What you're saying is that it's dirt cheap if you have a small amount of data. On the other hand, if for whatever reason you need to back up, say, 1TB worth of video files, it's extraordinarily expensive.
I think it's just the wrong pricing model to have a flat rate per gigabyte. A flat rate looks simple, but far from being transparent or 'honest', it's essentially arbitrary in this case. Other than backend storage, Tarsnap's main non-fixed cost is Colin's time providing support - but that scales mainly with the number of customers, barely at all with the amount of data they're using. Thus, heavy data users are effectively subsidizing light data users, who pay far less than their 'fair share' of costs.
> it's dirt cheap X. On the other hand, for Y, it's extraordinarily expensive.
This may be intentional. Not every service tries to provide an optimal solution for every use case.
> it's just the wrong pricing model to have a flat rate per gigabyte.
I have no axe to grind (I'm not associated with tarsnap in any way, I'm not even a user though I have considered it) but some of the discussion here makes people sound somewhat entitled: "I want X, and I don't want to pay more then $Y for it, and any service charging more is silly/bad/ripoff".
Stating that something ins't the best choice (or even a good choice) in some (or many) circumstances is fine, but "it is wrong for me so I don't see how anyone can think that it is right" is an irritating stance.
The pricing model seems to work for plenty of users, enough that it works for the service as it has been successfully running for some time. If you think he is missing out on a huge amount of money from the users who are put off, why not start your own service priced to be attractive to that userbase, and take the profit you see that service as giving away.
> providing support - but that scales mainly with the number of customers, barely at all with the amount of data
Sometimes having lots of small customers works better than having a few large ones, even if you have a few large ones and lots of small ones. With large customers you are sometimes beholden to their whims at the expense of the smaller majority (or they expect you to be beholden to their whims and get difficult if you refuse!).
> but far from being transparent or 'honest', it's essentially arbitrary
Being arbitrary in no way precludes being transparent or honest.
> heavy data users are effectively subsidizing light data users
Only if they don't go elsewhere, which they are perfectly free to do. tarsnap is not in a monopoly position such that people are effectively forced to use it.
(I'm not intending to pick on you specifically, there are other comments I could have responded similarly to, but this post just happened to be the one that tipped the balance on my rant reflex!)
I think it's just the wrong pricing model to have a flat rate per gigabyte. A flat rate looks simple, but far from being transparent or 'honest', it's essentially arbitrary in this case. Other than backend storage, Tarsnap's main non-fixed cost is Colin's time providing support - but that scales mainly with the number of customers, barely at all with the amount of data they're using. Thus, heavy data users are effectively subsidizing light data users, who pay far less than their 'fair share' of costs.