> you get their full benefit and their full downside. what, prey tell, downside? they operate at a scale (since you mentioned it) much larger than yours. you

> you get their full benefit and their full downside. what, prey tell, downside? they operate at a scale (since you mentioned it) much larger than yours. you don't benefit from scale beyond what you need, you "only" benefit from the SLA. you don't get to tell them what to do, to set their priorities on features vs bugs vs performance vs meaningless metric of the day. you don't get to interact consistently with the same person or same set of staff, to understand their foibles and to nudge effectively. you don't get to decide what features are critical to you and cannot, ever, ever be cut no matter how otherwise impactful they are on the environment. you don't get to set the timetable for "events". it's not the absolute no-brainer you are making it out to be. that said, i agree that the value is solidly there for those in the fat part of the bell curve.