'The Cloud Fugitive' | David Heinemeier Hansson | NTK # 001

Dark Matter presents a controversial take on cloud with Co-Owner and CTO of ‪@37signals‬ ‪@davidheinemeierhansson9989‬ . 37Signals hasn't been shy about telling the story of its cloud exit. In an exclusive interview, we caught up with David to get the detail behind its decision and what it means for anyone else who has 'that nagging feeling that something isn't right in cloud'.
The first in its series, 'Need To Know' (NTK) discusses the sometimes uncomfortable truths about technology decision making - the things people think but rarely say. Subscribe for more.
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[@theSlavenIvanov]

Listening to DHH talk about engineering always gets me exited to build cool things!

[@jaffarbh]

What a passion, what a clarity. Thanks David and DM for this great video

[@vtstev]

I agree with DHH on many things regarding their cloud exit, but the main reason why 37signals is better with their own hardware is because they have predictable workloads (as they said many times), so this discourse doesn't apply to everyone, especially to startups and new companies that don't have a clue about what their workloads will look like in a few months.
So in short, don't take what DHH says here as the absolute truth for everyone.

[@fotipanagio9725]

Most workloads are extremely predictable. Obviously there are exceptions, but even for those, it's most likely going to be cheaper to just plan those spike ceilings and purchase hardware within that envelope accordingly.

[@WouterSimonsPlus]

He says, “run the numbers” which you definitely should. You can still leverage cloud for quick and flexible scaling if you need that in starting a new product or service, testing some new feature or capability. Then, once you realistically believe you need it for 3 years and the numbers work, you can just build it yourself.

[@tmarsha4]

Let’s be honest: your company won’t have hockey stick like growth. It will scale extremely predictably a couple customers at a time. You don’t need an infinite scaling cloud. Just grab a droplet from DigitalOcean.

[@Sammi84]

DHH is already saying exactly the same in the video you just watched. Cloud is great for some use cases, but it is not for everyone.

[@Joeyxyx]

​@@Sammi84Agree. Also not for every data type. If you have very sensitive data, you are better off with a privat cloud.

[@marco114]

Great Video! I work at the DC that 37 Signals has all their stuff at. This has started an avalanche of #CloudExit stories and we see more every day. Savings of 30-70% is typical when exiting the cloud. Some workloads migrate easy and some are more complicated. The more entrenched into the managed, cloud-native services, the harder it can be. Static workloads generally have the best savings where bursty workloads are a little more tricky. For a Hybrid approach, use an AWS Direct Connect and put your static workloads in the DC and your bursty traffic in AWS. You can also take advantage of some cool stuff like EKS Anywhere for containerized workloads in a central management plane.

[@mattgrashoff3469]

Outstanding truths. Glad you put this out there!

[@soliveirajr]

There are different types of cloud, not just AWS. For bare metal, check Hivelocity. For virtual machines check Linode. You pay a monthly fee and that's it. No hidden costs.

[@haziqali3348]

Its like dividing the cloud further, buying your own hardware to be maintained by others and deploying your own services.

[@dfinlen]

This is geeat stuff.
Although i dont have influence i hope to make those with it aware. Suprisingly we have a data center that keeps being downsized. The industry we are in is a late adopter. Maybe that late adopter property will become a benefit.
I think the whole idea of obfuscation of cost can happen in a poorly managed data center as well but at least you have more control of that risk.

[@mixmastermaverick3336]

This guy is the tech version of Russel Brand 😂😂😂

[@krumbergify]

It makes a lot of sense if you have a stable number of users, but if you are a startup it doesn’t and if you is growing rapidly it can also be problematic.
Regardless, ”Run the numbers” is certainly a wise advice!

[@hussross]

Bezos getting ready to send a Amazon drone visit . I agree I never understood the cloud appeal for medium business.

[@RyanJeffB]

the video using python coding while DHH is ruby, ruby on rails project. 😂Based on my six years of experience working in data centers and nearly nine years in web and software development, I agree with DHH.

[@CocXx]

Is @dhh coding in python now 🤔? 1:34

[@SyedMSawaid]

lol

[@hpatoio]

noticed that too :D

[@sh856531]

This video would have been even better if it was sans distracting music

[@rommellagera8543]

My son's project with 10 concurrent users in the same building still used cloud service for around $1,000/mo.
In my mind this is a waste of money. Do anyone know what a $5,000 server can do vs a $1,000/mo. cloud service? The bare metal server will run circles around the $1,000/mo. cloud service. But what about security? You're in the same building, did everyone forgot about corporate firewall. The problem is cloud is sexy, on-premise/bare metal server is not.
As a side note, 5 years for a branded server is very conservative, it could run longer. The only issue is older server have lesser compute power vs newer CPU and most companies fully depreciate computers on it's 5th year in service.

[@king_and_country]

DHH is 100% correct on all but one thing: Racking your servers is nowhere near as simplistic as putting it in the cage and simply connecting the power and ethernet lol. Switches, firewalls, redundancy, vLANs, power consumption, etc. all come into play, and you need a good network architect to put that into place properly. Of course once you've done it you're good to go and it's 1000x better than being a renter in the "cloud".

[@Sammi84]

DHH uses a provider that physical handles their hardware for them. They only ever see the hardware they own through a terminal.