I can understand it if you have brou…
That's exactly what happened 3 years ago too. Look at the sequence of events.