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Google outage – resolved

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Re: Google outage – resolved

#751

Post by jjguy »

nickjj wrote: post #719
kaushikt wrote: post #676

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why?

This topic just came up recently on a podcast I was on where someone said a large service was down for X amount of time and the service being down tanked his entire business while it was down for days. But he was compensated in hosting credits for the exact amount of down time for the 1 service that caused the issue. It took so long to resolve because it took support a while to figure out it was their service, not hi…

I like your anecdote, I might steal that one.

IANAL, but I negotiate a lot of enterprise SaaS agreements. When considering the SLA, it is important to remember it is a legal document, not an engineering one. It has engineering impact and is up to engineering to satisfy, but the actual contents of it are better considered when wearing your lawyer hat, not your engineering one.

e.g., What you're referring to is related to the limitation of liability clauses and especially "special" or "consequential" damages -- a category of damages that are not 'direct' damages but secondary. [1]

Accepting _any_ liability for special or consequential damages is always a point of negotiation. As a service provider, you always try to avoid it because it is so hard to estimate the magnitude, and thus judge how much insurance coverage you need.

Related, those paragraphs also contain a limitation of liability clause, often at capped at X times annual cost. Doesn't make much sense to sign up a client for $10k per year but accept $10M+ liability exposure for them.

This is just scratching the surface -- tons of color and depth here that is nuanced for every company and situation. It's why you employe attorneys!

1 - https://www.lexisnexis.com/lexis-practical-guidance/the-jour...

Re: Google outage – resolved

#752

Post by Cthulhu_ »

jacquesm wrote: post #196

So, anybody still feel like arguing that 'the cloud' is a viable back-up? Or is that a sore point right now? Just for a moment imagine: what if it never comes back again? Of course it will, - at least, it better - but what if it doesn't? And if it does, are you going to take countermeasures in case it happens again or is it just going to be 'back to normal' again?

Well yeah; I don't trust myself enough to own & operate my own servers, and I cannot give myself any uptime guarantees - let alone at the scale that a cloud provider can offer me.

Re: Google outage – resolved

#753

Post by zeroping »

patrickthebold wrote: post #736
nickjj wrote: post #719

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This topic just came up recently on a podcast I was on where someone said a large service was down for X amount of time and the service being down tanked his entire business while it was down for days. But he was compensated in hosting credits for the exact amount of down time for the 1 service that caused the issue. It took so long to resolve because it took support a while to figure out it was their service, not hi…

Seems like you want insurance. As with the hospital bill you'd generally be paying a bunch of extra money for your health insurance plan to not get stuck with the bill. Not sure that exists for businesses, but I'd expect you'd need to go shopping separately if you want that. Seems like a good business idea if it doesn't exist.

Independent 'a service was down' insurance isn't the same though. It is important for the cost to come out of the provider's pocket, thus giving them a huge financial incentive to not be down. Having that incentive in place is the most important part of an SLA.

Re: Google outage – resolved

#754

Post by rakoo »

vultour wrote: post #586
rakoo wrote: post #577

Earlier quoted context omitted.

World GDP was ~$90B last year ( https://databank.worldbank.org/data/download/GDP.pdf ), which averages to ~$150M/minute

That's trillion not billion

Sorry, language mistake. The result is the same: GDP is ~$150M/minute

Re: Google outage – resolved

#755

Post by thu2111 »

mizzao wrote: post #594
bonoboTP wrote: post #421

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess a lot of people are fine with the risk. Everybody uses it, so if, like, Gmail loses all the emails, we are then in such a state that the consequences will be more bearable and socially normal. Most people are fine with accepting that whatever future thing will happen to most people will also happen to them. Because then the consequences will also be normal. If the apocalypse comes, it comes for almost all of…

This sounds like the good old 1970-80s "No one ever got fired for buying IBM" argument.

Yeah but for the people making that argument, it was a good one!

Re: Google outage – resolved

#756

Post by judge2020 »

fgblanch wrote: post #723
eric_khun wrote: post #669

If you pay for Google Services, they have an SLA (service level agreement) of 99.9% [1]. If their services are down more than 43 minutes this month[2], you can request “free days” of usage. Edit: Services were down from ~12:55pm to ~1:52pm, it's 57minutes. Thanks hiby007 [1] https://workspace.google.com/intl/en/terms/sla.html [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_availability#Percentage_c...

In [1] it says: "Customer Must Request Service Credit." Do you know how to request it?

Admins can go to admin.google.com and click the help button to start a support request.

Re: Google outage – resolved

#757

Post by krallja »

jacquesm wrote: post #196

So, anybody still feel like arguing that 'the cloud' is a viable back-up? Or is that a sore point right now? Just for a moment imagine: what if it never comes back again? Of course it will, - at least, it better - but what if it doesn't? And if it does, are you going to take countermeasures in case it happens again or is it just going to be 'back to normal' again?

I’ve heard multiple founders argue that it’s safe to have downtime because of a cloud outage, because you’re not likely to be the highest importance service that your customers use that also had downtime.

Re: Google outage – resolved

#758

Post by thu2111 »

diggan wrote: post #699
oknoorap wrote: post #637

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But our tech right now is far more advanced than 15 years ago. We have IPFS, Blockchain, dat protocol today. I think it's possible to kill the giants. Even, Tim Berners-Lee want to decentralized the web: https://techcrunch.com/2018/10/09/tim-berners-lee-is-on-a-mi...

Even? Tim Berners-Lee tried since day 0 to make the web decentralized. One of the initial requirements in the 1989 proposal for a global hypertext system included "Non-Centralisation" where "new system must allow existing systems to be linked together without requiring any central control or coordination". See https://www.w3.org/History/1989/proposal.html for the rest. While it went OK-ish for the internet, we massiv…

No we didn't. The web is very nicely decentralised, especially with the general malaise and decline of Facebook.

What isn't decentralised is web apps but TBL never intended the web to be used for full blown desktop app replacements in the first place so no surprise it doesn't meet its design goals for that.

Re: Google outage – resolved

#759

Post by thu2111 »

woofie11 wrote: post #262
username90 wrote: post #111

I feel like Google is having more outages recently. I worked there for 4 years and even in such a short time you really noticed the shift from engineering focus to business focus. But maybe it is just a coincidence.

I interviewed for Google many years ago and recently. The expectations fell through the floor. I've see plots of number of employees too. I'm not sure how Google will dig itself out of that one.

They made you interview again even after having worked there before? That's odd. It used to be that they didn't do that.

Re: Google outage – resolved

#760

Post by brandmeyer »

Singalong: She broke the whoooole world, with her change, he broke the whole wide world, with his change, they broke the whole world with their chaaaaange!

I'm sure its stressful right now. But someday, these engineers will look back and retell the stories about how it happened and the lessons they learned. Hopefully with a laugh.

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