26 ms·

Ask HN: Grafana or Datadog?

5 points by kvaranasi_ 1y ago

I don't understand why people pay thousands of dollars to DataDog when you can do the same with Grafana. I would like to understand what's so good about it.

haileyLlyod3 1y ago
[dead]
toomuchtodo 1y ago
You are always paying, either in time or money. Which you pick is based on your assessment of where resources of time and money are best spent forward looking. Some people do their own laundry. Some pay a laundromat to do their laundry. Why do some pay? Because those that pay have decided to trade money to buy some time back for another (higher value to them) activity. There is no right or wrong answer, only tradeoffs based on current ground truth and predictions. Paying Datadog (or whomever you elect to manage observability) means you're not paying someone to or spending time focusing on said observability. That is time you are presumably spending on development velocity to accelerate revenue growth. Balance growth and optimization accordingly.
- kvaranasi_ 1y ago
  Makes a lot of sense. So I am thinking of building an AI-powered Datadog alternative. Why now? is because with AI I can rapidly build integrations to Ruby, Python and other languages. But I'm really low-confidence on this one, because how do I make it reach a lot of people? Is there a need for this? Because I can make it really cheap.
  - toomuchtodo 1y ago
    I recommend talking to potential customers. Do they want cheap? Do they want AI? Or do they want a reliable observability platform they don't have to think about because it Just Works. Not rhetorical! I don't know what these customers want, but you should know if you're going to build for them. Go talk to folks and then go make something people want.
    - kvaranasi_ 1y ago
      Okay, I reached out to a few who are cursing DataDog, but also are not fully committed to buying what I'm building. How do I reach out to more people? I mean, it's like I KNOW there is some way here. Because they are not like "I'm happy with DataDog", but it's also not like "We're ready to abandon it for yours". I talked to ones paying like $40k/mo and $80k/mo(DHH).
      - toomuchtodo 1y ago
        > How do I reach out to more people? https://hn.algolia.com/?q=how+to+find+customers https://hn.algolia.com/?q=how+to+find+customers https://www.ycombinator.com/library/Ip-how-to-get-your-first-customers https://www.ycombinator.com/library/Ip-how-to-get-your-first... https://web.archive.org/web/20231211111753/https://www.indiehackers.com/post/finding-your-first-users-without-spending-on-ads-69d79d88ba https://web.archive.org/web/20231211111753/https://www.indie... https://web.archive.org/web/20230519174725/https://www.indiehackers.com/post/how-where-did-you-find-your-first-1-10-and-100-customer-f146e8e3d3 https://web.archive.org/web/20230519174725/https://www.indie...
        kvaranasi_ 1y ago
        ok wow. I will check them out and start reaching out. Also any industries I should target with the current idea? Company size/position you have in mind?
        toomuchtodo 1y ago
        You’re the founder, you tell me. What is your target customer and addressable market and why? You’ve already mentioned some potential differentiators, but you’ll want to be able to cold call and pitch to the customers you believe you’re best suited to serve. I can email you if you want to chat more, let me know.
        kvaranasi_ 1y ago
        can you please email me at kaushik [at] rocketgraph.io

5 points by kvaranasi_ 1y ago

I don't understand why people pay thousands of dollars to DataDog when you can do the same with Grafana. I would like to understand what's so good about it.

haileyLlyod3 1y ago

[dead]

toomuchtodo 1y ago

You are always paying, either in time or money. Which you pick is based on your assessment of where resources of time and money are best spent forward looking. Some people do their own laundry. Some pay a laundromat to do their laundry. Why do some pay? Because those that pay have decided to trade money to buy some time back for another (higher value to them) activity. There is no right or wrong answer, only tradeoffs based on current ground truth and predictions. Paying Datadog (or whomever you elect to manage observability) means you're not paying someone to or spending time focusing on said observability. That is time you are presumably spending on development velocity to accelerate revenue growth. Balance growth and optimization accordingly.

kvaranasi_ 1y ago
Makes a lot of sense. So I am thinking of building an AI-powered Datadog alternative. Why now? is because with AI I can rapidly build integrations to Ruby, Python and other languages. But I'm really low-confidence on this one, because how do I make it reach a lot of people? Is there a need for this? Because I can make it really cheap.
- toomuchtodo 1y ago
  I recommend talking to potential customers. Do they want cheap? Do they want AI? Or do they want a reliable observability platform they don't have to think about because it Just Works. Not rhetorical! I don't know what these customers want, but you should know if you're going to build for them. Go talk to folks and then go make something people want.
  - kvaranasi_ 1y ago
    Okay, I reached out to a few who are cursing DataDog, but also are not fully committed to buying what I'm building. How do I reach out to more people? I mean, it's like I KNOW there is some way here. Because they are not like "I'm happy with DataDog", but it's also not like "We're ready to abandon it for yours". I talked to ones paying like $40k/mo and $80k/mo(DHH).
    - toomuchtodo 1y ago
      > How do I reach out to more people? https://hn.algolia.com/?q=how+to+find+customers https://hn.algolia.com/?q=how+to+find+customers https://www.ycombinator.com/library/Ip-how-to-get-your-first-customers https://www.ycombinator.com/library/Ip-how-to-get-your-first... https://web.archive.org/web/20231211111753/https://www.indiehackers.com/post/finding-your-first-users-without-spending-on-ads-69d79d88ba https://web.archive.org/web/20231211111753/https://www.indie... https://web.archive.org/web/20230519174725/https://www.indiehackers.com/post/how-where-did-you-find-your-first-1-10-and-100-customer-f146e8e3d3 https://web.archive.org/web/20230519174725/https://www.indie...
      - kvaranasi_ 1y ago
        ok wow. I will check them out and start reaching out. Also any industries I should target with the current idea? Company size/position you have in mind?
        toomuchtodo 1y ago
        You’re the founder, you tell me. What is your target customer and addressable market and why? You’ve already mentioned some potential differentiators, but you’ll want to be able to cold call and pitch to the customers you believe you’re best suited to serve. I can email you if you want to chat more, let me know.
        kvaranasi_ 1y ago
        can you please email me at kaushik [at] rocketgraph.io