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Comment by greentrust | Hacker News Reader

Facebook is the creator and maintainer of the most popular web framework in the world (React). This certainly doesn't mean they should do cloud computing, but let's not downplay their favor amongst developers.

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React is a piece of code that is versioned which the developer has full control over. A cloud service would be entirely controlled by Facebook, meaning your business can be bricked by Facebook on a whim, as has happened to many Facebook-hosted apps in the past. There's a reason why few take Facebook seriously as a developer platform these days.

Frameworks and Infrastructure tend to get chosen by different people with different requirements though.

"Move fast and break things" is okay/great if you can control the deployment of code and use tests to make sure it still works how you expect it to. It's less great if the infrastructure keeps failing (it's not failing, it's changing!) and you can't test before the roll out.

Ubiquity of a library/framework doesn't translate to trust or favor among developers. Just look at Oracle.

Oracle has a very significant cloud business:

$26.7B in 2019

https://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspeculations/2019/06/21/or...

Yes, they do, but not because developers like them. They are infamous for their super strong targeting of C-level for sales.

The correct statement is some developers don't like Oracle. As for their business tactics, every business has to find viability in its own way. Obviously Oracle is providing services of value if they are able to consistently turn a profit on revenue in the tens of billions per year. This doesn't really answer the question why Facebook is not in the cloud business.

> Obviously Oracle is providing services of value if they are able to consistently turn a profit on revenue in the tens of billions per year

Not obvious; Oracle is known for underhanded marketing and lock-in. Or if you prefer: Successfully selling to the C-levels doesn't mean that you provide actual value.

Right, because C-level types are just spending $30B a year on Oracle services for zero value added. You shouldn't take your own opinions on a provider's services too seriously. No doubt there are some practices that are subpar but like any competitor in a crowded marketplace, there are going to be trade-offs between cloud providers. If the trade-offs between price, features, and value align with the needs of an organization, they will choose Oracle. That C-suite and devs have different needs shouldn't surprise you. There's always going to be some tension between those two groups, because their perspective on the business is filtered from a different set of parameters. That tension, by the way, will necessarily create a demand for different services and functions in the marketplace. You may not personally like Oracle, but don't pretend that some people don't, and don't imagine for one moment that it's purely out of ignorance.

Are you referring to Java? Sun was beloved.

Products and services have a very different risk profile. With products you generally can vet a lot of risk up-front, with services, you have more risk tied to future activities.

No, developers don't like React because of an infrastructure supported by Facebook. React is entirely selfhostable, and only as secure as your own dev environment. Built as an open sourced tool, with major contributions from thousands outside of FB.

You can't compare the two and their safety anf 'favor among developers', devs also fought against FB by having them change their licensing bc FB made the horrendous decision to essentially own any and all projects developed on it.

Devs don't trust facebook, such as no one should.

Please don't speak for all of us. I for one think Facebook being involved with React is absolutely a good thing.

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