[HN Gopher] We apologize. We did a terrible job announcing the e...
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       We apologize. We did a terrible job announcing the end of Docker
       Free Teams
        
       Author : mmbleh
       Score  : 377 points
       Date   : 2023-03-16 19:41 UTC (3 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.docker.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.docker.com)
        
       | manifoldgeo wrote:
       | > This impacted less than 2% of our users.
       | 
       | I think they mean it impacts less than 2% of user _accounts_. Not
       | every account is created equal. If you were an open-source org
       | with millions of image downloads a month, having your org deleted
       | would have an outsized effect on the community. Many more Docker
       | Hub users than 2% stand to be affected by these changes, even if
       | the nominal value of 2% of user accounts is accurate.
       | 
       | Also, this "apology" does not feel even 2% apologetic. "I am
       | sorry you misunderstood us" is not an apology. They're running
       | the seldom used "docker pull gaslight:latest" command.
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | Aleklart wrote:
       | I don't get the hate of Docker as a company. Yes, this is crap
       | technology that incentivise resource inefficiency at its peak
       | form, but this is how stacks like ruby or python are at least
       | working. Still, docker org invented all the tools, gave them for
       | free, promote, document and support them, gave free global
       | registry that can be filled by anyone and contains petabytes of
       | trash, with free thousands of terabytes of egress monthly. They
       | gave away all their intellectual work to RedHat/bazaar and
       | participate in development of "open standards" for free. And now
       | when they take away some expensive toy, developers became hostile
       | and call them unreliable.
        
       | franky47 wrote:
       | > You can migrate to a Free Team organization to a Personal
       | account by opening a support ticket. No action will be taken
       | against your account while your ticket is being processed.
       | 
       | Support request sent, I wish there were more clear on what
       | "Topic" and "Severity" this kind of request falls into.
       | 
       | #HugOps to the tech support team that's going to be flooded with
       | requests.
        
       | chillbill wrote:
       | What I'd like to know is why the hell is there so many Docker
       | editions/licenses? Did docker just hire people who made Windows
       | vista?
       | 
       | Also, just switch to Podman already people...
        
         | antoineMoPa wrote:
         | Doesn't podman use docker.io images by default?
        
       | mkl95 wrote:
       | > You can migrate from a Free Team organization to a Personal
       | account by opening a support ticket. No action will be taken
       | against your account while your ticket is being processed.
       | 
       | This company raised $400M+ and they cannot be arsed to implement
       | a feature to change account types.
        
       | yjftsjthsd-h wrote:
       | > How can I see if I'm affected?
       | 
       | > Please consult the Organizations page of your Docker account;
       | any affected organizations are labeled "Docker Free Team" in the
       | "Subscription" column. Less than 2% of Docker users have a Free
       | Team organization on their account.
       | 
       | Interesting theory, but no; _my_ account is paid, but I 'm using
       | third party images that are rather harder to verify.
        
       | xbar wrote:
       | Who is docker for now?
        
       | wkdneidbwf wrote:
       | oh glorious docker thank you for completely changing course and
       | not deleting our data and then acting like you never said you'd
       | delete it in the first place.
       | 
       | fuck docker!
        
       | ericb wrote:
       | If they are listening to feedback, first is that a 30 day
       | timeframe sends the message that "we feel our profit is more
       | important than whatever else you are working on, so much that you
       | should either pay us, or if you cannot afford it, immediately
       | halt your other activities to reduce our costs." None of that
       | builds trust.
       | 
       | As someone affected, I'm ok with paying.
       | 
       | * I don't like feeling tricked
       | 
       | * I don't like feeling held hostage
       | 
       | * Make your changes in a manner that preceding the announcement
       | with "SURPRISE!" wouldn't be fitting
       | 
       | This was done with no notice--basically a bill for RIGHT NOW with
       | no warning, and it seems that the only reason for that was greed?
       | Docker just hit 100 million in ARR. I mean, really, you can't
       | afford to role this out gracefully?!?
        
         | bpodgursky wrote:
         | I can assure you that Docker is not trying to protect any
         | profits. More like... slow the cash hemorrhage.
        
           | ericb wrote:
           | Docker is over 100 million ARR from what I understand, so
           | that's a strange thing to say.
        
           | hackernewds wrote:
           | how can you "assure" that?
        
         | throitallaway wrote:
         | Docker Hub has become deeply integrated into the workflow of
         | development/pipelines/runtime environments/etc. Announcing
         | something like this with 30 days notice is extremely insulting.
         | They're a software company (maybe not...?) and should be well
         | aware of the amount of interruption that a 30 day notice on
         | something like this causes.
        
       | hectormalot wrote:
       | Compared to the recent apology from Fly.io [1], Docker's
       | corporate apology is terrible. Fly's was open about the struggles
       | they faced and how they feel about it, empathetic to their
       | customers, and come across as genuine (also reinforced by
       | mrkurt's active follow up both in their community, as wel as here
       | on HN).
       | 
       | Docker's on the other hand is none of that, and full of corporate
       | PR red flags:
       | 
       | - "This only impacted less than 2% of our users" signals that
       | they're not really sorry. It tells me they see this as a 'loud
       | minority' problem
       | 
       | - "This does not affect [list of 6 other types of subscriptions]"
       | -> signals the post is partially being used to promote the other
       | subscriptions. Reinforced by the "what are the benefits of a
       | Docker subscription" at the bottom.
       | 
       | - It's still unclear (to me) what is the actual implication for
       | some of the non-official open source projects here. On the one
       | hand they say: "Public images will only disappear if the
       | maintainer decides to proactively delete it from Docker Hub".
       | Further down they mention "we will defer any organization
       | suspension or deletion while the DSOS application is under
       | review". Clearly they do intent to suspend organisations, but
       | maybe let old images remain? Then the problem remains, as it
       | prevents future updates.
       | 
       | Despite what it tries to say in words, (for me) this post just
       | reinforces the initial signal of both not understanding and not
       | caring about the open source usage.
       | 
       | [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35044516
        
       | ryan29 wrote:
       | Edit: It looks like you can migrate from a team to a personal
       | account:
       | 
       | > You can migrate from a Free Team organization to a Personal
       | account by opening a support ticket. No action will be taken
       | against your account while your ticket is being processed.
        
         | imron wrote:
         | > I don't get it. It's still exactly the same problem for me.
         | 
         | So you do get it then.
         | 
         | Sorry, not sorry.
        
       | ignoramous wrote:
       | > _...we recently emailed accounts that are members of Free Team
       | organizations, to let them know that they will lose features
       | unless they move to one of our supported free or paid offerings.
       | This impacted less than 2% of our users._
       | 
       | What percentage of those orgs / users hosted popular docker
       | images? Surely, 2% is a small enough number to warrant a public
       | apology?
        
         | klooney wrote:
         | Plus, this isn't 2% of the random people who have created an
         | account since 2013, it's the images that everyone freeloads off
         | of.
        
       | bovermyer wrote:
       | I already moved my relevant containers to GHCR.
       | 
       | Side note - Google's "crane" CLI tool was marvelous for this
       | purpose.
        
       | siva7 wrote:
       | I'm baffled who the heck wrote and approved such a poor
       | communication piece with the original mail
        
       | sasakrsmanovic2 wrote:
       | Good job on docker to come clean so quickly.
        
         | eatonphil wrote:
         | I'm not sure I'd call this "coming clean" since it doesn't seem
         | like they really changed anything. They just apologized for
         | that what they are doing is upsetting people.
        
       | Aeolun wrote:
       | > This impacted less than 2% of our users.
       | 
       | Hmm, I'm not sure how I feel about them making excuses a few
       | sentences into what is supposed to be an apology.
        
       | dawnerd wrote:
       | So if it's only such a small amount of accounts, then surely it's
       | barely a line item. Makes no sense, something doesn't add up
       | here.
        
         | giaour wrote:
         | I would guess that those 2% of users account for more than 2%
         | of the load on Docker Hub. Open source projects on a regular
         | release cadence would push images more frequently than your
         | average user, and those public images from the projects
         | themselves were probably used in FROM statements more
         | frequently than other images.
        
           | rightbyte wrote:
           | Sure. But what share of their users use those 2% images.
           | Surely way more.
           | 
           | Also I don't think Docker grasps how much their users value a
           | one way stop for pulling images of OSS.
           | 
           | It is a really stupid move.
        
           | dawnerd wrote:
           | Obviously but they should use that metric of resources used
           | vs how small the impact is.
        
             | giaour wrote:
             | I think they used one metric (resources used) when deciding
             | to kill free teams, then their PR team scrambled to find
             | another metric to make the whole kerfuffle seem like a
             | tempest in a teapot when the backlash hit.
        
       | tananaev wrote:
       | The key part for our project is "You can migrate from a Free Team
       | organization to a Personal account by opening a support ticket."
       | 
       | Migrating to a free personal account will work for many small
       | open source projects. That's what we're planning to do.
        
       | 0xbadcafebee wrote:
       | I have nothing against Docker Inc. But it's worth noting that
       | this kind of screw up happens when your company, from the top
       | down, does not practice a culture in which empathy/compassion for
       | people comes first.
       | 
       | In all areas of the business, everyone should first be thinking,
       | how does this impact the people using this thing? Have I talked
       | to them? Do they understand what's happening? Do they have
       | concerns? Have I fully addressed them? Is this going to make
       | their lives harder, or will this be scary, or confusing?
       | 
       | It's my biggest pet peeve. Both as a user and an employee. If you
       | don't take the time to care, it's really obvious, and an easy way
       | to piss people off and inconvenience them. From a business
       | perspective that drives customers to your competitors and makes
       | employees quit. From a personal perspective, it's just a dick
       | thing to do.
        
       | patientplatypus wrote:
       | [flagged]
        
       | avereveard wrote:
       | Can't they just idk release a list of the images that are likely
       | to be impacted unless the owner takes action?
       | 
       | I don't care much of the business decision, it's their house.
       | 
       | I care for the persons I support whom use docker and I dont see a
       | way to prepare them without sounding like a crackpot and looking
       | like a fool if they after making noise turns out they aren't
       | impacted.
        
       | linuxftw wrote:
       | Lots of people outraged here, but did any organization step up to
       | fill this (perceived) gap?
       | 
       | Docker is way too generous IMO. Petabytes of freeloader data
       | they'll never generate a nickle from. Everyone around here wants
       | people to pay $20/month for some newspaper, and spend $0/month on
       | infrastructure that helps run the internet. It's crazy town.
        
         | yjftsjthsd-h wrote:
         | > Lots of people outraged here, but did any organization step
         | up to fill this (perceived) gap?
         | 
         | Well, quay already exists.
         | 
         | > Everyone around here wants people to pay $20/month for some
         | newspaper, and spend $0/month on infrastructure that helps run
         | the internet.
         | 
         | And you believe that those 2 ideas are both held by the same
         | people?
        
       | voytec wrote:
       | > This impacted less than 2% of our users.
       | 
       | Ah, only 2%. Completely irrelevant number. Move along.
        
       | jdlyga wrote:
       | Monetizing what we took for granted as available for free has
       | really rubbed everyone the wrong way. I've noticed teams are much
       | less likely to request paid Docker Desktop, especially since
       | there are perfectly suitable free alternatives nowadays. We all
       | use either native docker engine on Windows + WSL2, or the MIT
       | licensed Colima on Mac. Honestly, Docker Desktop was always a
       | fairly heavyweight and cumbersome app with a very high opinion of
       | itself.
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | renewiltord wrote:
       | Cool. I'm just glad I don't have to replicate all these images to
       | my own ECR.
        
       | r00fus wrote:
       | They say that their separate "open source program" (DSOS) is
       | completely better than Free Teams. Why didn't they just migrate
       | everyone on Free Teams to DSOS and then worry about the
       | qualifications for those migrated afterwards (and less
       | stringently)?
        
         | evrflx wrote:
         | And why don't they answer for nearly a year after submitting a
         | request, only to THEN ask to resubmit the request with an
         | improved form or something. After which everything goes back to
         | silence?
        
       | Macha wrote:
       | > What are the benefits of a paid Docker subscription?
       | 
       | > Docker Pro is ideal for individual developers looking to
       | accelerate productivity.
       | 
       | > Docker Team is ideal for small teams looking to collaborate
       | productively.
       | 
       | > Docker Business is ideal for businesses looking for centralized
       | management and advanced security capabilities. Visit our pricing
       | page to learn more.
       | 
       | I'm not quite sure that answers the question, just how docker
       | would like it's customers to self-discriminate.
        
       | dang wrote:
       | Recent and related:
       | 
       |  _Docker is deleting Open Source organisations - what you need to
       | know_ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35166317 - March
       | 2023 (727 comments)
       | 
       |  _Docker is sunsetting Free Team organizations [pdf]_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35154025 - March 2023 (105
       | comments)
       | 
       |  _Docker is sunsetting Free Team organizations_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35153949 - March 2023 (12
       | comments)
       | 
       | Also:
       | 
       |  _Elixir: Docker now charges open source orgs $300_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35166579 - March 2023 (38
       | comments)
       | 
       |  _Ask HN: Docker Alternatives?_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35171491 - March 2023 (5
       | comments)
        
       | WWLink wrote:
       | Ah, good ole Docker.
       | 
       | When they did the "it's not free anymore" rugpull on Docker
       | Desktop, I couldn't use it at work anymore since they wouldn't
       | invoice us for less than a 50 seat license. Unfortunately, a lot
       | of businesses won't buy things without invoicing for legal
       | reasons.
       | 
       | It really upset me because I had a pretty solid workflow with
       | docker desktop on a mac. Now I can't use that anymore. I am not
       | surprised they continue to make foolish moves trying to monetize
       | their software.
       | 
       | I get it, you need to monetize your software... but this is dumb.
        
         | YuriNiyazov wrote:
         | Ah, the good ole "my company won't pay for a $5/month tool that
         | I like because the tool maker won't invoice my company for less
         | than 50 users, so instead of paying $5/month myself on my
         | credit card, I literally 'can't use it anymore' out of
         | principle."
        
           | floatinglotus wrote:
           | That's not the problem. The problem is that companies forbid
           | their employees from using it if they can't pay for it.
        
             | jussij wrote:
             | And surely that's a problem for the employee's company,
             | only because they're the ones imposing the restriction, not
             | some external third party.
        
               | MandieD wrote:
               | Big companies have people around whose sole job is to
               | make sure that all software that needs to be licensed, is
               | licensed, and that these licenses are the exact ones that
               | meet the providers' rules. This usually means that you
               | are not allowed to use a personally-owned license on a
               | company computer.
               | 
               | Why?
               | 
               | Because the consequences of getting this wrong can be far
               | more expensive than whatever productivity gains you, the
               | individual employee, claim to be achieving.
               | 
               | Docker, for example: we had absolutely no interest in
               | individual users directly accessing their online features
               | (we took a bit of trouble to block them, in fact), so
               | theoretically, the free Personal licenses should have
               | been fine. No.
               | 
               | Ok, so just have each Docker user pay that $5 themselves.
               | How do we make sure every person who has Docker installed
               | on their PC really _is_ paying for a license? Even if we
               | gave them all corporate cards, and Docker was going to be
               | cool with several hundred accounts (or more) from the
               | same domain _not_ being on the  "Business" plan, we then
               | get to set up a process with Accounting to make sure the
               | PC scans match the payments.
               | 
               | This might all sound ridiculous to start-up/boutique
               | employees, but is a basic fact of life in corporate IT...
               | which Docker was hoping to get a lot of money out of.
        
             | jiggawatts wrote:
             | I love big enterprise, where ten people can have daily
             | meetings for a month to decide how to pay a few hundred
             | dollars.
             | 
             | Yes, this happened to me. More than once.
             | 
             | No, you can't just pull your wallet out and offer to pay
             | for it yourself with cash. You're not an "approved
             | supplier" and it's the supplier that needs to provide
             | warranty support.
             | 
             | Also if you pay for it yourself, then you're providing it
             | as a "gift" and that could be construed as corruption --
             | unless you're reimbursed, but it's above the threshold...
             | 
             | This whole thread has given me flashbacks to that time when
             | the project manager broke down in tears and put his credit
             | card back in his wallet...
        
           | isatty wrote:
           | That's literally how it works in big corps and how it should
           | work in general - company property should be paid for by the
           | company, and the companies liability in case anything goes
           | wrong.
           | 
           | You should not be giving your $x (it does not matter that its
           | only 5) to the company.
        
             | hgsgm wrote:
             | [flagged]
        
         | solarkraft wrote:
         | What's the workflow? What more is Docker Desktop than a way to
         | get the Docker CLI on non-Linux machines?
        
         | pnw wrote:
         | I get invoices for my $5 Pro plan. Do you mean they wouldn't
         | take the order on credit?
        
           | InvaderFizz wrote:
           | Probably means they would not do NET30 or the like terms to
           | fit with their corporate purchasing workflow.
        
             | pnw wrote:
             | Pretty hard to get NET30 invoicing on a transaction which
             | is less than $450, especially if you've chosen the monthly
             | plan. It's just not worth the labor chasing an unpaid $450
             | invoice every damn month.
        
           | Volundr wrote:
           | I assume they mean Docker issues an invoice which the
           | company's AP department can then pay by either cutting a
           | check or ACH transfer. At least that's what we had to get all
           | our vendors to start doing when the company I worked for
           | killed off corporate cards and quit letting employees expense
           | things like this.
        
             | tobyjsullivan wrote:
             | I have many issues with Docker the business but, have to
             | say, this situation sounds like they might not be the
             | problem quite as much as the employer.
        
         | strictnein wrote:
         | On the other side of the spectrum, working somewhere that would
         | have purchased thousands of licenses, they were equally unaware
         | of what larger corporations want or need for such arrangements.
        
           | MandieD wrote:
           | They were so blinded by giant dollar/Euro signs when
           | insisting that we take loads of those ~20/month licenses that
           | included a lot of things that are _anti_ -features to most
           | enterprises (we need to _prevent_ people from pulling
           | /pushing to Docker Hub!) but left out things that would make
           | it less miserable (SSO/SAML), that they couldn't see that
           | absolutely no one was going to put five figures on their
           | corporate card each month.
           | 
           | I see that they now have those things, but it would have been
           | very clever to have asked a few potential customers about
           | these things ahead of time, and made sure they had them as
           | soon as they stuck their hands out... or had a few ex-
           | corporate types around to run this all by before telling us
           | that we _will_ be buying Docker licenses within 120 days for
           | everyone who happens to have Docker Desktop installed. At
           | least they were savvy enough to realize that large companies
           | couldn 't have begun to cope with much less notice, but as it
           | was, the rough start with a looming deadline was enough
           | motivation to get us trying alternatives right away.
        
         | MandieD wrote:
         | Hey! They decided to do invoicing, after all! When they
         | couldn't find a way to take purchase orders in the initial
         | license obligation round and we were going to have to go
         | through a third party licensing service to pay, we did a little
         | math, and realized that it was cheaper to let one of the guys
         | on the DevOps team create and maintain the customized WSL
         | install option, with the bonus of steering the developers to
         | our internal registry out of the box, because we really don't
         | want devs pulling stuff directly from Docker Hub without any
         | sort of traceability, much less (shudder) _pushing_ anything
         | there. The prospect of having to manage hundreds (or more) of
         | user accounts with SSO  "on the roadmap, pinky swear" pushed
         | the math over the top.
         | 
         | Many months later, this is still proving to have been a good
         | call.
         | 
         | Moral of the story: do not try to shove a category change on
         | large corporations without having basic things large
         | corporations routinely require in order to give you money,
         | especially if replacing you requires a lot less spend on extra
         | internal labor and material than you're demanding to be paid.
        
       | mig39 wrote:
       | We're sorry there was a backlash.
        
       | ly3xqhl8g9 wrote:
       | Two solutions that don't seem to be mentioned:
       | 
       | 1. Let any user have how many "free teams" they want, but
       | restrict the image size (under 1GB?) and/or downloads (under
       | 1,000/month?). Maybe let the community vote for open source
       | images exempt from this restriction.
       | 
       | 2. Run a free link redirect service: user registers _my-team_ on
       | hub.docker.com, links _my-team /my-image_ with their preferred
       | registry _my-registry.com_ , client-side _docker pull my-team
       | /my-image_ resolves automagically to _my-registry.com /my-
       | team/my-image_.
        
         | dpkirchner wrote:
         | 3. Let paying teams sponsor free teams. Maybe allow multiple
         | organizations to sponsor a single team. (The free team should
         | be able to refuse sponsorship on a case by case basis)
        
       | sleepybrett wrote:
       | Faq does not include the most asked question: "Why the fuck are
       | you still so bad at this?"
        
         | mikesir87 wrote:
         | (from the Docker DevRel team) Ha! Just had to say... this gave
         | me a good laugh! We're trying to get better... I swear! Comms
         | are hard. We'll get there.
        
       | mellowyeller wrote:
       | The third sentence in their apology is "This impacted less than
       | 2% of our users." What is that supposed to convey? It feels like
       | a handwave.
       | 
       | 'We're sorry we mistreated you, look how small you are to us.'
        
         | bobleeswagger wrote:
         | > 'We're sorry we mistreated you, look how small you are to
         | us.'
         | 
         | They could choose not to share any data, which is what most
         | companies default to.
         | 
         | You're complaining about something so small as if they aren't
         | handling this entire thing beautifully at this point. They
         | noticed their mistake, and corrected it swiftly to keep the
         | community from bifurcating. What else do you want, exactly?
        
           | foobarbecue wrote:
           | > What else do you want, exactly?
           | 
           | There's a world of difference between "This impacted less
           | than 2% of our users." and "This impacted about 2% of our
           | users."
           | 
           | The first implies that they have up to 2% of users which they
           | don't respect, and undermines their apology.
           | 
           | I agree that it's good that they responded quickly, and I
           | know there's a tradeoff between fast and perfect.
        
             | bobleeswagger wrote:
             | > There's a world of difference between
             | 
             | No there isn't. This is entirely subjective and you're
             | acting like they said "Fuck our customers" when they just
             | shared data. Anything you want to imply beyond that says
             | more about you than it does about any part of Docker.
             | 
             | > The first implies that they have up to 2% of users which
             | they don't respect, and undermines their apology.
             | 
             | Where does this implication come from? Why is Docker not
             | given the benefit of the doubt when they are already
             | extending an olive branch...? This isn't Microsoft.
             | 
             | I guess if you want to change things, you should shoot for
             | a position in PR at docker. Otherwise, you look like a rube
             | for acting as though they "could have done better with one
             | sentence." I bet you're fun at parties.
        
             | burnished wrote:
             | How is that your read here? It feels completely arbitrary
        
           | burnished wrote:
           | It feels like people just enjoy digging into outrage - this
           | sort of nit picking at specific phrasing in communications is
           | baseless, and happens for literally any incident where an
           | apology is issued.
           | 
           | Its wild how the same people will complain that some
           | corporate missive is completely content-free while at the
           | same time punishing any attempt at earnest communication by
           | scouring the missive for a raised edge to take offense at.
        
         | xp84 wrote:
         | (Note: I'm neutral on the main issue of whether Docker's moves
         | are evil, etc. I don't really care)
         | 
         | To me this "This impacted less than x%" business is more of a
         | classic Apple damage control PR statement, designed to convey
         | to the whole userbase, "You almost definitely aren't affected,
         | it's just a _tiny_ number of _whiners_ making all this fuss,
         | and look how small _they_ are! "
        
         | slantedview wrote:
         | The "2% of our users" is indeed misleading since most users
         | don't run organizations, and it's mainly orgs that were
         | affected. A better metric would be what % of orgs were
         | impacted.
        
         | afarrell wrote:
         | One of the difficulties of public relations is communicating to
         | multiple audiences at once. One of Docker's audiences are the
         | paying customers who outside that 2% and would want some
         | assurance that if docker makes errors, those errors are smaller
         | in magnitude. This statement seems like it is aimed at
         | assuaging the worries of that audience. Is it good practice? I
         | do not know.
        
           | r00fus wrote:
           | Can't they say something like "a small and important group",
           | yada yada, etc. Just laying out the % alone is derisive and
           | pointless.
        
             | burnished wrote:
             | Well, the end result would be some one else complaining
             | about that phrasing being insulting, or a lack of
             | transparency or something.
        
           | dheera wrote:
           | > One of the difficulties of public relations is
           | communicating to multiple audiences at once.
           | 
           | Why not just release multiple statements and links?
           | 
           | "Click here for customized PR statement if you are a open
           | source developer"
           | 
           | "Click here for customized PR statement if you are a closed
           | source developer"
           | 
           | "Click here for customized PR statement if you are an
           | executive who can't code"
           | 
           | "Click here for customized PR statement if you are a
           | billionaire who invested in Docker but secretly don't know
           | what it is"
           | 
           | etc.
        
             | bleuchase wrote:
             | Is that a serious suggestion? Who on earth would take the
             | time to look through all of those to see which one best
             | fits them? Companies have enough trouble getting press
             | releases read already.
        
             | hawski wrote:
             | ChatGPT> Could you rephrase the PR statement to the ad
             | profile of this HTTP client?
        
             | hk__2 wrote:
             | What if you are a "closed source developer" at work but an
             | open-source one during your free time? What if you are a
             | billionaire codes? What if... etc. You could make TL;DR's
             | targeted at specific audiences, but you still need the same
             | introduction for everyone.
        
           | hgsgm wrote:
           | There are 2 audiences: 1 with impact and 1 with 100% impact.
           | The relative size of those audiences is irrelevant to the
           | people in the audience.
        
         | golem14 wrote:
         | Also, the 2% of the impacted users might have 50% of _all_
         | users as a dependency (just throwing out a random number for
         | illustration), so I'm not sure that the "2% users" messaging
         | matters to the recipients of that PR.
        
         | tylersmith wrote:
         | I think that was an attempt to describe that the change won't
         | delete tons of projects like many believed, and break
         | downstream users, not that it was too small of a group to care
         | about.
        
         | packetslave wrote:
         | Ever wonder why Google outage notifications always say stuff
         | like "this impacted 0.01752% of users"? Because if they leave
         | that out, the PR department ends up flooded with questions from
         | reporters about "how bad was this outage, exactly?", and less-
         | diligent publications running "Google suffers massive outage"
         | headlines.
        
           | tyingq wrote:
           | It's really misleading though, as it only reflect the owners
           | of the images. Presumably I should count as an affected user
           | if I don't own the image, but try to download it.
        
             | wizzwizz4 wrote:
             | I think that's what they're trying to say: you're not an
             | affected user if it's not your image, because you can't
             | download it in the first place.
        
               | tyingq wrote:
               | Meaning I can't download it because their account was
               | zapped after the 30 days? I could certainly download it
               | before all this.
        
               | nmjohn wrote:
               | Nope - public images are not affected - you never would
               | have been able to download a relevant image if you
               | weren't in the private org.
        
               | tyingq wrote:
               | I'm still confused. As I understood, for example,
               | "httptookit" is one of the affected accounts.
               | 
               | They have public images here:
               | https://hub.docker.com/u/httptoolkit
               | 
               | The original announcement said:
               | 
               | > If you don't upgrade to a paid subscription, Docker
               | will retain your organization data for 30 days, after
               | which it will be subject to deletion. During that period
               | you will maintain access to any of your public images.
               | 
               | That sounds a lot like the public images were subject to
               | deletion. At the very least, subject to being frozen in
               | time and not updated/updateable, which can be worse in
               | some cases.
        
               | [deleted]
        
         | tyingq wrote:
         | The most favorable percentage possible, probably. Rather than
         | percentage of requests, percentage of active users, etc.
        
         | abscind wrote:
         | Agreed. It's frustrating to see companies try to downplay the
         | impact of their mistakes by using statistics like "less than 2%
         | of our users." Companies NEED to take responsibility for their
         | actions and show genuine empathy for those affected, rather
         | than trying to minimize the impact of their mistakes with vague
         | statistics.
        
         | femto113 wrote:
         | It's worse than just handwaving, it's straight up nonsensical.
         | Perhaps it is literally true that only 2% of distinct accounts
         | that log into Docker Hub have this plan, but for the vast
         | majority of people "using Docker Hub" means "pulling public
         | images from Docker Hub", not "logging into Docker Hub", so by a
         | more reasonable criteria (say % of images pulled) I'm sure its
         | at least an order of magnitude greater.
        
         | foxbee wrote:
         | This is how i interpreted this. I feel this was a box ticking
         | exercise with 0 emotion.
        
         | phphphphp wrote:
         | The 2% they're referring to are businesses that are using
         | Docker's hosted services for free. The majority of the outrage
         | was from people thinking about the non-business users, that is,
         | open source projects, which Docker unintentionally implied
         | would be impacted by this change. Docker are apologising for
         | their poor communication which made people think this change
         | applied to more than just a tiny portion of the user base (who
         | are probably happy to pay). They're not apologising for the
         | change.
        
           | lozenge wrote:
           | Anybody who uses "docker pull" or "FROM" and not pointing at
           | their own hosting or their own paid Docker account was
           | affected as evidenced by the thousands of comments worried
           | about the impact.
        
             | [deleted]
        
             | SomeCallMeTim wrote:
             | No. This was NEVER implied at all.
             | 
             | This only ever applied to the *Team* accounts. I have a
             | paid non-team/personal account, but I am also aware that I
             | could have a free personal account if I didn't need private
             | repositories.
             | 
             | In other words, they weren't clear enough in their
             | communication, which is what they're apologizing for.
             | 
             | But the internet outrage mob is going to yell about the
             | evil of The Man no matter what I say, so I don't know why I
             | bother...
        
             | madeofpalk wrote:
             | Well, they say they were never actually affected
             | 
             | > _We'd also like to clarify that public images will only
             | be removed from Docker Hub if their maintainer decides to
             | delete them._
             | 
             | > _Will open source images I rely on get deleted?_
             | 
             | > _Not by Docker. Public images will only disappear if the
             | maintainer of the image decides to proactively delete it
             | from Docker Hub. If the maintainer takes no action, we will
             | continue to distribute their public images._
             | 
             | People may have _thought_ they were affected, which is what
             | they seem to be apoligising for.
        
               | yencabulator wrote:
               | They also are saying the maintainers will be unable to
               | update the images after the 30 days. So the panic and
               | bitching are perfectly deserved:
               | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35188691
        
               | SomeCallMeTim wrote:
               | For TEAM accounts that aren't "Docker sponsored open
               | source" teams.
               | 
               | They should allow a TEAM->PERSONAL conversion for any
               | open source account that doesn't qualify to be "Docker
               | sponsored." But really this is a communications fail more
               | than anything.
        
           | fabian2k wrote:
           | > Less than 2% of Docker users have a Free Team organization
           | on their account.
           | 
           | I don't think so. The quote above is what they say on that
           | page, and I think that is a pretty useless metric. It affects
           | 2% of all Docker Hub users, 100% of all Free Team users.
        
         | perbu wrote:
         | I'm guessing this sentence is aimed at current and future
         | investors.
        
           | floatinglotus wrote:
           | Is it even possible that there will be future investors?
        
       | jacooper wrote:
       | GHCR goes brrrrrrrrrr...... Also quay.io is free for public
       | repos.
        
       | system16 wrote:
       | It's almost becoming a cliche for companies to release damage
       | control follow-ups like this after they pull a bait and switch.
       | 
       | It's always "we're sorry that we didn't _communicate_ our bait
       | and switch effectively ". Not we're sorry that we pulled a bait
       | and switch. We're sorry you _didn 't understand_ the value in
       | this bait and switch. It's your fault, actually. But we're sorry
       | you're angry. Now stop giving us negative attention.
        
         | exac wrote:
         | This speaks to the product culture at Docker. They are unable
         | to admit they are changing direction after negative customer
         | feedback, so they are pretending this was always their plan,
         | and shifting the blame to their customers.
         | 
         | It is similar to pseudo-blameless engineering cultures, where
         | engineers won't admit to bugs, or update the status indicator,
         | least they face the shame of writing a post mortem, or having
         | it brought up in their performance review.
        
         | AbraKdabra wrote:
         | We're deeply sorry https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15HTd4Um1m4.
        
         | dheera wrote:
         | The forces of capitalism reward this, it will continue to
         | happen as long as we pick pure capitalism as a system, and keep
         | assigning values to companies purely on financials with no
         | consideration toward their ability to empathize and
         | communicate.
        
           | vlunkr wrote:
           | This feels like a win for capitalism to me. The actually
           | innovative Docker did is open source, and replacements
           | already exist for DockerHub. So, we get the good tech they
           | created, and the company with the user-hostile choices dies,
           | or becomes irrelevant.
        
           | wizzwizz4 wrote:
           | There's no such thing as "pure capitalism" - not if you're
           | talking about things that exist.
           | 
           | In an ideal free market with perfectly-rational omniscient
           | actors, this issue wouldn't occur. I don't think you even
           | need the omniscience: trust, memory, reputation/vouching and
           | basic game theory should be sufficient (though I haven't
           | proven this). Alternatively: a free market with contracts,
           | where _all things_ go through the system, would work.
           | 
           | In the real world, the system consists of people, each of
           | whom is optimising for a particular thing. Very few people
           | are optimising for "make the most money, at the expense of
           | all else". Show me anyone (even a billionaire), and I'll show
           | you somebody who values other things higher than the
           | accumulation of money. And plenty of things don't go through
           | "the system of capitalism": we have commons, and volunteers,
           | and favours, and coerced unpaid labour / wage theft.
           | 
           | "The forces of capitalism" might be a good shorthand for the
           | reasons behind this problem, but it's not strictly an
           | accurate one: _these_ issues aren 't inherent to capitalism.
           | They're not problems with capitalism, but problems with _this
           | system_. (Capitalism does have other, different problems that
           | are pretty baked in, like how capital is power and power lets
           | you accrue capital, but I don 't see how that relates to this
           | issue.)
        
             | [deleted]
        
         | jeron wrote:
         | Ah, but there's no such thing as negative press. Look how many
         | people are talking about Docker now!!
        
           | irrational wrote:
           | On our team we are mainly talking about how will we divest of
           | Docker.
        
           | user3939382 wrote:
           | > No such thing as negative press
           | 
           | Tell that to Silicon Valley Bank after that WSJ article that
           | started the run lol
        
         | slantedview wrote:
         | This is somewhat an extension of modern politics, which is
         | largely seen by political professionals as a problem of
         | "messaging", where policy details are secondary to how people
         | can be persuaded to think about those policies.
        
       | slantedview wrote:
       | This isn't a good clarification. While Docker says they will not
       | delete images, it doesn't clarify whether they will delete
       | organizations. Indeed, under "Can someone else squat my
       | namespace?", it says "if your organization is suspended, deleted,
       | or you choose to leave Docker voluntarily", which implies that
       | orgs may also be deleted involuntarily. This is still a problem.
        
       | eyeareque wrote:
       | I'm guessing they did this change because the cost of giving a
       | free service isn't cheap for docker?
        
         | ericb wrote:
         | It seems the concept of a loss leader is "lost" on Docker.
         | 
         | Some MBA with a spreadsheet at Docker hasn't realized that
         | where the upstream OSS goes, the rest follow.
        
           | renewiltord wrote:
           | They've historically had trouble having that loss leader lead
           | to a non-loss.
        
             | ericb wrote:
             | A lot of folks have missed the updates--they are now past
             | 100 million in annual recurring revenue--that history has
             | evolved.
        
           | sleepybrett wrote:
           | Loss leader for products that don't sell? The change to a
           | full open source toolchain for their core products was more
           | or less painless.
        
         | jillesvangurp wrote:
         | The problem runs much deeper than that. Most of what Docker
         | offers is commodity software. You can get docker image hosting
         | from a variety of sources and hosting your own registry isn't
         | that hard. All you need is a docker container and some file
         | storage or bucket. Docker for desktop is nice but there are
         | free alternatives.
         | 
         | Docker registries are included with most cloud services (AWS,
         | Azure, Gcloud, digital ocean) and you can use those to self
         | host as well without too much issues. Github and gitlab offer
         | docker registries as well. As do lots of other companies.
         | Mostly, those services make money from other things than
         | hosting docker images. That's just a low value commodity that
         | they need to offer the really interesting stuff. If you are
         | going to charge people for some expensive kubernetes cluster,
         | they need a place to dump their container images. So you offer
         | that for free. It's just a few GB of storage. It literally is a
         | rounding error on the total bill. It does not matter. Charging
         | for that does not make sense.
         | 
         | That's the problem docker has right now: they need companies to
         | pay them absurd amounts of money for something that is
         | essentially a low value commodity and they don't really have
         | anything with a lot of value that they could charge for
         | instead. And the harder they insist people need to pay, the
         | more they erode their position as a leader in this space (which
         | arguably they lost years ago). While it was free and
         | convenient, people used them. But now that that's no longer the
         | case, people engineer around them. They are throwing the baby
         | out with the bathwater. The one asset they still had (people
         | treating them as the de-facto place to park docker containers)
         | is basically being lost. And as soon as that stops, it's going
         | to get harder for them to gain new customers or even retain
         | existing ones.
         | 
         | Contrast that with Github that used to charge for stuff that
         | they now give away for free. I paid for it back in the day. And
         | now I don't. Except Github is making loads of money from
         | companies that outgrow the freemium tier. And they have a
         | steady supply of happy freemium users using their services for
         | free transitioning to valuable paid services. And they get to
         | host the entirety (well close to it) of the software developer
         | population on this planet. It's the largest professional
         | network outside of linkedin. Which of course MS also owns. It
         | would be madness to incentivize users to not use that by
         | charging for it. It's way too valuable for that.
         | 
         | Speaking of MS, they should just buy out Docker. Fire the
         | management. Get rid of their sales department and revitalize
         | docker and dockerhub development and integrate it into github.
         | It's so complementary to Github that it's a no-brainer. And
         | probably investors are getting fed up with the way things are
         | going at docker. I imagine this could be a relatively cheap
         | acquisition for them. This isn't OpenAI, LinkedIn, or Github.
        
       | maerF0x0 wrote:
       | Only fair that this also gets 1500 points and front page
        
       | threeseed wrote:
       | Not sure how this changes anything.
       | 
       | Their open source program [1] only grants a free 1-year Docker
       | Team subscription. After which time the whole system is unusable.
       | And most of those features aren't what open source teams even
       | need which is surely just basic multi-user access.
       | 
       | They really should have just tightened the entry criteria for
       | their open source offering if they were so concerned about it
       | being misused.
       | 
       | https://www.docker.com/blog/docker-sponsored-open-source-pro...
        
         | beached_whale wrote:
         | I think I read that it prohibits making money, like consulting
         | on the OSS product. This prohibits a lot of OSS teams.
        
         | mikesir87 wrote:
         | (Docker DevRel team here) For clarification, the program grants
         | one year of access, but is indefinitely renewable as long as
         | the program is still compliant with current criteria.
        
           | zamnos wrote:
           | Thank you for the clarification. For reference, are there any
           | open source projects you've seen that suddenly change course
           | to being paid products and would lose open source status
           | according to Docker? Any Linux distros that suddenly went
           | closed source? Are there any sort of general public licenses
           | that might preclude projects from even doing so?
        
         | quijoteuniv wrote:
         | Too little, too late, everyone i know is looking for ways of
         | leaving docker for good. This last announcement just cemented
         | the lack of confidence in the platform. As someone put it to me
         | recently:>> a bunch of execs trying to squeeze out a dying
         | platform for a bonus before moving to another money sqeezing
         | project.>> At work we made the plan to leave today.
        
       | tofuahdude wrote:
       | Given the number of times that Docker the company has rugged the
       | community, I am highly pessimistic of their organization / paying
       | them. I'd rather run my own registry.
        
       | lozenge wrote:
       | Not much has changed then.
       | 
       | If you don't meet the strict criteria of the Open Source Program,
       | for example you are a for profit company publishing an open
       | source image, you can't upload new versions of your public
       | images. Your images are one CVE away from becoming useless.
       | 
       | If you do meet the criteria, they will build images for you. No
       | way to have your own build process. All artifacts are made
       | public.
        
       | computronus wrote:
       | Reading carefully about image deletion:
       | 
       | * "public images will only be removed from Docker Hub if their
       | maintainer decides to delete them"
       | 
       | * "Public images will only disappear if the maintainer of the
       | image decides to proactively delete it from Docker Hub. If the
       | maintainer takes no action, we will continue to distribute their
       | public images."
       | 
       | This sounds good, but it would be better to explicitly say "if
       | you opt to let your free organization be suspended, Docker Hub
       | will continue distributing your public images indefinitely
       | anyway". It feels like there's a loophole here where if a public
       | image comes to have no maintainer - because they abandoned its
       | organization - then it no longer benefits from this assurance.
       | That seems unlikely, but given how this change has been going so
       | far, it's tough to give Docker the benefit of the doubt.
        
       | kundi wrote:
       | What if the 0.1% of the users are the ones that you should deeply
       | care for?
        
       | nielsole wrote:
       | Previous communication:
       | 
       | > If you don't upgrade to a paid subscription, Docker will retain
       | your organization data for 30 days, after which it will be
       | subject to deletion. During that period you will maintain access
       | to any of your public images.
       | 
       | New communication:
       | 
       | > We'd also like to clarify that public images will only be
       | removed from Docker Hub if their maintainer decides to delete
       | them. We're sorry that our initial communications failed to make
       | this clear.
       | 
       | Given these statements directly contradict each other I am a bit
       | surprised this is called clarification. It feels like they
       | changed the actual strategy, not just the communication around
       | it.
        
         | mmcnl wrote:
         | You are right, it's two different messages.
         | 
         | I always am annoyed by how companies apologize for the
         | communication or the confusion arising after the communication.
         | As if we, the public, didn't understand properly or are too
         | dumb to understand what they tried to say. We understood
         | perfectly and the _message_ was dumb, not the communication
         | around the message. It doesn't feel like an honest apology.
        
           | saurik wrote:
           | Dude: "the message" _is_ "the communication".
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | tyingq wrote:
         | Both sound like "you won't be able to update them", so images
         | sort of permanently squatted and growing tech debt, potentially
         | vulnerabilities, etc. They should really allow for configuring
         | the ":latest" tag to raise a 404 or something if this is what
         | all that means.
        
         | mikesir87 wrote:
         | (from Docker DevRel team)
         | 
         | > Given these statements directly contradict each other
         | 
         | Actually... they aren't contradictory. The organization data
         | will be retained for 30 days and is subject to deletion. That
         | data includes the teams, memberships, etc. But, it wasn't clear
         | what we were going to do about the images. Keeping the public
         | images is important as many other images build on top of them.
         | 
         | > It feels like they changed the actual strategy
         | 
         | We recognize it might feel that way, so apologies. But, that's
         | part of where we are recognize it wasn't clear the technical
         | details... we didn't talk at all about the images. After the
         | feedback, we recognized this, so wanted to make that clear.
        
           | [deleted]
        
           | vertis wrote:
           | Deleting 'organization data' absolutely read that they would
           | delete everything. Changing direction and back pedaling with
           | a non-apology is borderline insulting.
           | 
           | I understand the need to make money as a company, but it
           | really is biting the hand that fed messing with open source
           | maintainers
        
             | nikolay wrote:
             | They really think we're idiots!
        
               | brianwawok wrote:
               | Marketing people try to explain away mistakes with
               | doublespeak. Isn't it grand? They keep digging deeper at
               | this point.
        
               | bombcar wrote:
               | We have learned that public images are NOT organization
               | data!
        
               | golem14 wrote:
               | With the organization data gone, will there be a way to
               | update the retained images, like security fixes etc? If
               | not, then this could become very dangerous.
        
             | pgwhalen wrote:
             | I have no horse in this race, but fwiw, I can see how this
             | mistake would be made honestly. Organization data could be
             | easily refer to just the metadata of the organization, and
             | depending on how the product is structured[1], could feel
             | quite different from public images.
             | 
             | [1] Disclaimer: I don't know how the product is structured.
        
             | sacrosancty wrote:
             | [dead]
        
           | bragr wrote:
           | >Actually... they aren't contradictory.
           | 
           | They are. Your intent may not have been contradictory, but
           | the messages received by everyone else were contradictory.
           | You should own that if you are serious about doing better.
           | Your intent doesn't really matter in these situations.
        
             | chasil wrote:
             | It is important to understand that most corporations do not
             | apologize, _ever_ , unless there is a direct threat to cash
             | flow.
             | 
             | This behavior is now demonstrated, it is the desired
             | relationship, and it _will_ be the baseline, all
             | protestations aside.
             | 
             | The apology is meaningless. If this is not what you want,
             | then take steps to limit the damage done to you, and do it
             | now.
        
             | travisjungroth wrote:
             | Yeah, really weird that after an apology announcement
             | they're still defending the original message at all. Not
             | too hard to say "Yes, those messages contradict each other.
             | The first one did not communicate our actual plan. The
             | second message is a correction and clarification."
        
             | xboxnolifes wrote:
             | That's.... why they are saying it was poor communication.
        
               | throwwwaway69 wrote:
               | They did in the OP link. To say now in comments "It's not
               | contradictory" is not owning up to it being bad
               | communication
        
           | hgsgm wrote:
           | Can the images be updated after the organizational data is
           | gone? If not, is there a security concern, since vulns are
           | likely to be discovery in future?
        
           | patmcc wrote:
           | >>>During that period you will maintain access to any of your
           | public images.
           | 
           | What did this mean in that case? That the images will
           | continue to exist but the maintainers cannot update them?
           | They'll just become orphaned?
        
             | mikesir87 wrote:
             | (from the Docker DevRel team)
             | 
             | "During that period" refers to the 30-day period. During
             | that time, the images are accessible. After the 30-day
             | period, they will still be pull-able, but not able to be
             | updated.
        
               | yencabulator wrote:
               | So, any public image where the maintainer doesn't jump
               | through hoops gets frozen in time, unable to be updated,
               | and starts accumulating CVEs? This sounds worse than
               | deleting the image.
               | 
               | Any smart FOSS maintainer will find alternate hosting...
        
               | setr wrote:
               | > Any smart FOSS maintainer will find alternate
               | hosting...
               | 
               | I think that's obviously the point of the whole exercise
               | -- pony up or leave. They're just doing it in an annoying
               | manner
        
               | ok_dad wrote:
               | > If you don't upgrade to a paid subscription, Docker
               | will retain your organization data for 30 days, after
               | which it will be subject to deletion. During that time,
               | you will maintain access to any images in your public
               | repositories, though rate limitations will apply.
               | 
               | Specifically (emphasis mine):
               | 
               | > _During_ that time, you will _maintain access_ to any
               | images in your public repositories
               | 
               | So, the logical conclusion, which literally everyone else
               | on HN had, was that _after_ that time you will _lose
               | access_ to images in your public repositories; access
               | meaning  "we can get to the image" in this context,
               | because that's what people f-n care about.
               | 
               | Not to mention the other part, about how Docker will
               | still have images available for pull that can't be
               | changed, for which there is no way to "forward" user
               | pulls elsewhere if the developer chose to not pay the
               | fee; so in affect you're capturing their user base with
               | old software and almost no way to know that.
               | 
               | "DevRel" at Docker failed this week. Just own up to it,
               | take the hit, and don't be evasive. Evasiveness is shady
               | and no one trusts that bullshit.
        
               | saurik wrote:
               | Yeah!! We should really demand they provide a public
               | apology for doing such a terrible job with how they
               | communicated and executed this... oh, wait: _that 's what
               | they did_ :eyeroll:. Can you stop with the witch hunt? If
               | you want to hate on Docker there are too many actually-
               | legitimate reasons to waste time trying to claim that
               | this apology is somehow "evasive".
        
               | ok_dad wrote:
               | Nah, it's this guy sitting in here trying to tell us how
               | we're supposed to think, that it wasn't their fault we
               | were stupid, that's the issue I have. I don't give a
               | flying FUCK about Docker as a company; whether they live
               | or die matters less to me than when I'll have to pee
               | next.
        
               | bragr wrote:
               | >accessible
               | 
               | >pull-able
               | 
               | To any reasonable average person, these mean the same
               | thing.
        
               | terom wrote:
               | This is an important implication that needs to be brought
               | up in the FAQ explicitly.
               | 
               | In other words, the public repos are being archived. If I
               | was a maintainer responsible for providing up-to-date and
               | secure images, then I think it would indeed by my duty to
               | delete them, if I am no longer able to update them.
        
           | [deleted]
        
           | HDThoreaun wrote:
           | Communication isn't about you meant, it's about what the
           | person you're communicating to thought you meant.
        
           | terom wrote:
           | If you are deleting the organizational data and effectively
           | archiving [1] all the images, keeping only the option for
           | public images to be pulled but not updated... then how will
           | affected maintainers be able to delete their now out of date
           | public images after the 30 day cut-off? You will have to
           | retain enough of the organization data to allow that to
           | happen.
           | 
           | Keeping the public images available in an archived state is
           | okay for specific image references, but questionable for
           | specific image tags and somewhat irresponsible for the
           | `latest` tag. A `latest` tag that cannot be updated is ...
           | worse than no `latest` tag.
           | 
           | Responsible maintainers that are unable to apply for open-
           | source status or otherwise sponsor their usage of
           | organization public repos should be advised to delete their
           | public repos.
           | 
           | Responsible users of public images on Docker Hub need to have
           | a way to determine which images will be affected, and which
           | will continue to be maintained. Archiving the public repos
           | gives an extended grace period, but users will still need to
           | be prepared to notice if they end up using a now
           | unmaintained, archived repo and migrate to alternative image
           | sources.
           | 
           | [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35188691
        
         | sleepytimetea wrote:
         | Exactly ! I remember the original email mentioned deletion and
         | now they say "we never said that".
         | 
         | Time to get rid of Docker in our world.
        
           | sitzkrieg wrote:
           | im looking forward to hipster posts about compiling and
           | running your stack directly on a machine. probably one, and
           | it'll be faster. that'll be great
        
             | Kwpolska wrote:
             | Nah, Docker/containers are here to stay. But Docker, Inc.
             | isn't.
        
           | themitigating wrote:
           | If you run a company wouldn't it be cheaper to just pay. This
           | can't be worth the trouble changing everything
        
           | hgsgm wrote:
           | Please share a copy of that email.
        
             | Symbiote wrote:
             | Docker is sunsetting Free Team organizations
             | 
             | Free Team organizations are a legacy subscription tier that
             | no longer exists. This tier included many of the same
             | features, rates, and functionality as a paid Docker Team
             | subscription.
             | 
             | After reviewing the list of accounts that are members of
             | legacy Free Team organizations, we've identified yours as
             | potentially being one of them.
             | 
             | If you own a legacy Free Team organization, access to paid
             | features -- including private repositories -- will be
             | suspended on April 14, 2023 (11:59 pm UTC). Upgrade your
             | subscription before April 14, 2023 to continue accessing
             | your organization.
             | 
             | If you don't upgrade to a paid subscription, Docker will
             | retain your organization data for 30 days, after which it
             | will be subject to deletion. During that time, you will
             | maintain access to any images in your public repositories,
             | though rate limitations will apply. At any point during the
             | 30-day period, you can restore access to your organization
             | account if you upgrade to a paid subscription. Visit our
             | FAQ [1] for more information.
             | 
             | [1] https://web.docker.com/rs/790-SSB-375/images/privaterep
             | osfaq...
        
               | saurik wrote:
               | This is the exact quote that was already up-thread of
               | here, and they absolutely are not claiming they "never
               | said that"; instead, they are clarifying that
               | "organization data" does not include "public images", and
               | while that's confusing, I can appreciate why they didn't
               | think it would be and--lo and behold--they are publicly
               | apologizing for being so confusing and taking the hit for
               | having done so.
        
           | mekster wrote:
           | With what?
        
             | mort96 wrote:
             | Podman is pretty good, and more or less a drop-in
             | replacement.
        
             | gpm wrote:
             | Someone on lobste.rs mentioned quay.io (maintained by
             | redhat) as an alternative to dockerhub. Anyone have any
             | experience with it?
        
               | sofixa wrote:
               | It started as a CoreOS project and for a long time it was
               | the only ebterprisey registry, and it included security
               | scanning. Had some availability issues some time ago, but
               | AFAIK today it's pretty good.
        
               | bravetraveler wrote:
               | The software is nice, if looking to run your own - I'd
               | recommend it over the typical Docker-provided incantation
               | 
               | Way more enterprise appropriate, for example - granular
               | control on caches
        
             | notbuyingit wrote:
             | If you want actual reproducable, actual portable software,
             | Nix. Otherwise there are countless other OCI runtimes,
             | cri-o, containers, etc. Kubernetes doesn't even use Docker.
             | 
             | What a thing, docker. I can't get over the staying power it
             | has had despite... Everything.
        
               | mekster wrote:
               | How do I run the ecosystem the docker already has with
               | nix alone?
               | 
               | It's not just the runtime.
        
               | [deleted]
        
         | incangold wrote:
         | Reminds me of the gaslighting of the D&D community recently
         | around changes to the license there.
         | 
         | It's like watching a five year old who's convinced he can fool
         | his parents.
        
           | pizzaknife wrote:
           | sorry what d&d license change?
        
             | ekidd wrote:
             | WotC tried to retroactively revoke an open gaming license
             | that had been in widespread use since 2002. They had a
             | legal theory why they could do this, but that theory
             | contradicted quite a few public statements they had made on
             | record. IP lawyers had very mixed opinions.
             | 
             | Many TT-RPG players enjoy reading rules carefully and
             | figuring out fun ways to "exploit" them. So everyone jumped
             | on WotC's changes and dissected the implications. And many
             | companies in the larger ecosystem quickly announced plans
             | to ship their own games competing with D&D.
             | 
             | WotC decided to back down and to just use Creative Commons,
             | which largely resolved the immediate issue.
        
         | djha-skin wrote:
         | _rolls eyes_ OR, their marketing and DevRel departments and
         | their engineering departments simply had a miscommunication;
         | when it was realized, the present post was composed.
         | 
         | This kind of thing happens inside companies all the time,
         | including the one you're probably working at right now.
         | 
         | No need to get up in arms over it.
        
           | worksonmine wrote:
           | I don't believe it was a miscommunication. Even if it was a
           | company as important as Docker inc, mentioning DELETING
           | containers requires some care and should raise some flags at
           | any serious communications department.
           | 
           | This is not just the wrong date for a convention in the
           | newsletter. What impact does it have on the ecosystem they've
           | built? Some really serious projects use Docker and even if
           | they have their own repositories can they be sure the
           | software they rely on can keep publishing containers?
           | 
           | Even at the tiny startups I've worked on I'm asked to
           | proofread any technical stuff they want to publish, I assume
           | Docker does too.
        
           | hgsgm wrote:
           | People who are busy working aren't going to rush to HN to
           | post about how they understood the announcement and are
           | reacting as needed.
           | 
           | People who are bored (like me) will post rants and
           | accusations.
        
         | gilrain wrote:
         | [flagged]
        
           | dang wrote:
           | Maybe so, but please don't post unsubstantive comments to
           | Hacker News.
        
             | actually_a_dog wrote:
             | [flagged]
        
           | LASR wrote:
           | Organizational gaslighting?
           | 
           | I personally hate the term "gaslighting", but it could be apt
           | here.
        
         | eternalban wrote:
         | That depends on what "organization data" means. Does that
         | phrasing cover the images or just the existence of the
         | organization in Docker (i.e. deleted organization)?
        
           | gpm wrote:
           | > During that period you will maintain access to any of your
           | public images.
           | 
           | Pretty unambiguously means "after that period you may not
           | have access to any of your public images".
        
             | eternalban wrote:
             | Isn't that like a service like Github saying 'you will
             | maintain access to any of your public projects' as in
             | _administrative access to one 's own projects_. After that
             | period, you are no longer the owner of that repo and you no
             | longer have "access". So I can still clone your github
             | project but alas you no longer can commit to it.
             | 
             | https://docs.docker.com/docker-hub/orgs/
             | 
             | https://hub.docker.com/orgs
        
               | wholinator2 wrote:
               | Doesn't sound like it to me. If they meant
               | "administrative access" they should have said
               | "administrative access". They didn't, they just said
               | "access" which unambiguously means just "access".
               | Would've been very easy for them to make a one word
               | correction somewhere in the dozen or so people who should
               | have read this before it went out. But they didn't, they
               | just said "access". If they wanted unambiguous meaning,
               | they could have easily just said what they meant.
               | 
               | Methinks that's exactly what they did
        
               | eternalban wrote:
               | Well, methinks otherwise. Lack of access does not mean
               | files deleted. Organization data deleted means account
               | deleted. Contention here was the claim that they have
               | done a uturn but they _never_ said they will delete
               | images. This entire somewhat useless thread is about
               | whether lack of access actually meant images deleted.
               | (Administrative is a word that I used in my comment and a
               | red herring to pick on, quite frankly.)
        
       | gardenhedge wrote:
       | "We'd also like to clarify that public images will only be
       | removed from Docker Hub if their maintainer decides to delete
       | them."
       | 
       | Was HN spreading fake news then?
        
       | PhysicalNomad wrote:
       | I stopped using Docker entirely after the Moby mess, when Podman
       | came around without needing a daemon, and better runtimes became
       | available for Kubernetes. It's been the inferior product for a
       | long time, only kept alive by the dev mindshare they gained early
       | on.
        
         | oofbey wrote:
         | It's synonymous with "containers" for a lot of people. I know a
         | lot of groups that use docker to build containers and other
         | infra to run them.
         | 
         | Too bad the company screwed up turning their technology into a
         | real business, or taking a graceful massive exit when they had
         | the chance. Their VC's doubtless pushed them towards an IPO
         | when they didn't really have a solid revenue plan.
         | 
         | Once they started nagging / forcing / tricking people into
         | paying for what they had offered for free, they company was
         | doomed. The "+WASM" branding all over their website reeks the
         | sad desperation of a has-been coulda-been. Sorry folks, you
         | built cool and important technology, but that's not good enough
         | if you're greedy.
        
       | sys_64738 wrote:
       | Stupid is as Stupid does.
        
       | solarkraft wrote:
       | It's cool that you're not completely deaf, but the damage has
       | been done and not only due to this announcement. There are
       | alternatives and people are increasingly choosing them.
        
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