Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups • Hacker News Board

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#81

Post by ampersandy » Fri, Dec 07, 2012, 12:59 AM UTC

cllns wrote: post #19

ampersandy wrote: post #4

Why hasn't Google offered an option to increase from the default 25GB of email storage? Drive has an option to increase upto 16TB, but Gmail is locked at 25GB? What gives?

I would like to see a breakdown (from google) of how much storage people use. I'd guess a majority use <1 GB, and I can't imagine many people need more than 25GB.

My comment is aimed at business users, not casual users. Several friends of mine have hit the cap with their business accounts and have had to consider alternative email providers because now they can't use their email accounts.

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#82

Post by Margh » Fri, Dec 07, 2012, 12:59 AM UTC

eikenberry wrote: post #69

indiecore wrote: post #15

GOD DAMNIT I was literally 10 minutes away from signing up.

Be glad it came when it did. It would suck to just get all setup then find out the service has been deprecated. For everyone with an account, I suggest looking for an alternative soon.

Yerp, we signed up about a month ago and had pretty much just settled in over the past week. Hooray.

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#83

Post by toomuchtodo » Fri, Dec 07, 2012, 12:59 AM UTC

ams6110 wrote: post #59

redthrowaway wrote: post #25

What really struck me was that they're only offering three nines of uptime. I can't see many businesses ditching Excel or Word to go with something that will cost you half a day of productivity every year, especially not for $50 a license.

What's the "nines" of uptime on a typical corporate desktop? By my back of the envelope calculations it's worse than 3.

I'll take "Google downtime" (a damn small amount) over any other sort of downtime (Rackspace, AWS US-EAST-1, the hardware on my desk) any day of the week.

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#84

Post by thewordis » Fri, Dec 07, 2012, 1:00 AM UTC

indiecore wrote: post #15

GOD DAMNIT I was literally 10 minutes away from signing up.

According to another blog post, you can still "switch to it" for the next 30 days. So maybe sign up for paid and then immediately switch to free?

http://googleappsupdates.blogspot.com/2012/12/changes-to-goo...

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#85

Post by jamesmiller5 » Fri, Dec 07, 2012, 1:00 AM UTC

I use Google Apps for my domain but forward the mail to another account which means I see no ads and get hosted mail for free. I didn't even realize until this announcement that I'm probably a net negative and probably not the only person doing this.

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#86

Post by toomuchtodo » Fri, Dec 07, 2012, 1:00 AM UTC

aidos wrote: post #28

chrisblackwell wrote: post #3

This is really a logical step. If you are an individual and don't really see the value in $50 a year, you can forward your own domain to your regular Gmail account and set the reply to email address to whatever you want. If you run a business and need the Google Apps platform, then $50 a year really shouldn't be a barrier for you. If it is, time to rethink your business priorities.

$50 / user / year - still not insane but I know it's put people off in the past.

We have a Google Apps account at my day gig with 79 users; I pay it monthly on a credit card, at $5/month, so right around $400/month. That is incredible value for what we get with Google Apps, as they don't just do our email, calendar, etc, but also Drive and our authentication (via OAuth/LDAP).

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#87

Post by jtbarrett » Fri, Dec 07, 2012, 1:02 AM UTC

I have a free Google Apps account mostly so that I can have a custom domain for my small (free) App Engine site: https://developers.google.com/appengine/docs/domain

It's sad that now attaching a custom domain will cost a lot more than the domain itself.

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#88

Post by cdcarter » Fri, Dec 07, 2012, 1:04 AM UTC

ampersandy wrote: post #4

Why hasn't Google offered an option to increase from the default 25GB of email storage? Drive has an option to increase upto 16TB, but Gmail is locked at 25GB? What gives?

They used to offer it. I'm still grandfathered on a 30GB plan, which is wonderful. I occasionally get poke emails from Google asking me to upgrade to one of the new plans.

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#89

Post by Margh » Fri, Dec 07, 2012, 1:05 AM UTC

aidos wrote: post #28

chrisblackwell wrote: post #3

This is really a logical step. If you are an individual and don't really see the value in $50 a year, you can forward your own domain to your regular Gmail account and set the reply to email address to whatever you want. If you run a business and need the Google Apps platform, then $50 a year really shouldn't be a barrier for you. If it is, time to rethink your business priorities.

$50 / user / year - still not insane but I know it's put people off in the past.

Certainly puts me off. $5/10 per user per year, wouldn't think twice about it (even though the money would be paid grudgingly). With the number of users we have that would end up being around $50/year; but $500/year to host some email and store spreadsheets? No thanks.

Re: Google Apps stops accepting free sign-ups

#90

Post by redthrowaway » Fri, Dec 07, 2012, 1:06 AM UTC

ams6110 wrote: post #59

redthrowaway wrote: post #25

What really struck me was that they're only offering three nines of uptime. I can't see many businesses ditching Excel or Word to go with something that will cost you half a day of productivity every year, especially not for $50 a license.

What's the "nines" of uptime on a typical corporate desktop? By my back of the envelope calculations it's worse than 3.

Even so, it's not like they're replacing the desktop. This is in addition to the downtime they can already expect.