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Cloud infrastructure is certainly a big thing nowadays but AWS isnt really the grand solution to all problems. Its quite expensive, and in my case, since im not

by tacker2000 6y ago

Cloud infrastructure is certainly a big thing nowadays but AWS isnt really the grand solution to all problems. Its quite expensive, and in my case, since im not using any fancy stuff, have transferred all of my servers from EC2 to a more simple service (hetzner) and now pay less than half the cost. I think most businesses need to really evaluate this issue before blindly putting everything on AWS since it can really get pricey once you need good performance. So my point is, all these AWS specific config languages really create an even more tight lock in with the platform, maybe it would be best to do it in a cloud agnostic way, which of course also comes with its own issues.

calpaterson 6y ago
Well the truth is, almost no organisations ever consider cost before they get started. That's one of the purposes of "cloud credits" that AWS/GCP/etc give out to new companies and projects that they are very successful in that. Even worse, organisations rarely do it even once they're up and running and spending large sums - and even then I have never seen the impetus for cost control ever come from within the technology department. It's finance that reins in the spending later, and usually by sticking with the same cloud supplier but limiting activity - so now you need to get someone to sign off on your infrastructure before you provision any of it - which is largely the problem the cloud was supposed to solve.
- jnwatson 6y ago
  You could say that cloud companies exploit company dysfunction. That engineering is usually not incentivized (until too late) to keep costs down is the key to this whole mess. I've seen the pendulum swing the other way, too. At former large employers, I've had to cobble together (shadow IT) servers from discarded equipment because the process of getting cloud boxes allocated was so onerous.
  - calpaterson 6y ago
    > You could say that cloud companies exploit company dysfunction. Like every large software vendor, yes, it's moderately profitable to produce good software and sell it but it is much, much more profitable to abuse bad procurement practice. Shadow IT is a sad state of affairs but at least it builds the skills and culture to economise on computing cost.
awakeasleep 6y ago
This may be the subject of an amazing HBR article in 10-15 years. "Businesses need to evaluate before blindly using AWS" - Why is that seemingly logical sentence proven false so many times every day in so many companies? In my opinion, the success of AWS is due to the way it interacts with corporate hierarchy. It allows every level to externalize some annoying part of their job in exchange for a little more money. Even Finance is happy because capital expenditures (that require more complex planning and tax handling) turn into operating expenses. Eventually the board will wonder what happened to earnings per share, but by that time the project to migrate off amazon will be impossibly large and most people with the skills to run their own infrastructure will have retired.
closeparen 6y ago
Most European businesses. EC2 and traditional dedicated server pricing are much closer together for US datacenters. I think eventually we will see a European native cloud provider spring up with prices that make sense locally the same way EC2 prices make sense in America, and the big three cloud providers' pricing for EU datacenters will be driven towards Hetzner's pricing.

calpaterson 6y ago

Well the truth is, almost no organisations ever consider cost before they get started. That's one of the purposes of "cloud credits" that AWS/GCP/etc give out to new companies and projects that they are very successful in that. Even worse, organisations rarely do it even once they're up and running and spending large sums - and even then I have never seen the impetus for cost control ever come from within the technology department. It's finance that reins in the spending later, and usually by sticking with the same cloud supplier but limiting activity - so now you need to get someone to sign off on your infrastructure before you provision any of it - which is largely the problem the cloud was supposed to solve.

jnwatson 6y ago
You could say that cloud companies exploit company dysfunction. That engineering is usually not incentivized (until too late) to keep costs down is the key to this whole mess. I've seen the pendulum swing the other way, too. At former large employers, I've had to cobble together (shadow IT) servers from discarded equipment because the process of getting cloud boxes allocated was so onerous.
- calpaterson 6y ago
  > You could say that cloud companies exploit company dysfunction. Like every large software vendor, yes, it's moderately profitable to produce good software and sell it but it is much, much more profitable to abuse bad procurement practice. Shadow IT is a sad state of affairs but at least it builds the skills and culture to economise on computing cost.

awakeasleep 6y ago

This may be the subject of an amazing HBR article in 10-15 years. "Businesses need to evaluate before blindly using AWS" - Why is that seemingly logical sentence proven false so many times every day in so many companies? In my opinion, the success of AWS is due to the way it interacts with corporate hierarchy. It allows every level to externalize some annoying part of their job in exchange for a little more money. Even Finance is happy because capital expenditures (that require more complex planning and tax handling) turn into operating expenses. Eventually the board will wonder what happened to earnings per share, but by that time the project to migrate off amazon will be impossibly large and most people with the skills to run their own infrastructure will have retired.

closeparen 6y ago

Most European businesses. EC2 and traditional dedicated server pricing are much closer together for US datacenters. I think eventually we will see a European native cloud provider spring up with prices that make sense locally the same way EC2 prices make sense in America, and the big three cloud providers' pricing for EU datacenters will be driven towards Hetzner's pricing.