7 ms·

Basho has experienced some MAJOR brain drain in the last year. I wonder if this re-positioning is related to that.

wlesieutre 11y ago
New CEO and CTO a year ago are a likely source of repositioning: http://basho.com/basho-names-new-ceo-and-cto/ http://basho.com/basho-names-new-ceo-and-cto/ I can't speculate on how that all relates to brain drain.
- InvisibleCities 11y ago
  Given tweets like this one (https://twitter.com/jtuple/status/598230043093897216 https://twitter.com/jtuple/status/598230043093897216), there doesn't seem to be much to speculate about.
  - wlesieutre 11y ago
    I've heard a bit from a friend there, so what I really mean is "I think I'll stay out of this one" :P But yeah, @jtuple, @Roach_B_me, and others have some choice tweets on the matter. Off topic- your name is a fantastic book!
  - defen 11y ago
    "Data gravity" ?
    - wlesieutre 11y ago
      It's why data wants to be together! http://datagravity.org/ http://datagravity.org/
    - e12e 11y ago
      Sounds like Terry Pratchett's idea of L-Space translated to Enterpriselish: "L-space, short for library-space, is the ultimate portrayal of Pratchett's concept that the written word has powerful magical properties on the Discworld, and that in large quantities all books warp space and time around them. The principle of L-space revolves around a seemingly logical equation; it is an extension of the 'Knowledge is Power': Books = Knowledge = Power = (Force x Distance^2) ÷ Time" http://wiki.lspace.org/mediawiki/L-space http://wiki.lspace.org/mediawiki/L-space
rch 11y ago
Well they have to monitze effectively if they expect to retain talent, and so it's definitely related in that way. It's a nice database, but not well understood. I've found it difficult to communicate how everything fits together to people do don't use this stuff everyday, so maybe this will help? At least it makes it clear that a seemingly complex configuration is perfectly valid and workable in practice.
jtuple 11y ago
To be honest, the repositioning isn't really a response to the brain drain -- it's a reflection of a changing culture at Basho that was the cause of the brain drain in the first place. The primary reason I left Basho is that I felt the company was turning into a "don't invent here" culture, the polar opposite of "not invented here". The goal was no longer to solve hard distributed systems problems and build amazing technology, but to just integrate various "trendy" technologies and make an enterprise simplification play. The problem is that most of these other technologies have major failings and/or punt on the corner cases that us old time Basho engineers obsessed over. The whole point of Riak was to be the most highly available, fault tolerant, trusted database you could use. You can't just integrate Riak with arbitrary products X, Y, and Z without compromising on those core tenants. I really hope Basho can deliver on the promises they're making about this data platform product. I really do. But, for various reasons I can't really talk about, I'd say I'm extremely skeptical. (BTW, for those that don't know me: I'm a former Principal Engineer at Basho and was the lead developer on a variety of sub-systems in Riak over the last four years)
- deegles 11y ago
  Would you still recommend using Riak?
  - scurvy 11y ago
    I would also like to know the answer to this. Specifically, riak CS. It seems to have been passed by other technologies in the space. It also has some really bizarre requirements (like 1 disk per node).
    - jtuple 11y ago
      Unfortunately, Riak CS (as of today now rebranded Riak S2, apparently), is something I don't have enough personal experience with to really have an opinion on.
  - jtuple 11y ago
    Riak is a great product/technology. I have no idea what the future of Riak looks like, but Riak in it's current form is something I still highly recommend. Just keep in mind that Riak works best for pure key/value workloads -- most of Riak's other features are (as they've been for years) hit/miss.

New CEO and CTO a year ago are a likely source of repositioning: http://basho.com/basho-names-new-ceo-and-cto/ http://basho.com/basho-names-new-ceo-and-cto/ I can't speculate on how that all relates to brain drain.

InvisibleCities 11y ago
Given tweets like this one (https://twitter.com/jtuple/status/598230043093897216 https://twitter.com/jtuple/status/598230043093897216), there doesn't seem to be much to speculate about.
- wlesieutre 11y ago
  I've heard a bit from a friend there, so what I really mean is "I think I'll stay out of this one" :P But yeah, @jtuple, @Roach_B_me, and others have some choice tweets on the matter. Off topic- your name is a fantastic book!
- defen 11y ago
  "Data gravity" ?
  - wlesieutre 11y ago
    It's why data wants to be together! http://datagravity.org/ http://datagravity.org/
  - e12e 11y ago
    Sounds like Terry Pratchett's idea of L-Space translated to Enterpriselish: "L-space, short for library-space, is the ultimate portrayal of Pratchett's concept that the written word has powerful magical properties on the Discworld, and that in large quantities all books warp space and time around them. The principle of L-space revolves around a seemingly logical equation; it is an extension of the 'Knowledge is Power': Books = Knowledge = Power = (Force x Distance^2) ÷ Time" http://wiki.lspace.org/mediawiki/L-space http://wiki.lspace.org/mediawiki/L-space

rch 11y ago

Well they have to monitze effectively if they expect to retain talent, and so it's definitely related in that way. It's a nice database, but not well understood. I've found it difficult to communicate how everything fits together to people do don't use this stuff everyday, so maybe this will help? At least it makes it clear that a seemingly complex configuration is perfectly valid and workable in practice.

jtuple 11y ago

To be honest, the repositioning isn't really a response to the brain drain -- it's a reflection of a changing culture at Basho that was the cause of the brain drain in the first place. The primary reason I left Basho is that I felt the company was turning into a "don't invent here" culture, the polar opposite of "not invented here". The goal was no longer to solve hard distributed systems problems and build amazing technology, but to just integrate various "trendy" technologies and make an enterprise simplification play. The problem is that most of these other technologies have major failings and/or punt on the corner cases that us old time Basho engineers obsessed over. The whole point of Riak was to be the most highly available, fault tolerant, trusted database you could use. You can't just integrate Riak with arbitrary products X, Y, and Z without compromising on those core tenants. I really hope Basho can deliver on the promises they're making about this data platform product. I really do. But, for various reasons I can't really talk about, I'd say I'm extremely skeptical. (BTW, for those that don't know me: I'm a former Principal Engineer at Basho and was the lead developer on a variety of sub-systems in Riak over the last four years)

deegles 11y ago
Would you still recommend using Riak?
- scurvy 11y ago
  I would also like to know the answer to this. Specifically, riak CS. It seems to have been passed by other technologies in the space. It also has some really bizarre requirements (like 1 disk per node).
  - jtuple 11y ago
    Unfortunately, Riak CS (as of today now rebranded Riak S2, apparently), is something I don't have enough personal experience with to really have an opinion on.
- jtuple 11y ago
  Riak is a great product/technology. I have no idea what the future of Riak looks like, but Riak in it's current form is something I still highly recommend. Just keep in mind that Riak works best for pure key/value workloads -- most of Riak's other features are (as they've been for years) hit/miss.