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Comment by obulpathi | Hacker News Reader

I worked with both Google Cloud and AWS. Having read Gartners Magic Quadrants on Cloud, I really question Gartners competency on understanding what Cloud really means. There is no question that Google Cloud is years ahead of AWS (ease of use, scalability, performance, vertical integration, networks, security ... ), but Gartner reports that AWS is leader. Bottomline: Don't trust what others say. Try out various cloud providers and decide for yourself, before diving head down and suffering with pain everyday.

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That MQ is led by Lydia Leong who is probably the most respected analyst in cloud (dating back to 2008!)... they're pretty transparent in the actual paid report.

AWS Lambda has a major head start and is a big reason for its head of vision above Google. Don't get me wrong, Google has a great quality cloud, but the pace and breadth of Amazon's offering is breathtaking.

One of the big controversies was IBM Softlayer being reduced to niche status, which led to howling of a volume never heard out of New York... which delayed the report months... but Gartner stuck to their guns. It's a pretty fair report.

I am AWS heavy and used Google Cloud a bit. There are tons of AWS services where Google just does not provide an equivalent. Also, AWS release pace is incredible. Quality of Google Cloud is very decent though.

Google Cloud and AWS are pretty much equivalent in terms of feature parity: https://cloud.google.com/free-trial/docs/map-aws-google-clou.... There are few (10% os services maybe?) that are not available on other platform. Also, the way AWS counts service is by nuts and bolts (AWS believes in providing fundamental components, not higher level frameworks) vs Google Cloud counts things by Cars / Trains / Submarines levels. That why people tend to think that Google Cloud provides fewer services. (As an example, imagine how many number of AWS components are needed to perform the function of App Engine. May be 10?)

>> Having read Gartners Magic Quadrants on Cloud, I really question Gartners competency on understanding

I think you can replace "Cloud" with whatever technology Gartner or most analysts write about.

These firms are little more than uninformed hype producers that fuel the enterprise software spend cycle through marketing (webinars, "research", tap-my-back-events and 3k€ "reports") that tell CIOs/CTOs what they should already know, by definition of their function: what technologies to consider for their business problems, why and how.

On the other hand, they provide a nice scapegoat when someone needs to offload responsibility, a bit like the "no one ever got fired for buying recommended by Gartner".

PS: wish I could find Zed Shaw's video on "calling bullshit" (or related), as it includes a nice anecdote on dealing with industry analysts.

As someone who works with technology every day, i never have any idea what Gartner is trying to say. I look at their magic quadrants or whatever, and have no idea how it is supposed to make decisions about technologies or their vendors.

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