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It's been a while since I used AWS, is premium documentation a thing now? Monetizing documentation just seens so sleazy.
by victor9000 2y ago
It's been a while since I used AWS, is premium documentation a thing now? Monetizing documentation just seens so sleazy.
- portaouflop 2y agoHaven’t really seen this anywhere tbh - most devs would rightfully not even start evaluating such a product.
- Spivak 2y agoRedHat does this with their kb which famously have really high-quality answers.
- szundi 2y ago[dead]
- OptionOfT 2y agoWorkday is an example. And I don't believe you can download the Z-Wave specification without paying a membership.
- ale42 2y agoThis is common in specifications and standards, ISO standards are expensive to get, and good luck if you try to get the HDMI 2.1 specification. Usually, people need that type of documentation if they are developing products they will later sell (although there are other uses, like hobby and research...). Not saying that I second putting such documentation behind paywalls, but it is at least in part understandable. On the other hand, paywalling documentation about a product I have anyway to pay for if I want to use it feels very greedy.
- Terr_ 2y ago> Workday is an example. I'll also name and shame iCIMS. Some API docs are public but then link to other pages that are blocked (restricted to direct customers or temporary access by contractors) for no good reason and with no obvious pattern.
- op00to 2y agoRed Hat paywalled their knowledge base years ago. It was unpopular inside the company, but seen as required to respond to Oracle's wholesale ripping off of the content.
- bikson 2y agoIBM* Not Oracle.
- op00to 2y agoI was at Red Hat at the time. It was Oracle who ripped off Red Hat’s knowledge base content for their own knowledge base. IBM was not selling a RHEL clone at the time and had no reason to rip off the knowledge base. This was over 10 years ago.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- MichaelZuo 2y agoYeah if they were at least offering some added benefit, like guarantees of correctness, more detailed explanations, etc., then I could see it. But otherwise it seems more like an insult.
- paranoidrobot 2y ago> like guarantees of correctness, Yeah, no. I have to strongly disagree with this. AWS's documentation about operating AWSs products and services I assume are correct and accurate. If I follow their guides and end up breaking something because it turns out they forgot to tell me about something important, I would consider that a breach of warranty. The only reason I can think of where documentation should be behind a pay/auth-wall is if it was generated specifically for your circumstances as part of some kind of solutions architecture or technical support process.
- placardloop 2y ago> The only reason I can think of where documentation should be behind a pay/auth-wall is if it was generated specifically for your circumstances as part of some kind of solutions architecture or technical support process. That’s exactly what this is, actually. These aren’t the AWS docs. The linked site is the AWS support forums in which AWS employees, AWS support and/or other known contributors from the AWS community will give you personalized responses to questions you have. Some of these questions are more generic, and so aren’t personalized, but they’re still the result of a question-and-answer on the forum.
- paranoidrobot 2y ago> That’s exactly what this is, actually. I disagree that these are specific enough to warrant being private. I'm thinking more along the lines of your very specific resources/application/architecture. This is more like a curated version of Stack Overflow.
- athrowaway3z 2y agoI can only applause this change. Next time somebody blindly suggests AWS I can counter-argue by saying even their documentation costs money. But I don't think sleazy is the right term for hitting yourself in confusion. Maybe moronic fits better?
- bolognafairy 2y agoHow do you differentiate “blindly” suggesting AWS from someone non-blindly suggesting it? Or is everyone that disagrees with you simply not seeing the Objective Truth of which you are aware and they are not? Sheesh.
- Retric 2y agoIn tech, blind support of anything is simply based on superficial aspects like popularity or marketing without any specific supporting arguments around price, performance, etc. Thus it’s easy to distinguish the two by asking in-depth questions. IE it’s fast! How fast?
- anal_reactor 2y agoThe problem is that in most engineering discussions "big tech does this" is instant discussion win, while a solution that deviates from what coworkers perceive as "standard" will never get accepted, even if you use logical arguments. I mean, if I'm doing a project with one other person, we can use logic to get to the best solution, but if it's three people in a group or more, then the most charismatic person becomes the leader, and the rest does whatever the leader wants, even if they make bad calls.
- MadVikingGod 2y agoIt usually starts with blindly suggesting we should get on cloud. Usually with no other reason than "Everyone else is doing it". That usually ends with a large pile of cash burnt and maybe a thought piece or two about how cloud is bad and we should just go back to banging rocks. The non-blind suggestion usually has reasons on why you want cloud services, why AWS is the right choice over many other suppliers of cloud, and some cost analysis of what it would cost vs doing nothing or why you can't do nothing.
- placardloop 2y agoThis isn’t really the official AWS “documentation”. AWS docs are located at a completely different website and are free to access. The linked article is from “AWS re:Post” which is the equivalent of a “support forum” where you can ask questions and get crowdsourced answers from either other AWS users, or from AWS employees/AWS support themselves. Some of these questions are so popular that they show up in search results and so might be treated as documentation. It’s dumb, but not uncommon in my experience for such “support forums” to be behind a paywall.