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This sounds like stellar news for Heroku employees and investors. I'm not sure how it's going to be good for Heroku customers (like me) in the long-term. There

This sounds like stellar news for Heroku employees and investors. I'm not sure how it's going to be good for Heroku customers (like me) in the long-term. There will be the inevitable brain drain over the course of 1-2years when key staff move away as their contract clauses run out and then we'll be left with Heroku being run by SalesForce :(

sedachv 16y ago
From what I understand SalesForce totally shafted Sitemasher's customers by shutting the service down a month of so after the acquisition. At least with Heroku you can move to another hosting provider. Sitemasher was a closed-system "build a web application without programming!" type of service. So I'd actually start worrying about the short-term right now.
notahacker 16y ago
Gotta agree with this assessment. I've found deployment to Heroku whilst tinkering with side projects fantastic, whilst Salesforce is the bane of my life in the day job. And whilst they have the in-house infrastructure to actually reduce Heroku prices, the Salesforce focus on the enterprise market hints that they're more likely to raise them. Congratulations to the Heroku team though. Is it DropBox's turn next?
- alnayyir 16y ago
  >Congratulations to the Heroku team though. Is it DropBox's turn next? Shut up before you jinx us all.
  - StavrosK 16y ago
    Jinx us? What could be better? You get to build a product with a clear roadmap, a vast market of disgruntled users of the product that went to shit and basically guaranteed success. I wonder if I should start building Heroku 2 now...
    - alnayyir 16y ago
      >I wonder if I should start building Heroku 2 now... Yes, but make it good
- samratjp 16y ago
  Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if Dropbox became the first YC company to hit IPO.
  - mikeryan 16y ago
    I actually would be surprised if Dropbox exited via IPO. I think their offering fits in with a lot of large companies profiles. Dropbox could easily fit into a portfolio of Google, Microsoft, even Cisco. explaining Cisco - Cisco seems to be trying to break into the "Digital Home" market with things like FlipVideo and some other video services. Dropbox would make a great cloud storage play for media services.
    - samratjp 16y ago
      They are obviously swinging for the fences, especially with Sequoia involved. It's fair to expect that they would aim for a 9 figure exit. IPO or not. Interesting case about Cisco. I would've also thrown in Apple because of their huge war chest and select big acquisitions. Dropbox could easily outdo MobileMe. Then again, I'm sure Google wouldn't mind getting a GDrive finally. But then, there's facebook!(Sure, they got Drop.io, but facebook loves grabbing startups away before Google get to them)
    - jaen 16y ago
      Dropbox uses Amazon S3 for their storage. Google and Microsoft have their own cloud storage backends - if they did acquire Dropbox, they would probably throw away most of the technology, making an acquisition somewhat less likely.
davidedicillo 16y ago
Time to start keeping an eye on other hosting solutions. I'm love Heroku and I host a decent number of paying applications on it, but I'm afraid that when the original people will start leaving we'll be left with just another big corporation.
- jmtame 16y ago
  if you're a fan of python, keep your eye on djangy. those guys are sharp.
  - megamark16 16y ago
    Are these guys on HN, and if so, who are they?
    - jmtame 16y ago
      endlessvoid94
  - nateaune 16y ago
    Another Heroku-like service for Python is DjangoZoom. Sign up for the beta at http://www.djangozoom.com http://www.djangozoom.com Disclaimer: I'm a co-founder of DjangoZoom.
yesno 16y ago
Nothing last forever. Eventually all the "startups that you love" will either close their door or be acquired and I think people should expect that since day 1.
- tamersalama 16y ago
  Why are these the only 2 outcomes? Why not grow a business?
  - rikthevik 16y ago
    I guess it depends what kind of investors they've taken on, and how eager they are for a big money exit.
  - ry0ohki 16y ago
    Partly because of the changing pace of technology. A watch company could be pretty sure 100 years ago that watches would still be around in 20 years, sure the technology might need to be updated but not dramatically. You think anyone will even use Heroku in 5 years? There is a new language and technology every month now that gets hype, it's unlikely something like this will continue to grow for the long term.
    - jcapote 16y ago
      I'm sorry but that's a bullshit notion. Why is anyone still using PHP today? or Java? Just cause something new comes out, it doesn't automatically displace the old. I think paperback's are more likely to go away before the last rails app is written.
      - jasongullickson 16y ago
        Agreed. Also, why does a company have to be tied to one bit of technology? We hear a lot that being a good programmer/designer/etc. isn't language-specific but that it is a skill-set that transcends technical knowledge. Why isn't this the same for companies and products?
_pius 16y ago
I'm actually really excited about it as a customer. Heroku's solution is outstanding, but it was clear that they were having trouble scaling up customer support; this acquisition makes it more likely that they'll have the support staff needed to serve their customer base. Big congrats to them!
- hasenj 16y ago
  The support staff of a big company? Not really looking forward to that.

sedachv 16y ago

From what I understand SalesForce totally shafted Sitemasher's customers by shutting the service down a month of so after the acquisition. At least with Heroku you can move to another hosting provider. Sitemasher was a closed-system "build a web application without programming!" type of service. So I'd actually start worrying about the short-term right now.

notahacker 16y ago

Gotta agree with this assessment. I've found deployment to Heroku whilst tinkering with side projects fantastic, whilst Salesforce is the bane of my life in the day job. And whilst they have the in-house infrastructure to actually reduce Heroku prices, the Salesforce focus on the enterprise market hints that they're more likely to raise them. Congratulations to the Heroku team though. Is it DropBox's turn next?

alnayyir 16y ago
>Congratulations to the Heroku team though. Is it DropBox's turn next? Shut up before you jinx us all.
- StavrosK 16y ago
  Jinx us? What could be better? You get to build a product with a clear roadmap, a vast market of disgruntled users of the product that went to shit and basically guaranteed success. I wonder if I should start building Heroku 2 now...
  - alnayyir 16y ago
    >I wonder if I should start building Heroku 2 now... Yes, but make it good
samratjp 16y ago
Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if Dropbox became the first YC company to hit IPO.
- mikeryan 16y ago
  I actually would be surprised if Dropbox exited via IPO. I think their offering fits in with a lot of large companies profiles. Dropbox could easily fit into a portfolio of Google, Microsoft, even Cisco. explaining Cisco - Cisco seems to be trying to break into the "Digital Home" market with things like FlipVideo and some other video services. Dropbox would make a great cloud storage play for media services.
  - samratjp 16y ago
    They are obviously swinging for the fences, especially with Sequoia involved. It's fair to expect that they would aim for a 9 figure exit. IPO or not. Interesting case about Cisco. I would've also thrown in Apple because of their huge war chest and select big acquisitions. Dropbox could easily outdo MobileMe. Then again, I'm sure Google wouldn't mind getting a GDrive finally. But then, there's facebook!(Sure, they got Drop.io, but facebook loves grabbing startups away before Google get to them)
  - jaen 16y ago
    Dropbox uses Amazon S3 for their storage. Google and Microsoft have their own cloud storage backends - if they did acquire Dropbox, they would probably throw away most of the technology, making an acquisition somewhat less likely.

davidedicillo 16y ago

Time to start keeping an eye on other hosting solutions. I'm love Heroku and I host a decent number of paying applications on it, but I'm afraid that when the original people will start leaving we'll be left with just another big corporation.

jmtame 16y ago
if you're a fan of python, keep your eye on djangy. those guys are sharp.
- megamark16 16y ago
  Are these guys on HN, and if so, who are they?
  - jmtame 16y ago
    endlessvoid94
- nateaune 16y ago
  Another Heroku-like service for Python is DjangoZoom. Sign up for the beta at http://www.djangozoom.com http://www.djangozoom.com Disclaimer: I'm a co-founder of DjangoZoom.

yesno 16y ago

Nothing last forever. Eventually all the "startups that you love" will either close their door or be acquired and I think people should expect that since day 1.

tamersalama 16y ago
Why are these the only 2 outcomes? Why not grow a business?
- rikthevik 16y ago
  I guess it depends what kind of investors they've taken on, and how eager they are for a big money exit.
- ry0ohki 16y ago
  Partly because of the changing pace of technology. A watch company could be pretty sure 100 years ago that watches would still be around in 20 years, sure the technology might need to be updated but not dramatically. You think anyone will even use Heroku in 5 years? There is a new language and technology every month now that gets hype, it's unlikely something like this will continue to grow for the long term.
  - jcapote 16y ago
    I'm sorry but that's a bullshit notion. Why is anyone still using PHP today? or Java? Just cause something new comes out, it doesn't automatically displace the old. I think paperback's are more likely to go away before the last rails app is written.
    - jasongullickson 16y ago
      Agreed. Also, why does a company have to be tied to one bit of technology? We hear a lot that being a good programmer/designer/etc. isn't language-specific but that it is a skill-set that transcends technical knowledge. Why isn't this the same for companies and products?

_pius 16y ago

I'm actually really excited about it as a customer. Heroku's solution is outstanding, but it was clear that they were having trouble scaling up customer support; this acquisition makes it more likely that they'll have the support staff needed to serve their customer base. Big congrats to them!

hasenj 16y ago
The support staff of a big company? Not really looking forward to that.