3 ms·

I'm sorry, but I'm unable to understand why an existing paying user should in any way, shape, or form expect to participate in a promotion to attract new users

I'm sorry, but I'm unable to understand why an existing paying user should in any way, shape, or form expect to participate in a promotion to attract new users to the platform. No matter how you look at it, this is a promotion for new users. Period. These expectations are analogous to you being a paying member on some platform, and they announce a "30 days free" promotion for new members, and you demanding that you should get to participate in that promotion. Shenanigans. And just because AWS is pay as you go doesn't make this any different.

detst 16y ago
Why is that "shenanigans"? I've asked to be put on promotional pricing many times as an existing user of other companies and you know what... they often give it to me. Why? Because I'm free to give my money to someone else. It's a way of showing appreciation and that they don't take you for granted. Period. (sorry, I had to) If you aren't negotiating better terms for recurring services, then you are giving money away. Promotions are just a nice bit of leverage in negotiations.
- sp4rki 16y ago
  So you believe every Amazon customer should get in the promotion of X amount of free service for a whole year without any retention mechanism? In comparison if you ask your internet provider to bump you up from 1mbps to 2mbps (or to lower the price from 50 bucks to 40) because they have a promotion for new users, and they give it to you, providing you sign a contract for another 12 months, is not equivalent to telling the internet provider that because they are offering a free year of service (up to lets say 5 gigs of downstream bandwidth) to new customers you should do to and without a contract specifying that you're staying with the company afterwards.
ollysb 16y ago
I've only used amazon rds and s3 to date. These have both been pretty straight forward to set up. I've been interested in exploring using EC2 instances but haven't gotten round to it because of the learning curve with images etc. The fact that I've got to pay for the service while I'm learning it has put me off. With the free tier now I have an opportunity to give EC2 a go and see how it works. It seems a bit silly to have to create a new account for this.

detst 16y ago

Why is that "shenanigans"? I've asked to be put on promotional pricing many times as an existing user of other companies and you know what... they often give it to me. Why? Because I'm free to give my money to someone else. It's a way of showing appreciation and that they don't take you for granted. Period. (sorry, I had to) If you aren't negotiating better terms for recurring services, then you are giving money away. Promotions are just a nice bit of leverage in negotiations.

sp4rki 16y ago
So you believe every Amazon customer should get in the promotion of X amount of free service for a whole year without any retention mechanism? In comparison if you ask your internet provider to bump you up from 1mbps to 2mbps (or to lower the price from 50 bucks to 40) because they have a promotion for new users, and they give it to you, providing you sign a contract for another 12 months, is not equivalent to telling the internet provider that because they are offering a free year of service (up to lets say 5 gigs of downstream bandwidth) to new customers you should do to and without a contract specifying that you're staying with the company afterwards.

ollysb 16y ago

I've only used amazon rds and s3 to date. These have both been pretty straight forward to set up. I've been interested in exploring using EC2 instances but haven't gotten round to it because of the learning curve with images etc. The fact that I've got to pay for the service while I'm learning it has put me off. With the free tier now I have an opportunity to give EC2 a go and see how it works. It seems a bit silly to have to create a new account for this.