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Our production servers were suspended by Google Cloud

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Re: Our production servers were suspended by Google Cloud

#11

Post by phphphphp »

meibo wrote: post #8

"I missed an email that had important in the title because I didn't think it was important, now my servers are suspended and it's all Google's fault". Makes sense, I'm sure you'll fare better with Amazon.

I’d normally agree — if you ignore an important email, the consequences are on you — but the Google verification process is very hostile and Google do constantly send emails about “important” but actually innocuous things which trains users to consider these emails as unimportant.

The OP certainly has some culpability but having bad experience of this process myself multiple times, it does feel as if Google designed it to be hostile — the emails being just one part of it.

Google Cloud is great in many ways, I love the product, but the billing is such a pain, top to bottom.

Re: Our production servers were suspended by Google Cloud

#12

Post by ar9av »

iamben wrote: post #6

Emails are a difficult thing, aren't they? Was the 10 day countdown the first time Google mentioned "we'll suspend the account unless..."? Generally on these things - and unless it's an absolute emergency - you'd expect lots of prior warning and at least a couple of "YOUR SERVICES ARE DUE TO BE SUSPENDED" emails in the 48 hours before. That said, I've rightly called my bank out for sending an email with the subject l…

It's frustrating when emails don't categorize as critical and we end up missing something important. And don't even get me started on those misleading subject lines that turn out to be nothing but a sales pitch. It's like we have to play detective just to figure out which emails are worth our attention. It would be great if companies could be more transparent and upfront about the urgency of their messages.

Re: Our production servers were suspended by Google Cloud

#13

Post by sieabahlpark »

Ayesh wrote: post #5

This is one of those reasons why I prefer prepaid cloud services. There are not many providers in this field (Vultr, Digital Ocean, etc). You can generally estimate the length of the runway based in the funds you have in your account. It also helps that there are multiple funding sources, so I can split the bill between multiple cards or accounts. I travel the major part of the year, and it is quite common to get my…

[dead]

Re: Our production servers were suspended by Google Cloud

#14

Post by permo-w »

yes this is fairly unreasonable behaviour by Google, but also, come on man. if this is your business and livelihood, then you should be at the very least scanning over all emails from your main service provider, never mind ones clearly marked as “important”

Re: Our production servers were suspended by Google Cloud

#15

Post by miyuru »

fwsgonzo wrote: post #3

You expect not to be treated the same way by AWS? Am I missing something here?

AWS don't do shutdowns over a email for missing details.

Even when they have issue over non payment, they wait at least 3 months, gives calls, sends follow up emails and for the actual shutdown they disable the network. the servers will continue to run for sometime. so if the payment is made it comes back without many issues.

Re: Our production servers were suspended by Google Cloud

#16

Post by kryptiskt »

meibo wrote: post #8

"I missed an email that had important in the title because I didn't think it was important, now my servers are suspended and it's all Google's fault". Makes sense, I'm sure you'll fare better with Amazon.

My payment info needed to updated at AWS recently, they sent increasingly frequent emails about it for weeks (what can I say? I'm a bit lazy) and no services were affected while I dawdled. So, yes, AWS does it better.

Re: Our production servers were suspended by Google Cloud

#18

Post by chrisandchris »

iamben wrote: post #6

Emails are a difficult thing, aren't they? Was the 10 day countdown the first time Google mentioned "we'll suspend the account unless..."? Generally on these things - and unless it's an absolute emergency - you'd expect lots of prior warning and at least a couple of "YOUR SERVICES ARE DUE TO BE SUSPENDED" emails in the 48 hours before. That said, I've rightly called my bank out for sending an email with the subject l…

True.

AWS at least prefixes mails with "[ACTION REQUIRED]" if there _might_ be some action on your side required.

And by coubting the mails that are coming in today with "important information", I can fully understand if you'll miss one.

Re: Our production servers were suspended by Google Cloud

#20

Post by michaelteter »

mjburgess wrote: post #2

In many ways, Google continues to expose the failure of automation. The 2010s dream of "megacorp serving everyone with centralised programming" ever more exposed as an unethical pipedream.

> failure of automation

Many of the Google horror stories are less a failure of automation and more just a failure of well designed business processes. This same event could/would have occurred if it were humans sending the "additional information required" emails and also following a protocol of "shut them down in 10 days if they don't provide". The fact that this process was (most likely) automated is not the issue.

Honestly, as an outsider, it would appear that Google is a tech company that isn't actually very good at business. They do some smart tech things with their huge number of smart workers, but the business side seems to make a lot of very poor decisions (or simply doesn't even consider some part of the business or doesn't prioritize business processes well).

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