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And what writing is on the wall, exactly, for Amazon? AWS powers the internet. Apple uses it for cloud services, for cryin' out loud -- the largest AWS customer

by jb1991 4y ago

And what writing is on the wall, exactly, for Amazon? AWS powers the internet. Apple uses it for cloud services, for cryin' out loud -- the largest AWS customer in fact. AWS has more market share than all of its competitors combined. Where is this writing you're speaking of?

geodel 4y ago
I think writing this time is Move along, nothing to see here .
phendrenad2 4y ago
But where is AWSs moat? It's not enough to have all of the customers. Customers are fleeting and will leave if they get a BBO (bigger, better offer). If you scrap together an AWS migration tool that can pull databases, instances, and lambdas off of AWS and mirror them in your cloud, for less money, you'll probably attract a lot of customers.
- jb1991 4y ago
  That sounds like just basic guesswork on your part. Replicating their infrastructure is not the trivial challenge you suggest.
  - orangesite 4y ago
    I think the trick you are missing is that AWS competitors do not need to replicate their infrastructure. The model you are wed to is "one service-provider per niche." Yeah, that requires scaling to an absolutely ridiculous extent. …but for those of us not in favor of soviet-style centralism, and there are a couple of us, well we'd love hosting providers that can let us serve a sufficiently profitable percentage of the market. Down with monopolist capitalism and oligopolist communism! All hail the vibrant marketplace!
- roncesvalles 4y ago
  And yet no one else (yes, not even Azure) has come close to holding a candle against AWS after all these years and billions of dollars invested. There is a moat. You just don't see it.
- rescbr 4y ago
  Their moat is on transferring data out of AWS (and GCP, Azure, etc). A competitor would have to be cheaper as to pay the migration out first. Sure, if you have TB-scale data it is still doable, but once you reach PB-scale it's better to negotiate an EDP rather than move out.
- yunwal 4y ago
  > If you scrap together an AWS migration tool that can pull databases, instances, and lambdas Ah yes, I’ll just throw a quick script together. Never mind that there are entire consulting firms dedicated to doing exactly this and each of their projects takes months to years and hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars.
- icedchai 4y ago
  Easier said that done. Migrations are hard. AWS can really lock you in to their proprietary services, "serverless" stuff like Dynamo, Lambda, SQS, etc. It's easy to get in, hard to get out once you have a lot of data. If you stick with more standard infrastructure (RDS, EC2, containers on ECS, etc.) you'll have an easier time.

by jb1991 4y ago

geodel 4y ago

I think writing this time is Move along, nothing to see here .

phendrenad2 4y ago

But where is AWSs moat? It's not enough to have all of the customers. Customers are fleeting and will leave if they get a BBO (bigger, better offer). If you scrap together an AWS migration tool that can pull databases, instances, and lambdas off of AWS and mirror them in your cloud, for less money, you'll probably attract a lot of customers.

jb1991 4y ago
That sounds like just basic guesswork on your part. Replicating their infrastructure is not the trivial challenge you suggest.
- orangesite 4y ago
  I think the trick you are missing is that AWS competitors do not need to replicate their infrastructure. The model you are wed to is "one service-provider per niche." Yeah, that requires scaling to an absolutely ridiculous extent. …but for those of us not in favor of soviet-style centralism, and there are a couple of us, well we'd love hosting providers that can let us serve a sufficiently profitable percentage of the market. Down with monopolist capitalism and oligopolist communism! All hail the vibrant marketplace!
roncesvalles 4y ago
And yet no one else (yes, not even Azure) has come close to holding a candle against AWS after all these years and billions of dollars invested. There is a moat. You just don't see it.
rescbr 4y ago
Their moat is on transferring data out of AWS (and GCP, Azure, etc). A competitor would have to be cheaper as to pay the migration out first. Sure, if you have TB-scale data it is still doable, but once you reach PB-scale it's better to negotiate an EDP rather than move out.
yunwal 4y ago
> If you scrap together an AWS migration tool that can pull databases, instances, and lambdas Ah yes, I’ll just throw a quick script together. Never mind that there are entire consulting firms dedicated to doing exactly this and each of their projects takes months to years and hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars.
icedchai 4y ago
Easier said that done. Migrations are hard. AWS can really lock you in to their proprietary services, "serverless" stuff like Dynamo, Lambda, SQS, etc. It's easy to get in, hard to get out once you have a lot of data. If you stick with more standard infrastructure (RDS, EC2, containers on ECS, etc.) you'll have an easier time.