3 ms·

"You would think that you could get better prices by signing 1 or 2 year contracts, but interestingly enough, out of the initial 5 providers we talked to the tw

by larrys 15y ago

"You would think that you could get better prices by signing 1 or 2 year contracts, but interestingly enough, out of the initial 5 providers we talked to the two that didn’t require contracts had the best prices." (snip) "We’ve moved 100% of our machines that rely upon performant (sic) disks to dedicated servers hosted at Softlayer. Roughly speaking, this corresponds to about 80% of our hosting costs. Eventually, we’ll move everything " If you don't have a contract there is nothing to prevent a provider from raising prices on you. The reason to have a contract is not just to get the best price. It's to have a price guarantee. Edit: Moving 100% of your machines won't be something you will want to do. If you have a contract you can renegotiate well in advance of any price increase. Prices always drop? People thought housing prices always go up as well. How long is the price guaranteed for? I'm assuming mixpanel has this issued covered but it's important to keep it in mind. Not having a contract goes both ways.

krobertson 15y ago
There are other aspects of a contract that can be beneficial: SLA, including compensation for outages and outs if they have too many. Sure, without a contract you can leave anytime, but a contract isn't necessarily a permanent trap. They are negociable. You can push for lower incidence allowances, an opt-out part way through the contract, and so on. Support... more in actual human assistance with the move and issues. Depending on your size and the terms, that contract could be worth 6 to 7 figures to the company. That is some serious motivation to help make the initial experiences good and the help along the way.
- biot 15y ago
  Generally "no contract" means no fixed-term (eg: multi-year) contract. There is always a contract of some sort covering acceptable use, SLA, payment terms, termination rights, and so on. Otherwise you could use as much as you want for any purpose and not pay them a cent and they'd have no recourse. You can even have a contract locking in your price for five years but that you only pay month to month and can leave at any time without penalty.

by larrys 15y ago

krobertson 15y ago

There are other aspects of a contract that can be beneficial: SLA, including compensation for outages and outs if they have too many. Sure, without a contract you can leave anytime, but a contract isn't necessarily a permanent trap. They are negociable. You can push for lower incidence allowances, an opt-out part way through the contract, and so on. Support... more in actual human assistance with the move and issues. Depending on your size and the terms, that contract could be worth 6 to 7 figures to the company. That is some serious motivation to help make the initial experiences good and the help along the way.

biot 15y ago
Generally "no contract" means no fixed-term (eg: multi-year) contract. There is always a contract of some sort covering acceptable use, SLA, payment terms, termination rights, and so on. Otherwise you could use as much as you want for any purpose and not pay them a cent and they'd have no recourse. You can even have a contract locking in your price for five years but that you only pay month to month and can leave at any time without penalty.