Episode 124: “These pants are all too small,” or Dropbox and all the great public clouds

Dropbox made $1.1bn last year, which is mind-blowing. What can we learn from the way Dropbox wiggled it’s way into so many people’s lives (11m paying users, it seems) versus competitors like Box? Well, probably a lot more than where Apple, Spotify, and Dropbox run their stuff in - or out! - of the cloud, a topic we also discuss. Also, sheep-skin shoes are hot, too hot. Also, something about dtrace and zfs, I don’t know - just listen to it.

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What even is a “Dropbox”?

• Now that we know they generated $1.1bn in revenue in CY2017 (with -10% op margins, translating to a loss of $111.7m and actual cash flow)…we should probably contemplate how they fit in.
• 451 estimates a valuation at $8bn+. More: “Dropbox has taken just over 10 years to go public since its founding in 2007, which we attribute to anxiety over its high private valuation, a sizable profitability gap, and the dour outlook often associated with the EFSS segment.”
• More from 451: “Its net loss ($111m) shrank by nearly half from 2016 – a faster pace than its topline growth. Its relative sales and marketing costs are lower than most of its peers. The vendor spent 28% of its revenue on sales and marketing – half the level of Box, a fellow FSS compatriot that's half the size as Dropbox." Man, think of the shit-per diem an travel policies for last year.
• E.g., who knew they were so widely used by normals?! 11m+ paying users, they says. (But, it’s 45 to 1 free to pay.)
• Do we think GDrive/G Suite is this big? I mean, it must be at least once you throw in Docs and GMail.
  • Gartner’s 2016 estimates: “$1.3 billion in G Suite sales ranked a distant No. 2 behind Office’s $13.8 billion, according to 2016 data from Gartner.” Checks out.

Tech Co.’s using Google Cloud

• Apple on Google for iCloud (but also AWS for the same), Spotify on Google, Dropbox on their own cloud (see Ben’s “turns out!” analysis).
• Does this matter for normals?
• “Dropbox is likely an outlier with its successful cloud data migration off AWS.”
• Wired’s write-up on the migration from 2016

Relevant to your interests

• Pants are sized wrong.
• DTrace going GPL-compatible
• Arrested DevOps talking with Andrew Shafer and Bryan Cantrill
• The ongoing nothingburger of blockchain-beyond-bitcoin:
  • “The only mass-market use of blockchain technology right now is bitcoin, and you can certainly debate just how widespread a market that really is. Lots of people are interested in blockchain’s distributed ledger system as a potential way to cut out the middleman in transactions between manufacturers or retailers and their suppliers, but the number of people actually using blockchain technology for those types of services right now is quite small.”
  • More: “The entire market for blockchain services in 2017 — and not necessarily cloud vendor-provided blockchain services — sits at $708 million, according to a report from WinterGreen Research cited by The Information. By comparison, Gartner said last September that it expects cloud services revenue will have reached $260.2 billion in 2017.”
  • WinterGreen, sittin’ in hot tubs, smokin’ those L’s: “In that report, WinterGreen also predicts astounding growth of 757 percent in that blockchain market by 2024 to $60.7 billion, which is among the most dramatic forward-looking statements I’ve seen in a while.”
• The concept of the millennial is dead. Time to start complaining and belly-aching about how simpering and fucked up the current generation of The Kids are.

Conferences, et. al.

• March 9th to 13th, SXSW - Brandon in Austin giving out stickers. Coté needs excuses to expense meals and drinks.
• March 22-23 - DevOps Talks Conference, Melbourne Matt speaking
• April 26-27, DevOpsDays Jakarta - Matt is keynoting, and Coté will be speaking too.
• May 15th to 18th, 2018 - Coté talking EA at Continuous Lifecycle London.
• May 22-25, ChefConf 2018, in Chicago.

SDT news & hype

• Check out Software Defined Interviews, our new podcast. Pretty self-descriptive, plus the #exegesis podcast we’ve been doing, all in one, for free.
• Keep up with the weekly newsletter.
• Join us in Slack.
• Buy some t-shirts! DISCOUNT CODE: SDTFSG (20% off)
• Send your name and address to stickers@softwaredefinedtalk.com and we will send you a sticker.

Recommendations

• Matt: Bose QuietComfort 20 headphones
• Brandon: Version Control.
• Coté: Starbuck’s Blonde roast; low-sodium Kirkland bacon - turns out! - no sugar.