←back to thread

PlanetScale Offering $5 Databases

(planetscale.com)
231 points ryanvogel | 1 comments | 30 Oct 25 15:20 UTC | HN request time: 0.231s | source
Show context
andreybaskov ◴[31 Oct 25 02:21 UTC] No.45767664[source]▶
I'm surprised so many replies here are about removing a free tier 2 years ago. Things cost money, what did you expect? Whenever I get free products that cost money I expect it's either temporary, or I'm being the product myself.
replies(7): >>45767789 #>>45768354 #>>45768911 #>>45769081 #>>45769220 #>>45769633 #>>45770466 #
Imustaskforhelp ◴[31 Oct 25 04:12 UTC] No.45768354[source]▶
If somebody built a service to try out planetscale or the fact that planetscale was constantly hyped around / sponsored some big names atleast in the youtube scale, I am pretty sure that some people went there thinking about the free forever and everything...

I do think it was a little bad move because now you can't even test planetscale and the memories of its free stuff still might haunt some people

replies(1): >>45768565 #
samlambert ◴[31 Oct 25 04:55 UTC] No.45768565[source]▶
Were we supposed to just keep it up until we go out of business or something? Out of sheer duty. Like burn everything we built to the ground to keep the free tier going as long as possible? Endlessly indentured to provide a free service on the internet for people that will never pay us money so that the people that do pay us money can eventually have to move provider too because we are shutting down?

I didn't enjoy doing it. I felt bad but I don't regret it at all.

replies(5): >>45768710 #>>45768729 #>>45769346 #>>45769791 #>>45771366 #
1. Imustaskforhelp ◴[31 Oct 25 05:33 UTC] No.45768729[source]▶
Fair take I guess, but my curiosity wants me to ask how big were the costs of the free tier that it was trying to make you shut down..

Do you feel as if people were abusing the free tier ? Was the only solution according to PlanetScale be to close the free tier entirely? How much were the people actually using the service (like out of 100 people who signed up, how many people were constantly utilizing it till its fullest) or ( maybe abusing it even)

If lets say that you could build your company once again or you could start planetscale from its beginnings, would you still take this decision before it was big, since I feel like as if the free tier was a key part in atleast giving PlanetScale some name/fame.

I can understand how you feel but I just feel like there were a lot of people who were advocates of your software, partially because of how people could test it out for free as well and those advocates were the one who were hurt the most. Personally, I wasn't involved but I would pretty bummed too if I advocate a service and it does something like this, although, I would still understand the situation.