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Disingenuous of them to not compare their pricing to Google Nearline[1] or AWS S3 Infrequent Access[2] or AWS Glacier[3] given their price points ($0.01/GB/mo,

Disingenuous of them to not compare their pricing to Google Nearline[1] or AWS S3 Infrequent Access[2] or AWS Glacier[3] given their price points ($0.01/GB/mo, $0.0125/GB/mo, $0.007/GB/mo) are much more competitive with B2 price-wise. Talk about stacking the deck in your favor. Makes me leery of even trying it (what other things are they covering up?) or moving my tens of petabytes over there, despite my intense interest. [1] https://cloud.google.com/storage/docs/nearline https://cloud.google.com/storage/docs/nearline [2] https://aws.amazon.com/s3/ https://aws.amazon.com/s3/ [3] https://aws.amazon.com/glacier/ https://aws.amazon.com/glacier/

onethumb 11y ago
Heh, a friend just pointed out that their math is wrong on their pricing comparison page, too. S3 isn't +440%, it's +340%.
- atYevP 11y ago
  Interesting! How'd they calculate that? Taking the S3 price and dividing by B2 price then multiplying by 100 = 440%. Are they accounting for something else in their calculation?
  - onethumb 11y ago
    +440% would mean: $0.005 + ($0.005 * 4.4) = $0.027 since you're adding (+) 440%.
    - atYevP 11y ago
      Ah, I think the difference there is + meaning adding instead of + meaning higher. Fair point though!
      - onethumb 11y ago
        + means add and + means higher. Both are incorrect. S3's pricing is 340% higher than B2's. S3's pricing is 440% of B2's. So either "+340%" or "440%" work.
        atYevP 11y ago
        Ah! Fair point, I'll fwd to our web folks!
atYevP 11y ago
We're trying to build a service that's more akin to Google Cloud Service and Amazon S3, not Nearline, IA, or Glacier. Those all have certain limitations (like time to access your data) that we are trying to avoid, which is why we didn't price against them and instead priced against the services we're trying to actually provide an alternative to.
- onethumb 11y ago
  So for that chart, you're choosing Availability Time as the only metric to care about or facet on? But not Durability (# of 9s, # of datacenters, etc)? If that's so, you should just make that clear. And S3-IA would be on that list. Otherwise, you're just picking & choosing whatever metrics paint you in the best light, which is what would make a prospective customer (like me) or of mine leery. It feels like you're either unaware of the competitive landscape (unlikely) or intentionally skewing the story, or both. And that will scare off potential customers, like me. B2 is exciting! You're doing something innovative! I'm interested! Just tell your story, don't hide the things that make you different, and let the clients choose. B2 is very competitive even with those other services listed - and it makes you seem more credible.
budmang 11y ago
Those are great services and we actually mention them just a bit lower on the page. In the chart, we're comparing apples-to-apples: real-time cloud storage services. Nearline, S3-IA, and Glacier are all made for 'infrequent access'. All charge you for deleting files and retrieving files (on top of bandwidth.) Near line has a 3 second latency to first file and Glacier has a 4 hour wait. S3-IA has a minimum file size they charge for. All of those restrictions might be fine...just depends on the use case. But B2 is designed to be used not only for 'infrequently accessed' files...but also for frequently accessed ones. And all of other services are still 40% - 250% more expensive for their base storage costs. Hope that helps. Not trying to hide anything and we'd love to have you give Backblaze B2 a try. (And to provide us feedback or ask us questions about anything else!) Gleb from Backblaze
- onethumb 11y ago
  B2 has plenty of limitations, too. Like being single datacenter. I wouldn't disqualify it from a list like this just because it's "different". Each of the services on the list have their upsides and downsides, and none of them are anywhere near apples-to-apples. What they all are are cloud-based key-value storage, each with their own tradeoffs, including price. So include all the major ones so your clients can make an informed decision and you don't look like you're completely unaware of your own competitive landscape.
  - budmang 11y ago
    Good feedback.

onethumb 11y ago

Heh, a friend just pointed out that their math is wrong on their pricing comparison page, too. S3 isn't +440%, it's +340%.

atYevP 11y ago
Interesting! How'd they calculate that? Taking the S3 price and dividing by B2 price then multiplying by 100 = 440%. Are they accounting for something else in their calculation?
- onethumb 11y ago
  +440% would mean: $0.005 + ($0.005 * 4.4) = $0.027 since you're adding (+) 440%.
  - atYevP 11y ago
    Ah, I think the difference there is + meaning adding instead of + meaning higher. Fair point though!
    - onethumb 11y ago
      + means add and + means higher. Both are incorrect. S3's pricing is 340% higher than B2's. S3's pricing is 440% of B2's. So either "+340%" or "440%" work.
      - atYevP 11y ago
        Ah! Fair point, I'll fwd to our web folks!

atYevP 11y ago

We're trying to build a service that's more akin to Google Cloud Service and Amazon S3, not Nearline, IA, or Glacier. Those all have certain limitations (like time to access your data) that we are trying to avoid, which is why we didn't price against them and instead priced against the services we're trying to actually provide an alternative to.

onethumb 11y ago
So for that chart, you're choosing Availability Time as the only metric to care about or facet on? But not Durability (# of 9s, # of datacenters, etc)? If that's so, you should just make that clear. And S3-IA would be on that list. Otherwise, you're just picking & choosing whatever metrics paint you in the best light, which is what would make a prospective customer (like me) or of mine leery. It feels like you're either unaware of the competitive landscape (unlikely) or intentionally skewing the story, or both. And that will scare off potential customers, like me. B2 is exciting! You're doing something innovative! I'm interested! Just tell your story, don't hide the things that make you different, and let the clients choose. B2 is very competitive even with those other services listed - and it makes you seem more credible.

budmang 11y ago

Those are great services and we actually mention them just a bit lower on the page. In the chart, we're comparing apples-to-apples: real-time cloud storage services. Nearline, S3-IA, and Glacier are all made for 'infrequent access'. All charge you for deleting files and retrieving files (on top of bandwidth.) Near line has a 3 second latency to first file and Glacier has a 4 hour wait. S3-IA has a minimum file size they charge for. All of those restrictions might be fine...just depends on the use case. But B2 is designed to be used not only for 'infrequently accessed' files...but also for frequently accessed ones. And all of other services are still 40% - 250% more expensive for their base storage costs. Hope that helps. Not trying to hide anything and we'd love to have you give Backblaze B2 a try. (And to provide us feedback or ask us questions about anything else!) Gleb from Backblaze

onethumb 11y ago
B2 has plenty of limitations, too. Like being single datacenter. I wouldn't disqualify it from a list like this just because it's "different". Each of the services on the list have their upsides and downsides, and none of them are anywhere near apples-to-apples. What they all are are cloud-based key-value storage, each with their own tradeoffs, including price. So include all the major ones so your clients can make an informed decision and you don't look like you're completely unaware of your own competitive landscape.
- budmang 11y ago
  Good feedback.