Pricing change is on pause for now

I have never written to the community before - but I think its incredibly important to chime in here. Today, @emmanuel , you have completely destroyed my trust in Bubble.

TLDR; Stop trying to gouge your amazing community and focus on getting net new customers, and helping existing customers succeed.

I am scaling up to be a large business built on the back of Bubble - and even the contemplation of this change is terrifying for me. I have well over 20m+ ‘things’, and growing very quickly - yes - its necessary. Not only do I spend lots per month to support this, but I am also investing heavily into community developers to rebuild in Bubble, which now frankly, I am reconsidering.

I hope everyone reading this knows that just because they didn’t make the change today, doesn’t mean they won’t make it in the future. This is what my developer friends warned me about using a no code platform, and Bubble is deciding to make a fool out of me.

To the Bubble team - as a customer paying a LOT of money to use your services - and as someone who is a prolific salesman of Bubble to my community - this change will kill your business. Not just the physical pricing change - but you have now changed from a company focusing on delivering an amazing product - to a company who gouges their customers. And if you do decide to pursue a change like this, not only will there be a mass exodus, but I guarantee someone will come and rebuild exactly what you have - but without ridiculous pricing. (It will probably be someone in this forum right now lol)

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I’ve sat down to work on my app this morning and I’ve got a horrible feeling that I’m wasting my time. Please Bubble team, confirm that any revision you introduce will not involve a limit on the number of records. If you can do that, it would provide certainty and anything else most could probably live with. While you remain silent on this, we’re all in limbo which isn’t healthy for anyone.

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Exactly this. I can’t focus on building in bubble today. This feeling of insecurity with bubble is eating me alive.

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We’re working on a response, but that takes a little bit of time. We’ll post as soon as we can (I am watching this thread).

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1- YES. Please offer native Amazon RDS integration.

Further on this point - Bubble’s Database sucks. The value add is that it is easier to setup and host simple data structures with few “things”. Throughput issues w/ the data API cause unnecessary stress on your systems. Let me manage this myself. This feature solves so many problems.

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@emmanuel hi.

A lot was said in this forum regarding this “paused” pricing change.

So, I want to share my feeling (as best as I can as English is not my primary language), as every story has a context that not necessarily is known and shared by you to all the audience, and we all bubble customers are not necessarily on the same page.

First of all, I want to thank you for being reflective about this issue and studying our feedback (that is a good practice for a customer-centered company).

So, I feel today that bubble is not the end of my scouting for a NoCode-LowCode framework, as I thought it was before the pricing change announcement, and I realized that I have to be careful to select my dev strategy, i.e. whether bubble will be just for the MPVs stage 0, and then with some tested hypothesis, move on to an open-source framework over IaaS? I don’t know yet, as that is what I was trying to avoid in the first place comming to bubble :¬(

But there are two promises from bubble’s FAQ that caught me when I was opting for bubble:

  1. Our goal is for Bubble to grow with your app. We provide enterprise solutions and web-scale infrastructure. With our Javascript and API integrations, you’ll never hit a hard limit within the system.
    Wishful thinking of my own: The above statement implies that we must be confident that our solutions built over bubble framework will have predictable costs over time, therefore any changes in pricing should also consider this math.

  2. We want to make sure you feel secure about building on the Bubble platform, so, although we plan to be around for a very long time, here’s our guarantee: if for some reason we ever have to close down shop, we will release the Bubble source code under an open-source license so that you can set up your own Bubble server and keep your app running.
    Wishful thinking of my own: If future pricing changes put any of bubble’s customers out of business, she should be able to have more useful ways to export its App, than the one available today, because it feels that you don’t have any choice against bubble pricing decisions, but start from almost scratch on a new framework. Is it possible to have a community open-source edition without risking your business model and revenue?

That’s all folks!

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They already have done it in 2019, so no learning.

I hoped the bubble wasn’t just

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Just spent $250 on a template to test a new idea. This is a lot of cash for me, which is now potentially wasted. What would better or more predictable alternatives be to Bubble? I really don’t want to be held hostage by the service that I use.

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unfortunately, this is one of the built-in downsides of relying on a for-profit company to built your software products. They need to make $ off of you somehow :slight_smile: We can agree a direct AWS charge is better for everyone, but then Bubble would have no primary way to charge us for the value they create.

I’ve been working on a Firebase integration with a client bubble app for a while, and there are a lot of technicalities and brunt development work that go into an external DB. I can’t imagine having to do this for every little app – it’s going to really destroy the agile development Bubble promises. I build on bubble because it’s quick, cheap, and easy to iterate on. Clients are always happy with the cost and speed, with full knowledge of bubble’s limitations.

The more I think about yesterday’s announcement, the more baffled I am. Perhaps it was some finance guy in a VC chair who came up with the idea, but how did this pass the engineering and leadership team? They rely on AWS for their CDNs themselves-- surely they understand the pricing models of industry-standard hosting?

I am mid-build with a client, who has also recommended bubble to many mid-sized and big companies to build their internal tools. We both felt like idiots today on call. I can’t imagine what it’s like for the agency owners and developers who have staked their careers on bubble, and been here on day 1.

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All dear devs out there. We’re all in the same position but now let’s try and give the bubble team a bit of time. Let’s focus on what we know.

  1. They will not keep this proposal as it is.
  2. Panic and pushing for more drama will not help.
  3. Our voice was heard and Bubble management team is aware.
  4. We say we’re professionals so now let’s act as ones.

Let’s wait for the feedback now.

I would be really suprised if there would be an answer within a day so let’s be a bit real.

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my exact feeling, im working on something which just got funded last - and our tech was part of the reasons for the investment…and now this…

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Wanted to add another q̶u̶i̶c̶k̶ thought after reading a lot of replies here:

I think we should be careful in assuming intentions before the Bubble team has had a chance to respond properly. I’m as baffled as anyone as to how this decision was reached and communicated, but I don’t find it given that this somehow indicates a major change in the company’s culture or failure to commit to its founding values. I think it’s important for now to see this as what it probably was: a major miscalculation and failure of communication.

Without getting philosophical, I’ll say that assuming the worst in people with very little information to go on is a major problem of our times and a seeming bi-product of how we live our online lives. Every assumption made about Bubble’s intentions is just that - assumptions. We should remember that Bubble has been bootstrapped for years by young founders just like many of its clients and that the transition from unknown startup with two employees to an industry leader with ripple effects probably far beyond their wildest imagination, we should all be understanding that it takes some adjustments to learn how to handle. I don’t find it completely unreasonable to turn the mirror at some of the more angry voices here and remind them that you did make the choice yourself to invest your time and money in a young company that’s going to go through growth pain, new investors, management changes, new boards and possible acquisitions in the years ahead. That’s a chance you were willing to take to get a low-cost development framework.

While I completely sympathise that yesterday’s move gave a strong sense of uncertainty and can affect people strongly bot financially and emotionally, I think it’s healthy to remember that this is by no means an unusual event for a startup to go through, and you shouldn’t expect this to be the last misstep they take.

While I have personally been more critical of yesterday’s event than anything prior to this, I also remain continually impressed and have a high level of faith in the integrity and ability of @emmanuel/@josh and their team to solve this. No one is more aware than they are of the challenging navigation they have to do in the coming days, and I personally find the calls for an apology to be quite unnecessary and unproductive. I also don’t expect a completely revamped pricing strategy to realistically be communicated a mere 18 hours since the last one was bombarded. What they decide today needs to balance the needs of the platforms Users with Bubble financial health for years to come: I wouldn’t want it rushed. In fact, I’d rather read about over the weekend or even later.

Af of now, you are still on the same plan as you were two days ago - take a breath and pretend nothing happened for now.

I hope I get the point through in my previous comments that my intention was to highlight what I thought was important:

  1. that the decision seemed incredibly rushed, not researched and frankly not even subject to common sense
  2. that the communication was extremely poorly executed
  3. that I think there’s an ongoing issue with agencies, freelancers and founders fighting an uphill battle to convince the market that Bubble is not just for MVP’s while Bubble themselves in many ways seem to fairly consistently communicate the opposite. I get the feeling a bit too often that Bubble don’t quite grasp the gravitas of what they’ve created and what it’s used for.
  4. that they also don’t seem to be fully aware that there’s a chain of communication that’s not serviced in the right way today: to publish these news without any indication to the thousands of developers who have clients to answer to is thoughtless, bordering on reckless.
  5. I also agree that going forward we need some guarantees in place that can remove some of the uncertainty that people are feeling now and have felt for a long time. As an example, to suggest applying this price change retroactively to existing apps seems to me pretty insane, and the reaction from the community is entirely predictable

Whether I was successfully able to convey this in a productive way I honestly don’t know, but at least it was my intention to do so.

Oh, and yeah, so I guess I’m unable to write short posts. I did try though.

For now, let’s give the team some room to breathe. Comment and provide feedback all you want, but let’s try to keep it constructive: if you have strong opinions about how the future of Bubble should look, it’s in your best interest to convey that in a way that they’ll listen to.

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very much agreed with @petter above.

It was our decision.
You knew of vendor lockin.
You decided to save time by not learning to code instead.

No need to lash out as much.
Sure, I also made some sarcastic jokes and had a bad night.
But I did offer logical reasons and most importantly alternatives that I supported that would make sense (many posts did not)
I did not make comparisons to war or dictators because a dictator ignores feedback and war destroys lives not only online businesses.

The decision has been revoked.
And waiting a few days can also be expected and should be in order.

100 years ago it would take a week for a letter to arrive across the world.
Now I can write this post (theoretically) from my toilet while ordering my Uber with a device with enough computing power to go to the moon

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Não Acredito !!! Principalmente na Limitação do Banco de Dados. aqui no Brasil temos um dos maiores crescimentos na plataforma Bubble. Temos vários aplicativos e cursos em desenvolvimento. agora com essa nova política de preços vai tudo para o Lixo. Bora procurar outra plataforma…

Good morning or good afternoon.
thank you emanuel for putting dreams or projects in check, I would like to emphasize that everyone who is using the bubble is because they trust or trust the tool, I really like the tool but I can’t stay on this check, rethink your business vision really in which one will be your impact, and many will migrate to other tools and abandon the bubble. I’m wondering if we can really trust the bubble tool now, a flea behind the ear. thanks

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i just hope the bubble team comes up with good news in the future…

Just a bit of a sort of mod thing from me.

  1. What a thread!

Thanks to everyone who has posted, there have been very very few reports. Given the emotional nature, that is pretty amazing. And testimony to the community. Bubble is listening. How could they not?

  1. Totally get the pain. I have been here before.

No, really. Twice before. Removing unlimited apps with unlimited data in 2016(?)…wow that was bad. I think I have a great-grandfather plan.

  1. I could never put it better than what @petter has written.

Let’s give them time and space. Take a breath.

  1. No removal of rants (at least not from me) but please be as civil as you have been, and also don’t repeat. Once (maybe twice) is enough. Thanks.

Thanks again :slight_smile:

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Finaly some wise words.

Let’s be honnest, Bubble has always been able to answer our questions, and adress our problems.

Did they make a mistake ? I’d say yes.
Should we be angry forever ? Definitely not.

Companies like Bubble actually talk with customers, not like GAFAs.
@emmanuel took less than 24 hours to answer our concerns to tell us they heard us. Would Zuckerberg do that ? Don’t think so.

So please just calm down.

All those threatening, and saying they’ll leave bubble, and “trust is broken” and “we’ll never forgive you” and “you will never find a customer like me again”, please allow me to laugh. You are not talking to your future ex girlfriend.

You have zero alternative because there is no product as good as bubble.
That is why you guyz are becoming crazy.

So now, just breathe and let them bring a solution to us.
They’ll do something sustainable for everyone for sure.

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Es por eso que me gusta estar acá, no somos un numero si no una comunidad

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