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The reason scale isn't so important today is because most DBs can actually scale vertically to really high numbers. The tipping point is high enough that if you

by didibus 10y ago

The reason scale isn't so important today is because most DBs can actually scale vertically to really high numbers. The tipping point is high enough that if you have this problem, you probably can also afford to fix it. What matters though is performance and availability. No matter what scale you work at, you can't be slow, that will drive people away. You also can't be unavailable. This means that you might have to handle traffic spikes. Depending on your offering, you probably also want to be secure and reliable. Losing customer data or leaking it will drive customers away too. So, I'd mostly agree, in 2016, scale isn't a big problem. Better to focus on functionality, performance, security, reliability and availability. These things will impact all your customers, even when you only have one. They'll also be much harder to fix. Where scale matters is at big companies. When you already have a lot of customers, you’re first version of any new feature or product must already be at scale. Amazon couldn't have launched a non scalable prime now, or echo. Google can't launch a non scalable chat service, etc.

hamburglar 10y ago
> Where scale matters is at big companies. When you already have a lot of customers, you’re first version of any new feature or product must already be at scale. Amazon couldn't have launched a non scalable prime now, or echo. Google can't launch a non scalable chat service, etc. This is the point I was going to make. When you are designing the very platforms on which all these "does it scale? who cares" startups are going to be built, you do not have the luxury of having that attitude. Definitely don't take that mindset into an interview at google or amazon. :) I do agree with the OP's sentiment for startup projects in general. I have had the experience of worrying about scale too early and over-engineering a system which never had more than a few dozen users, and the opposite experience of tossing something together that wouldn't scale and then going through the hairy scrambling at every order of magnitude of scale through tens of millions of users. The latter was definitely a better strategy.

by didibus 10y ago

hamburglar 10y ago

> Where scale matters is at big companies. When you already have a lot of customers, you’re first version of any new feature or product must already be at scale. Amazon couldn't have launched a non scalable prime now, or echo. Google can't launch a non scalable chat service, etc. This is the point I was going to make. When you are designing the very platforms on which all these "does it scale? who cares" startups are going to be built, you do not have the luxury of having that attitude. Definitely don't take that mindset into an interview at google or amazon. :) I do agree with the OP's sentiment for startup projects in general. I have had the experience of worrying about scale too early and over-engineering a system which never had more than a few dozen users, and the opposite experience of tossing something together that wouldn't scale and then going through the hairy scrambling at every order of magnitude of scale through tens of millions of users. The latter was definitely a better strategy.