DHH

90% of the system administration work was the same whether we owned the boxes or we rented them from Amazon, right? And I think that's the part a lot of folks aren't appreciating. They're thinking, wait, computer? Does that mean like... It's running in your basement. How do you secure that? Do you have a baseball bat down there in case someone tries to break in and get it? What even is this?

90% of the system administration work was the same whether we owned the boxes or we rented them from Amazon, right? And I think that's the part a lot of folks aren't appreciating. They're thinking, wait, computer? Does that mean like... It's running in your basement. How do you secure that? Do you have a baseball bat down there in case someone tries to break in and get it? What even is this?

He's like, no, that's not how it works. There are professional data centers that you just rent a space for, and then you put in your own computer. And there's just a basic education here where I kind of feel like it's like we're discovering an ancient civilization. And people go like, how the fuck did they build those pyramids, man?

He's like, no, that's not how it works. There are professional data centers that you just rent a space for, and then you put in your own computer. And there's just a basic education here where I kind of feel like it's like we're discovering an ancient civilization. And people go like, how the fuck did they build those pyramids, man?

Kind of crazy technology. And then the people who built the pyramids were just like, hey, man, I'm like 45. We did it like nine years ago. This isn't ancient technology that we need archaeologists to figure out. It probably wasn't fucking aliens either. Like we knew – and we know how to do – the people are still alive.

Kind of crazy technology. And then the people who built the pyramids were just like, hey, man, I'm like 45. We did it like nine years ago. This isn't ancient technology that we need archaeologists to figure out. It probably wasn't fucking aliens either. Like we knew – and we know how to do – the people are still alive.

The people who set up the internet as you know it today, which was set up not on hyperscalers but by individual companies owning computers and connecting them to the internet, they're still fucking alive. There's kind of a lot of them too. And – We can rediscover that. We can rediscover that and we'll be better off for it if we do.

The people who set up the internet as you know it today, which was set up not on hyperscalers but by individual companies owning computers and connecting them to the internet, they're still fucking alive. There's kind of a lot of them too. And – We can rediscover that. We can rediscover that and we'll be better off for it if we do.

And a bunch of the advances we've had in technology since then have actually made it easier to do that. When I got started with the internet, well, not even the internet, just to say, when I got started with Basecamp, when we launched Basecamp, we launched Basecamp on an Intel Celeron 1 core, I think, CPU with 2.8 gigahertz. Is that right? Something like that, right? One fucking core.

And a bunch of the advances we've had in technology since then have actually made it easier to do that. When I got started with the internet, well, not even the internet, just to say, when I got started with Basecamp, when we launched Basecamp, we launched Basecamp on an Intel Celeron 1 core, I think, CPU with 2.8 gigahertz. Is that right? Something like that, right? One fucking core.

One 2004 core, by the way, that shit was slow. I mean, by modern standards, two orders of magnitude faster. I just bought a hobby box from Hetzner just to rent and play with an experiment, right? 48 cores, hyper-threading, 96 vCPUs for $220 a month. What? The amount of computing power that's in that machine could operate probably 95% of all SaaS businesses that exist in the world.

One 2004 core, by the way, that shit was slow. I mean, by modern standards, two orders of magnitude faster. I just bought a hobby box from Hetzner just to rent and play with an experiment, right? 48 cores, hyper-threading, 96 vCPUs for $220 a month. What? The amount of computing power that's in that machine could operate probably 95% of all SaaS businesses that exist in the world.

And a napkin math that I did yesterday on Twitter said like, do you know what? We probably only need like five of those boxes to run all of Basecamp, which is a SaaS company doing tens of millions in ARR. Computers have gotten insanely fast and capable and productive. And you wouldn't know...

And a napkin math that I did yesterday on Twitter said like, do you know what? We probably only need like five of those boxes to run all of Basecamp, which is a SaaS company doing tens of millions in ARR. Computers have gotten insanely fast and capable and productive. And you wouldn't know...

half the time if you're dealing with a reseller of a reseller of perhaps a reseller of AWS because that shit is still expensive. I mean, Heroku, again, I love Heroku and I'm just going to bang them a little bit. Like, we'll literally charge you like 200 bucks for like half of a vCPU and two megabytes of RAM. That's a little over the top, but

half the time if you're dealing with a reseller of a reseller of perhaps a reseller of AWS because that shit is still expensive. I mean, Heroku, again, I love Heroku and I'm just going to bang them a little bit. Like, we'll literally charge you like 200 bucks for like half of a vCPU and two megabytes of RAM. That's a little over the top, but

Hardware is really good, really fast, and it's getting faster and cheaper like all the fucking time. Moore's Law, once you look at multi-core setups, is very much alive. Shit should be getting twice as fast at half the cost in no time at all. And it is, except if you buy it from a reseller of a reseller.

Hardware is really good, really fast, and it's getting faster and cheaper like all the fucking time. Moore's Law, once you look at multi-core setups, is very much alive. Shit should be getting twice as fast at half the cost in no time at all. And it is, except if you buy it from a reseller of a reseller.

We had a dog, yeah.

We had a dog, yeah.