Ask HN: Why should I use your service? It's just gonna sunset

[JadoJodo]

Apologies for the provocative title.

I just saw that Skiff is getting eaten by Notion, and I'm pretty frustrated. This service looked great, had a rich feature suite, and I was seriously considering migrating from FastMail – the lack of MaskedEmail support held me back – but they're now getting shutdown. Between Google and a few other big companies, I'm at the point where I'm hesitant to even consider using a new service because it may just get acquired and then shut down after I get comfortable. Is there any hope? (of course there is, but dang).

[JohnFen]

If you're looking for any meaningful guarantees, then there is no hope. Any service you use may evaporate (or, worse, change how it operates to make it less useful) tomorrow for any number of different reasons.

This is one of the reasons why I avoid depending on any services at all unless I have no other option.

[natpalmer1776]

I think this is why a lot of highly technical users opt to self-host and build out their own 'personal stack' using open-source projects or small self-built tools.

[pandemicsoul]

Same, and no, no hope. Money trumps all – most people are in this for the buyout, and when they get it, their users don't mean anything anymore. The best we can do is just use the services we like and know that any additional service we add will someday be a big fiasco to transition out of. Which, by the way, is why we should demand that every service make portability a standard.

[MattGaiser]

That is unfortunately a risk that one has to balance when adopting new products.

It is also a reason that a product needs to be substantially better to get traction rather than just an incremental improvement.

[nonrandomstring]

> a risk that one has to balance when adopting new products

Was just talking about the cost of the Google Graveyard [0]

I think this needs a serious financial analysis.

We talk about "externalities" and TCO (total cost of ownership) but what about hidden internal lifecycle costs like this?

Might it be that using some service platforms is a net loss even if they're free? I mean, if the cost of migration and disruption when they sunset actually outweighs the use value of even a free service?

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39347375

[JadoJodo]

True, although I feel like in the case of Skiff it was. The main attraction for me is that as a Google non-user, I don't really have a great Google Docs/Sheets alternative. FastMail works great for mail, but doesn't have these other services. Skiff seemed to be the happy marriage of those two.

[favourable]

Putting on my conspiracy robe, Skiff could have gotten a National Security Letter (NSL), and their encrypted Inbox feature probably pissed off the authorities. Then rather than shut down, they just sold out to Notion. They can't say this of course, because of gag orders, but it's a clever way to exit the market without saying anything.