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Hey you still need a place to store that mower you haven't used in 4 years? I have room in my shed, you can store it for infinite amount of time without ever talking to me again. I'll pass it on through the generations.
Where will I put the box my server came shipped in, though!?
Don't worry I'll keep that too, for at least 9999999 years.
For #3/year?
Yeah but you only have to pay for one. TOS doesn't say closet storage can be terminated.
If they ever try to take my box, I'll send my ATTOURNEY, SAUL "GENE" GOODMAN after them. It's MY fucking box, after all.
It is a long boring story, and I loudly shared my opinion on the DO thread when the change was made. I was a huge DO advocate at the time (still have my DO shirt actually) writing IoT and mobile dev articles, using DO for web services. I enjoyed it and was at a point where I had many more credits than I could use (probably in my life time). I didn't rush, I thought it was a good arrangement. I used it as a test platform for clients, and kept them on it when I transitioned the projects over.
Before the announcement hit, I already found half of my credits expired and something about the remainders expiring in a few months - it was a bad surprise (change management 101: any surprise is a bad surprise). I was not happy, closed the account, and moved to LET & linode.
I appreciate the offer, I've had people at DO offer to "extend" my credits since then - but as the client, my question is to what end? To deal with the remainder expiring again in a year? They were originally my credits to do with as I please. What stops DO from changing it to a 1 month expiry? Removing them altogether? What do I get, for giving up my freedom to use them as I please? No thanks! That wasn't the original agreement. In seriousness, that conversation couldn't go anywhere anyway. I don't even remember what my account was. I closed the account with over 100 in credits still available - who knows how many expired, it was the principle of it. I'm a good LET guy - I hold grudges well
.
That said, I have found a different value in it. I do a lot of local advising at startups - I speak out against trusting companies (like DO) and their services - I strongly urge them to use internal servers and moving to proper self-managed production servers at go live. Credits are a small thing obviously, but it is one example I use for providers imposing changes that the client has no influence over - it wakes them up to the risks of relying on someone for service and policy. As a service and subscription model discussion, I use it again as an example of a change gone bad. The take away is that user policy is best set before, and financially impacting policy changes are best used for only new clients going forward. And I like to discuss the impact of non-expiring credits (as it prevents corporate buyouts and new investors). It is a great example of a policy change that only benefits the company, not users, and I usually encourage a follow up conversation on how they think those changes could be rolled out properly.
I like you. You remind me of me! We should hold grudges. helps the heart.
..hopefully not the blood pressure.
Gryd> @needavps said:
Grudges are awesome! It reminds me of
Oh the blood pressure and that dirty old heart is getting it next. Their names... are on... the list... (things over the net are never ominous enough)
I just hope you don't treat other people that way. If it's just me, okay. I'll get over it. But imagine if you accept a gift, never pick it up, demand that they hold on to it until you do, and then talk bad about them to your mutual friends when they eventually throw it out years later. I mean, honestly, that hurts. It does.
Well I don't. I can resume old arguments with people over and over again, but they have to be the ones to initiate it. I'm already over it. If you want to be friends again, let's do it. If you just want to go around talking bad about me to everyone, that's okay too I guess... but I'll keep letting you know I'm here with open arms.
@jarland WHERE'S THE BOX MY PENTIUM 100 CAME IN!?!
Lol, well, fwiw I like you as a person. But if that is an analogy for my experience with DO ... it is kind of like giving your friend a piece of cake, then walking up and slapping it out of their hands and yelling surprise! And when they show alarm - telling them if they ask nice enough for another piece, they might get some (as long as they hustle while eating it this time). Not very friendly at all :P
I don't like analogies though. I was working through the credits - just slowly. Many of I got for referrals, etc... Yes, I know referrals weren't meant to expire (mine did), the take away was supposed to be a year later (most of mine were immediate) and that I can beg for a bit more time (I won't). This resulted in a long standing advocate turning against them - it was well earned. I assume their decision makers knew it was an acceptable outcome - the advocate loss & cost was worth less than the value of taking away the credits. It is what it is.
Fair point. I usually get over it after everything settles, and I'm pretty good at separating the issue (DO policy) from tangentially related stuff (DO employee). I have a bad habit of sticking with things in life 'Merchant of Venice' style. I wouldn't make a very good MOD
.
That would be the only case of it that I'm aware of, that was definitely not on the table. I hear you and I appreciate the calm talk. It's just... I emailed you one last time and was like "Hey if you're going to come pick this up eventually just let me know and I'll keep holding it for you." But the next time I heard from you was when you were talking bad about me to our mutual friends for throwing it out.
It seems like you enjoy the story of me throwing it out more than the gift, and part of me wonders if that's really why you didn't reach out, because the story of me doing you wrong was worth more. It's not too crazy that it hurts someone's feelings to be on that side of it, and I won't act like it doesn't hurt mine. But... I pick up every day and continue on, and I'll never have bad feelings toward you
@jarland I signed up to do, had $30,000,0000 in credit, and never used it. How about a top up?
Hold my beer.
No underflow, pls.
My memory is really bad, I couldn't find our email history, but I remember you wanted to help and I owe you an apology. When I left it was by my choice - I had lost credits, offered credits back by the support team, but I was refusing the policy change. I know it is dumb, but it wasn't what I had agreed to. I felt betrayed and even though I knew it was pointless - I decided to delete my accounts in an attempt to refute the policy change. I certainly didn't mean to talk bad about you, I was however frustrated with the person before you.
In full honesty, your response was what actually helped soften my opinion. I wrote an appreciative message response for you on the DO blog, but it got moderated, and my new reply was short... your response mattered. It made a difference. My bad experience was never from you.
I sincerely apologize, I responded poorly and the wrong was never caused by you. To the best of my memory, I was paying for my droplets over PayPal as needed and sitting on my credits for a rainy day when I needed them. I remember my credits being taken away, and support offering some or all the credits back with a future expiry date. Even if I accepted, they would expire again before I could use them up. I felt punished for paying up front and closed my accounts. I probably wasn't nice about it, I made them refund my PayPal balance. That's where my hostility lives, long before we met.
I didn't think about it again until I saw the DO blog post and employees saying the change was better for everyone. I was loud and reactive back then, and with my accounts already deleted, felt free to share my opinion. By the end, I met you (distantly). You were sincere and offered to help though, if I met you earlier or was less stubborn the story would have gone different
. You have always done right by me, and I apologize if I've ever made you feel otherwise.
On the story front... you are right, I do see more value from a loss and policy change perspective than the attempt to make it right - I often bypass that entirely which isn't fair. Your drive to help meant more than you know. This (unexpected) conversation has been valuable to me, and left me to reflect on myself (something I never expected on LET), so thank you. I also didn't realize my digital ocean responses had any impact. I assumed no one gave my opinion a second thought on the subject and it was quickly and long forgotten.
DO here or there, I've never been a fan of credit systems where credits are said or imagined to not have a deadline. To my mind, this is similar to offers advertising "unlimited space" that is said or imagined to not be limited.
In general, I'd prefer to simply pay a price and know what I'm getting for that price. I don't need or want credits beyond this.
Surely that is the credit system anyway. I credit DO with $5 for my $5 instance and it lasts a month, rinse, repeat each month.
The only issue there has ever been with credits at DO is that referral or introductory credits have to be used within 12 months (AFAIR). I am sure Vultr is the same.
Yes, of course, these credits shouldn't expire (and presumably don't).
Yes, I meant the referral or introductory credits.
If I understood @KermEd's issue with DO well, at one time in the past, such credits weren't expected to expire, but then they did expire.
Indeed, but to be fair they were open about it, whether people like what they did or not.
https://blog.digitalocean.com/details-on-expiring-digitalocean-credits/
But most importantly and in reference to @KermEd:
So, credit was never set to expire, they changed that, but if you need them get in touch and they will extend the expiry. Seems fair. And as long as you are actually running a droplet the referral credit will never expire anyway.
Referral credit as in the $10 for being referred expires, but credit you get for referring others does not. Apologies if I got those confused, I assume anyone talking about referral credit means to refer to the credit for referring others, as I personally have trouble seeing the case where the $10 for being referred should ever expire unless someone decided the service wasn't for them and moved on very quickly. Happy to see an alternative scenario there, just not able to create it in my mind.
Actually, if you look at my initial comment above, I wasn't defending @KermEd's point of view, though my comment made immediately above may suggest that I was.
My initial comment was more a restrained version of "To the h*ll with promotional and referral credits in general, I don't want them, and if I happen to get them, I don't expect that they'll last forever anyway!" :-) But I suspect that this is a minority view. :-)
Thanks for the link to that DO blog post, which was reasonable. Arguably, DO's main mistake was to allow too many credits to be awarded to begin with, which then led to a seemingly sudden change of rules.
Not realising from that start it would be a balance sheet liability was a major faux pas. Although having said that, a startup not thinking so many people would just hoard credits is also understandable.
I agree.
Edit: Though I guess that if everyone had really used all of their promotional and referral credits, this would also have left a mark on the balance sheet, but in a different way.