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> The Five run server clouds, app stores, ad networks and venture firms, altars to which the smaller guys must pay a sizable tax just for existing. Hmm... that

> The Five run server clouds, app stores, ad networks and venture firms, altars to which the smaller guys must pay a sizable tax just for existing. Hmm... thats not actually whats going on. Its not like start ups wouldn't have to pay hosting costs if the big 5 didn't exist. If anything these ability to host at Google/MSFT/Amazon lowers the barrier to entry for startups.

ocdtrekkie 9y ago
Perhaps, but bear in mind, instead of a multitude of potential hosts, that hosting tax must go to the Big Five. Which means the Big Five will always have a financial advantage entering any market.
- Bartweiss 9y ago
  Is that true, though? You can certainly host on Rackspace, avoid AWS entirely, and so on. Amazon will have cheaper hosting than you no matter how you get it, but that's merely a function of scale, not monopoly. Google traffic/ads and the iOs app store are the only two spots that seem truly captive.
  - ThomPete 9y ago
    Scale is due to monoploy
  - peoplewindow 9y ago
    AWS is quite expensive. It's not the case that it's cheap. Rather, you pay more for convenience. The idea that startups "must" pay AWS or equivalent is the kind of idiotic junk that only rags like the NYT could come out with. Nothing stops you buying your own hardware and racking it. For many companies that's in fact a better option than paying for cloud services!
    - phil21 9y ago
      > Nothing stops you buying your own hardware and racking it. If you're a bootstrapped startup, sure. I think you'll find it a rather hard sell to tell your VC-backed board that you are hosting somewhere other than AWS or GCE these days. It's an extremely concerning trend for anyone paying attention. Mandated-by-investor vendor lock-in before you even deploy a line of code.
      - Bartweiss 9y ago
        I don't expect anyone will actually be racking their own hardware, but "AWS or CGE only" still sounds pretty narrow to me. Are VCs really going to object to Oracle's bare metal setup, or RackSpace with OpenStack?
      - peoplewindow 9y ago
        Why would your board care where you host your servers?

ocdtrekkie 9y ago

Perhaps, but bear in mind, instead of a multitude of potential hosts, that hosting tax must go to the Big Five. Which means the Big Five will always have a financial advantage entering any market.

Bartweiss 9y ago
Is that true, though? You can certainly host on Rackspace, avoid AWS entirely, and so on. Amazon will have cheaper hosting than you no matter how you get it, but that's merely a function of scale, not monopoly. Google traffic/ads and the iOs app store are the only two spots that seem truly captive.
- ThomPete 9y ago
  Scale is due to monoploy
- peoplewindow 9y ago
  AWS is quite expensive. It's not the case that it's cheap. Rather, you pay more for convenience. The idea that startups "must" pay AWS or equivalent is the kind of idiotic junk that only rags like the NYT could come out with. Nothing stops you buying your own hardware and racking it. For many companies that's in fact a better option than paying for cloud services!
  - phil21 9y ago
    > Nothing stops you buying your own hardware and racking it. If you're a bootstrapped startup, sure. I think you'll find it a rather hard sell to tell your VC-backed board that you are hosting somewhere other than AWS or GCE these days. It's an extremely concerning trend for anyone paying attention. Mandated-by-investor vendor lock-in before you even deploy a line of code.
    - Bartweiss 9y ago
      I don't expect anyone will actually be racking their own hardware, but "AWS or CGE only" still sounds pretty narrow to me. Are VCs really going to object to Oracle's bare metal setup, or RackSpace with OpenStack?
    - peoplewindow 9y ago
      Why would your board care where you host your servers?