3 ms·

> Some members of the community have been vocal in their disappointment with stock levels, some even stating that they are switching away from the Raspberry Pi.

by Timon3 3y ago

> Some members of the community have been vocal in their disappointment with stock levels, some even stating that they are switching away from the Raspberry Pi. Upton believes that the anger is completely understandable and that it was the "single hardest decision I've ever had to make in my business career[.]" Upton continues "It's extremely hard to decide when you are a hobbyist, as I am, and you built this thing (Raspberry Pi) for hobbyists and education, to prioritize a different market (industrial customers). > Upton then explains that OEM customers are mainly 3,000 boards per year, with between one to ten employees who build some specific product using the Raspberry Pi and cannot use an alternative SBC. If these customers do not have access to Raspberry Pi, then they are likely to "go to the wall". Upton then explains "So the real question, when people are saying, 'Should you do this prioritization call?' is 'Should I zero some of those customers or constrain them so heavily that they go out of business or take very serious damage?'. It didn't feel like the moral thing to do." > Upton then explains that it felt like Raspberry Pi were doing the right thing, or hoped that community members would give them the benefit of the doubt. But Upton is aware that some members will be permanently disgruntled. Upton clarifies the misconceptions that Raspberry Pi are not making boards, they are, they are just not making enough. The second misconception being that Raspberry Pi are favoring large customers (Upton uses IBM as an example) over the communtiy, when in reality it is the smaller OEM customers who are the median customer base. Upton concludes by saying that they are looking forward to now making that judgment call anymore. Okay, yeah, they just permanently lost me. The idea that they had to make this decision to save the jobs of all those people is ridiculous.

shapefrog 3y ago
I set out to save the world, but then a corporation that was built on my product, because it was much cheaper for them than the alternative, said they would make less profit if they didnt get all of my product. Morally I had to support the corporation at that point.
- ChuckNorris89 3y ago
  That's a great translation of the corporate message
mavhc 3y ago
Why is it ridiculous? The top 2 uses of hobby Raspberry Pis is to sit in a drawer, or play tv shows you downloaded off the internet, that's the easiest market to switch to an alternative.
- Timon3 3y ago
  Mind sharing your statistics on hobby RasPi usage? It would be interesting to see just how many just sit in a drawer. If it's a ridiculous number you might change my opinion on this! :)
- yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
  > The top 2 uses of hobby Raspberry Pis is to sit in a drawer, or play tv shows you downloaded off the internet If that's true, I wonder why the market hasn't corrected. With the prices Pis have had lately, I would expect them to go from drawers to ebay quickly.
  - aleph_minus_one 3y ago
    > If that's true, I wonder why the market hasn't corrected. With the prices Pis have had lately, I would expect them to go from drawers to ebay quickly. My personal explanations (I do believe there is a grain of truth in each of them, but you have to take them all together to get an explanation): - A lot of the RPi boards that lie around in the drawers are older versions in which many buyers are less interested. - Many buyers are hesitant to buy used RPis because something might be broken with them; this risk (and attempting to get a refund) is not worth the trouble. - In countries where there are complicated taxation laws and strong(er) customer protection laws, many hobbyists do not consider it to be worth the (felt) potential legal trouble to put their RPis on eBay.
rwmj 3y ago
I don't even understand why its an either-or. Can't they treat the hobbyist market as another pseudo-commercial user, assigning blocks of boards to sell to hobbyist distributors?
- detaro 3y ago
  Isn't that what they are doing? Pis do keep popping up briefly at various distributors, just not in the numbers needed to keep them in stock consistently.
  - TeMPOraL 3y ago
    This has been going on for years now; I don't understand why can't the supply be ramped up to match demand. Is this the chip shortage thing again?
    - detaro 3y ago
      Again? Still. Getting parts has been nasty the past few years. (I think my favorite was the supplier that basically said "well, I can prioritize your order if you buy 10k units. Then I can get 500 to you in 6 months. Of course you need to pay for all 10k now. No, I can't tell you when we'll be able to deliver the entire 10k, might be a few years") I don't think they've talked about what their specific constraint is, but given their SoC supply afaik is still entirely dependent on Broadcom I wouldn't be surprised if Broadcom basically said "ok, you can have X units this quarter" and that's that. Not like RPi can easily replace Broadcom and not like Broadcom doesn't have demand from other potentially more important customers to meet.
aleph_minus_one 3y ago
> Okay, yeah, they just permanently lost me. The idea that they had to make this decision to save the jobs of all those people is ridiculous. A potential mitigation that the Raspberry Pi Foundation could have done: commercial users can get prioritized RPi boards, but they have to pay an insane mark-up for this priotization (say 200 € instead of 50 € for a board). This way, corporations for which otherwise the production chains would stand still (i.e. much larger financial losses) can get a solution, but a solution that is not cheap. This solution should appease many hobbyists, since this way they don't feel that commercial users "buy away the RPis, which were originally developed for hobbyists and schools", but rather that such commercial users rather subsidize the RPis for the hobbysist and schools via the "priotization mark-ups". EDIT: Under https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35999824 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35999824 cinntaile posted a related consideration.
- Timon3 3y ago
  That's a lovely idea and would have definitely kept me as a happy hobbyist.
- sheepybloke 3y ago
  This makes a lot of sense to me, and I think the biggest thing is this changes the conversation at a company level about which boards to buy. Generally, companies have a lot more resources to put towards supporting more niche commercial boards, like generating their own BSPs and Linux builds. They went with Pis because they are a) cheap and b) easier. If they are a) more expensive and b) easier, that would change the calculation potentially for a lot of companies.
  - aleph_minus_one 3y ago
    > They went with Pis because they are a) cheap and b) easier. If they are a) more expensive and b) easier, that would change the calculation potentially for a lot of companies. I do believe there exist further points that make the Raspberry Pi boards attractive to companies (in opposite to SBC offers by many other companies): c) There exist a lot of people (potential empoloyees) who have already worked with a RPi (even if for private projects) and thus know RPi's insides rather well. d) The RPi boards (even very old ones) are supported by the manufacturer for a very long time with GNU/Linux support that (mostly) "simply works". e) The Raspberry Pi Foundation is a British company (in opposite to boards by Chinese producers) Potentially: f) The esteemed Raspberry Pi brand might also give some martketing prestige to an offering of a company that uses a RPi board as a central part ("Our product uses a Raspberry Pi").

by Timon3 3y ago

shapefrog 3y ago

I set out to save the world, but then a corporation that was built on my product, because it was much cheaper for them than the alternative, said they would make less profit if they didnt get all of my product. Morally I had to support the corporation at that point.

ChuckNorris89 3y ago
That's a great translation of the corporate message

mavhc 3y ago

Why is it ridiculous? The top 2 uses of hobby Raspberry Pis is to sit in a drawer, or play tv shows you downloaded off the internet, that's the easiest market to switch to an alternative.

Timon3 3y ago
Mind sharing your statistics on hobby RasPi usage? It would be interesting to see just how many just sit in a drawer. If it's a ridiculous number you might change my opinion on this! :)
yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
> The top 2 uses of hobby Raspberry Pis is to sit in a drawer, or play tv shows you downloaded off the internet If that's true, I wonder why the market hasn't corrected. With the prices Pis have had lately, I would expect them to go from drawers to ebay quickly.
- aleph_minus_one 3y ago
  > If that's true, I wonder why the market hasn't corrected. With the prices Pis have had lately, I would expect them to go from drawers to ebay quickly. My personal explanations (I do believe there is a grain of truth in each of them, but you have to take them all together to get an explanation): - A lot of the RPi boards that lie around in the drawers are older versions in which many buyers are less interested. - Many buyers are hesitant to buy used RPis because something might be broken with them; this risk (and attempting to get a refund) is not worth the trouble. - In countries where there are complicated taxation laws and strong(er) customer protection laws, many hobbyists do not consider it to be worth the (felt) potential legal trouble to put their RPis on eBay.

rwmj 3y ago

I don't even understand why its an either-or. Can't they treat the hobbyist market as another pseudo-commercial user, assigning blocks of boards to sell to hobbyist distributors?

detaro 3y ago
Isn't that what they are doing? Pis do keep popping up briefly at various distributors, just not in the numbers needed to keep them in stock consistently.
- TeMPOraL 3y ago
  This has been going on for years now; I don't understand why can't the supply be ramped up to match demand. Is this the chip shortage thing again?
  - detaro 3y ago
    Again? Still. Getting parts has been nasty the past few years. (I think my favorite was the supplier that basically said "well, I can prioritize your order if you buy 10k units. Then I can get 500 to you in 6 months. Of course you need to pay for all 10k now. No, I can't tell you when we'll be able to deliver the entire 10k, might be a few years") I don't think they've talked about what their specific constraint is, but given their SoC supply afaik is still entirely dependent on Broadcom I wouldn't be surprised if Broadcom basically said "ok, you can have X units this quarter" and that's that. Not like RPi can easily replace Broadcom and not like Broadcom doesn't have demand from other potentially more important customers to meet.

aleph_minus_one 3y ago

> Okay, yeah, they just permanently lost me. The idea that they had to make this decision to save the jobs of all those people is ridiculous. A potential mitigation that the Raspberry Pi Foundation could have done: commercial users can get prioritized RPi boards, but they have to pay an insane mark-up for this priotization (say 200 € instead of 50 € for a board). This way, corporations for which otherwise the production chains would stand still (i.e. much larger financial losses) can get a solution, but a solution that is not cheap. This solution should appease many hobbyists, since this way they don't feel that commercial users "buy away the RPis, which were originally developed for hobbyists and schools", but rather that such commercial users rather subsidize the RPis for the hobbysist and schools via the "priotization mark-ups". EDIT: Under https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35999824 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35999824 cinntaile posted a related consideration.

Timon3 3y ago
That's a lovely idea and would have definitely kept me as a happy hobbyist.
sheepybloke 3y ago
This makes a lot of sense to me, and I think the biggest thing is this changes the conversation at a company level about which boards to buy. Generally, companies have a lot more resources to put towards supporting more niche commercial boards, like generating their own BSPs and Linux builds. They went with Pis because they are a) cheap and b) easier. If they are a) more expensive and b) easier, that would change the calculation potentially for a lot of companies.
- aleph_minus_one 3y ago
  > They went with Pis because they are a) cheap and b) easier. If they are a) more expensive and b) easier, that would change the calculation potentially for a lot of companies. I do believe there exist further points that make the Raspberry Pi boards attractive to companies (in opposite to SBC offers by many other companies): c) There exist a lot of people (potential empoloyees) who have already worked with a RPi (even if for private projects) and thus know RPi's insides rather well. d) The RPi boards (even very old ones) are supported by the manufacturer for a very long time with GNU/Linux support that (mostly) "simply works". e) The Raspberry Pi Foundation is a British company (in opposite to boards by Chinese producers) Potentially: f) The esteemed Raspberry Pi brand might also give some martketing prestige to an offering of a company that uses a RPi board as a central part ("Our product uses a Raspberry Pi").