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The Meteoric Rise of DigitalOcean

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Re: The Meteoric Rise of DigitalOcean

#141

Post by FireBeyond »

mattmanser wrote: post #82
unethical_ban wrote: post #28

Seems no one here so far has mentioned Rackspace. Let's start by saying that DO has fewer features for a complex deployment: No load balancing, no private subnets, (IIRC) no IPv6 at the moment. No "cloud files" or S3 equivalent, the scaling isn't as automatic as RAX or AWS can provide. DO can't host Windows (which still matters for many existing operations, don't fool yourself). RAX gives more information and granula…

Every time I look at rack space it looks phenomenally expensive. As far as I can tell it's 5 times the cost of digital ocean.

It does seem to be. We are relatively small, and admittedly have a whole bunch of data in S3, but aside from that, our $10K/mo at Rackspace (primarily VMs, some load balancing) is looking to go down to about $6K/month at AWS when we port across 40 or so VMs (then we also don't have to deal with $4K/mo of S3 data transfer, too).

Re: The Meteoric Rise of DigitalOcean

#142

Post by reqres »

riffraff wrote: post #123
reqres wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think in a nutshell you're describing Clayton Christensen process of disruptive innovation (or more specifically low end disruption). AWS is catering more and more to its most demanding users. This exposes them at the lower end to developers who aren't as demanding but prefer something simpler that better fits their needs. The way this narrative ends is that DO eats up AWS from below

IMO you are underestimating that AWS expands all the time in _every_ direction. When they added cloudfront, RDS or elastic beanstalk they were offering "something less flexible but very simple" even while they were adding glacier or MFA through IAM which are for more "complex" customers.

> IMO you are underestimating that AWS expands all the time in _every_ direction.

I think I can see where you're coming from but I strongly disagree that AWS will protect its market share by adding more products.

Each new product doesn't just bring utility in terms of what customers can do - it also brings disutility in other areas. New products dilute marketing (what are you selling?). It dilutes the allocation of internal resources (maintenance, R&D, marketing). It increases cognitive overhead for customers (E.g. the product range is a mess -EC2/S3/SWF/SQS/SES/SNS/FPS How is a customer to keep track of what's going on?).

My assertion is that for the average customer - new AWS products only bring headache and zero benefit. Because most people just won't find the need for it. Also AWS don't need to care. They will not meaningfully improve the core offering to the average user because it's the high end customers that will move the needle at the end of the day.

Re: The Meteoric Rise of DigitalOcean

#143

Post by devicenull »

digitalsushi wrote: post #54

I'm trying to find a VPS provider that can do IPv6 and multiple IPv4. Digital Ocean really surprised me in having no IPv6 offering. What really surprised me is that you can't get IPv6 on Amazon's EC2. You can get a v6 address for a load balancer, but that's surely not the same thing. Linode does actually almost fit the bill, except that they require manual authorization for an additional IPv4 addresses. So there's no…

It's because it's hard to do right, and securely. With IPv4, it's been around so long that all the secure issues are well understood, and software just expects it to be there.

IPv6 has a bunch of possible security issues, and breaks in all sorts of unknown ways.

It's not impossible to do, but it's a lot harder then just installing some software. As an example, libvirt comes with all sorts of network filters that will prevent IPv4 guests from doing all sorts of bad things (IP spoofing, ARP poisoning, etc). In contrast, it comes with exactly zero similar filters for IPv6.

You need to explicitly ask for this from providers. While you might not get it right away, having the demand there is the only thing that's going to encourage companies to spend time on it.

Re: The Meteoric Rise of DigitalOcean

#144

Post by ehPReth »

zubi wrote: post #79
MicroBerto wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah. For me it was price and performance, both of which DigitalOcean wins. I couldn't possibly care less about an admin panel. I'm a Linux guy. I want cheap speed and reliability. With DO, you get all of them. Sorry Linode, but you're old news now.

I share exactly the same feelings and experience with the person who replied to your comment previously. I have a server in each and I like them both. However; - Linode support is second to none. DO is not bad either but much slower and less responsive. You feel the difference when you really need it. - I had a CC payment issue with DO since the beginning. I mentioned it to the support twice but unsolved as of yet, u…

Is SNI (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Server_Name_Indication) an option for you?

Re: The Meteoric Rise of DigitalOcean

#145

Post by davexunit »

bduerst wrote: post #133
adestefan wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't care what it said. There is no reason for a provider to take down a blog post short of it being illegal and someone standing on their doorstep with a warrant.

Except a TOS agreement violation with a person who is obviously trolling. Normally I would be right there with you - but in this case it was a troll who was asked to anonymize his clearly defamatory attacks, and predictably he blew up over it. DO is a private provider, not government affiliated, so 1st amendment doesn't apply and they are protected under §230, but still they have a TOS that prevents it from becoming…

Sure, they have the right to make an oppressive TOS, and I have the right to take my business elsewhere in protest.

Re: The Meteoric Rise of DigitalOcean

#146

Post by vacri »

reqres wrote: post #135
vacri wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you mean "DO gobbles up the fruit that fell from the AWS tree". Why on earth would AWS be particularly concerned that DO gets all the people who want to spend $5/server and have a handful of servers, when AWS get all the people with four-figure-plus spends? One $1000 spender is worth 20 people who rave over $5 boxes. And there are plenty of $1k spenders. AWS does have some cheap offerings - some micro instanc…

The logic you present is correct from the incumbent's perspective. But followed to its logical conclusion, it leads to the downfall of the incumbent according to Christensen's model of disruptive innovation. The incumbents will continually cater upmarket to their higher value customers while the challenger picks up more and more low value customers. But there's only so far upmarket you can go until you run out of cus…

This must be how BSD/Linux has killed Windows.

The problem with the 'logical conclusion' that you're offering is that it works entirely in a vacuum. It assumes that AWS does not innovate itself, but steams on with a stolid product. Nothing could be further from the truth - barely a week goes by without them announcing a new service or improvements to an existing one. DO is behind the 8-ball-that-is-AWS, but AWS isn't just sitting there on the felt, it's moving too.

Given the culture of innovation that exists at AWS, it's not hard to see how they could adjust themselves if DO actually does become a threat. AWS is not head-in-the-sand Microsoft, and even if it were, the might of all other operating systems combined - including that of the company so successful that it has $100 billion just lying around in cash - still hasn't knocked Windows off the top spot. Hardly the 'downfall of the incumbent' suggested.

And Microsoft is still undisputed king in the realm of enterprise user software. Unix has always shared the server room with MS (actually, MS is the interloper there), but outside the server room, enterprise users live on MS. There is a myriad of cheaper enterprise and/or office software out there, and MS isn't particularly threatened by it.

Things about how DO is much less complex, simpler and as a result cheaper.

And then when you need the big stuff... the stuff for which you need to pay the big bucks... the complexity isn't there and you move to the vendor that does supply it. When DO makes those kinds of offerings, then AWS will see them as a serious competitor, and you will see prices drop sharply. Until then, it keeps on truckin'.

Re: The Meteoric Rise of DigitalOcean

#147

Post by array »

gregf wrote: post #106
bndr wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't Linode exactly the same? Easy to use web interface, a lot of documentation on getting the things up and going and the ability to resize linode on the web.

Linode doesn't do hourly billing either. They will credit your account for what you don't use, but you get charged for the month upfront.

They've recently released an hourly billing model into beta: https://forum.linode.com/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=10817

Re: The Meteoric Rise of DigitalOcean

#148

Post by bduerst »

dangrossman wrote: post #140
bduerst wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except a TOS agreement violation with a person who is obviously trolling. Normally I would be right there with you - but in this case it was a troll who was asked to anonymize his clearly defamatory attacks, and predictably he blew up over it. DO is a private provider, not government affiliated, so 1st amendment doesn't apply and they are protected under §230, but still they have a TOS that prevents it from becoming…

To take this to the extreme: you could shut down an innocent business that hosts on DigitalOcean by posting a threatening or defamatory comment on their blog, then making an abuse report. This puts them in the position of hosting such speech, and permits DO to cancel the service without recourse as a TOS violation. That's what you're OK with if you're OK with that being a term of the agreement. You point out that the…

True, that is an extreme. It seems like DO is willing to evaluate each case and give the blog host a chance to remedy the situation. Evidence thus far shows that they at least stick to their guns on the troll posts.

Re: The Meteoric Rise of DigitalOcean

#149

Post by bduerst »

davexunit wrote: post #145
bduerst wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except a TOS agreement violation with a person who is obviously trolling. Normally I would be right there with you - but in this case it was a troll who was asked to anonymize his clearly defamatory attacks, and predictably he blew up over it. DO is a private provider, not government affiliated, so 1st amendment doesn't apply and they are protected under §230, but still they have a TOS that prevents it from becoming…

Sure, they have the right to make an oppressive TOS, and I have the right to take my business elsewhere in protest.

Of course you do. Violating the TOS that you agree to does give the provider a reason to block your service though.

Re: The Meteoric Rise of DigitalOcean

#150

Post by aryastark »

reqres wrote: post #135
vacri wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you mean "DO gobbles up the fruit that fell from the AWS tree". Why on earth would AWS be particularly concerned that DO gets all the people who want to spend $5/server and have a handful of servers, when AWS get all the people with four-figure-plus spends? One $1000 spender is worth 20 people who rave over $5 boxes. And there are plenty of $1k spenders. AWS does have some cheap offerings - some micro instanc…

The logic you present is correct from the incumbent's perspective. But followed to its logical conclusion, it leads to the downfall of the incumbent according to Christensen's model of disruptive innovation. The incumbents will continually cater upmarket to their higher value customers while the challenger picks up more and more low value customers. But there's only so far upmarket you can go until you run out of cus…

Not sure I buy this premise. For one thing, I just had to decide between DO and AWS. I wanted something I could jump in and try something, and then later scale out. I was heavily leaning towards DO. But then I noticed AWS gives you a free year of their micro instance. DO isn't beating that.
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