I find the provided arguments a bit baffling - you would be better off without AWS because you might forget to turn off $80k of instances? How is that their responsibility or different than any other provider / service? Or, if you're using Lamda - well, you're not just accidentally developing a serverless solution, are you - you know pros and cons and have chosen to do it, knowing how it's priced and to be careful...If self-hosting is potentially a better option, I'm curious how that can be done in a simpler way, while providing all security and benefits of mentioned VPC, EKS etc...
I'm not particularly fond of AWS, but I think they're pretty transparent about pricing of various services - it's linked everywhere and pretty visible, calculators are available etc...I agree about not being able to set limits, though - but how many other vendors do it?
My biggest gripe is the UX of their Console and various services - I'd rate it 3/10 compared to what could be done in terms of design, displayed information and user paths / workflows.
> I find the provided arguments a bit baffling - you would be better off without AWS because you might forget to turn off $80k of instances?
Except that AWS (nor other cloud providers) specifically and intentionally doesn't give me a way to limit charges.
This ... is .. a ... big ... deal.
I'm happy with my site going down if I hit $1000 in charges in a month or $100 in a day.
Maybe some cryptobros broke into my instance because I screwed up. Maybe HN just threw a zillion people at my project. Maybe I just flat-out screwed up and opened an uber-expensive EC2 instance. It shouldn't matter. I don't want more than $1000 in charges in a month without me specifically and personally authorizing it.
The fact that I cannot do this means that AWS (and others) have specifically deemed this to be a significant source of profits. Who am I to argue with them?
Also, things can get pretty complicated when it comes to pricing on AWS. I'm thinking of things like S3 where at first, it seems simple. $x per gb/mo. But then you have egress charges and then operations charges, and then minimum storage time charges, and a half dozen other things that can affect the pricing.
Imo it's the author's attitude for why we have so many regulations on things. Their argument is essentially "I didn't do my reading to learn the implications of doing this thing, and now it hurt me." It's why the concept of an "accredited investor" exists.
I think I see your point, which is that sometimes safeties/regulations are necessary to prevent harm from people that don't know what they're doing. However, I'd counter your firearm example with one of the world's most popular firearms, the Glock handgun, which only has safety mechanisms that help ensure that the firing pin strikes the primer from an intentional trigger pull. You can still not know what you're doing ("what does the trigger do?") and have an ND (negligent discharge).
I'm not particularly fond of AWS, but I think they're pretty transparent about pricing of various services - it's linked everywhere and pretty visible, calculators are available etc...I agree about not being able to set limits, though - but how many other vendors do it?
My biggest gripe is the UX of their Console and various services - I'd rate it 3/10 compared to what could be done in terms of design, displayed information and user paths / workflows.