Vercel – $102M to Continue Building the Next Web, Together(vercel.com)
vercel.com
Vercel – $102M to Continue Building the Next Web, Together
https://vercel.com/blog/series-c-102m-continue-building-the-next-web
18 comments
Thanks for the feedback.
"Our platform enables frontend teams to do their best work" -> Our platform includes frameworks (e.g. Next.js), deployment and hosting (e.g. serverless infrastructure), and collaboration (preview deployments, nextjs.org/live).
The first section of the docs (https://vercel.com/docs) says:
"Vercel enables developers to host websites and web services that deploy instantly and scale automatically – all without any configuration."
How could we improve this further? Which part is still unclear? Open to any feedback.
"Our platform enables frontend teams to do their best work" -> Our platform includes frameworks (e.g. Next.js), deployment and hosting (e.g. serverless infrastructure), and collaboration (preview deployments, nextjs.org/live).
The first section of the docs (https://vercel.com/docs) says:
"Vercel enables developers to host websites and web services that deploy instantly and scale automatically – all without any configuration."
How could we improve this further? Which part is still unclear? Open to any feedback.
In the context of 'a person arriving knows nothing about Vercel' ... 'hosting websites' can mean a lot of things.
Are you hosting static files? Like AWS S3? It's a giant file server? With some fancy framework specific aspects?
Or is this like 'Wix', but using a specific framework?
Servers? Lambdas? Where is the business logic?
Is there storage, like RDMBS or or a document/noSQL DB?
Maybe it's fair to assume a lot of people are familiar with Next.JS ... but I suggest most are not. 'Next.JS is a React front-end Framework' is helpful, but most of us already know React itself is a framework, so a 'framework on a framework' probably needs a few more words as well.
So even a few well placed, even pedantic descriptions might help a lot, especially for those who arrive 'completely naive' i.e. have maybe 'heard of' Vercel, but that's it.
Are you hosting static files? Like AWS S3? It's a giant file server? With some fancy framework specific aspects?
Or is this like 'Wix', but using a specific framework?
Servers? Lambdas? Where is the business logic?
Is there storage, like RDMBS or or a document/noSQL DB?
Maybe it's fair to assume a lot of people are familiar with Next.JS ... but I suggest most are not. 'Next.JS is a React front-end Framework' is helpful, but most of us already know React itself is a framework, so a 'framework on a framework' probably needs a few more words as well.
So even a few well placed, even pedantic descriptions might help a lot, especially for those who arrive 'completely naive' i.e. have maybe 'heard of' Vercel, but that's it.
Thank you for this! Very helpful. I will work on improving this.
The Developer Experience (DX) on Vercel is exceptional. Definitely rivals the best companies. Great job Guillermo! Way to really understand your customer profile.
Easily the best platform I've used over the years. Excellent community, support, and toolings all around. Kudos to the team and all contributors.
Great platform! They are able to improve the DX (developer experience) year after year and update their products to make building and hosting websites tremendously easy.
I recognized the username rauchg from when I worked with socket.io over 10 years ago. Super inspiring to see such a talented programmer do so much for the web.
Might get downvoted for this but I'm not happy with how nextjs keeps expanding its scope. I don't want my server side react lib to do have anything to do with my deploy set up. Same with how nextjs now wants to meddle with my rest API. So while I use nextjs for some things I am having to opt out of more and more pieces of it.
"I don't want my server side react lib to do have anything to do with my deploy set up." You can deploy Next.js anywhere that has a Node.js server. It's not dependent on any deployment set up.
"Same with how nextjs now wants to meddle with my rest API." -> You also don't have to use API Routes! It's completely opt-in.
"Same with how nextjs now wants to meddle with my rest API." -> You also don't have to use API Routes! It's completely opt-in.
Vercel tooling is the best I’ve worked with in quite a while in the web dev world. It makes so much sense for our team to pay for it - it’s incredibly productive. Glad to see this.
Congrats Guillermo and team! Well deserved.
Love Vercel, NextJS is my fav frontend framework.
Great for using lambda funcitons abstracted away on their API folders...
Best of luck
Great for using lambda funcitons abstracted away on their API folders...
Best of luck
Vercel’s examples in the NextJS repo made life so much easier.
I wonder how Netlify is doing in comparison
Based of non-scientific research, I think Netlify is approx 4x larger than Vercel in terms of headcount and annual revenue.
1st line: "Vercel combines the best developer experience with an obsessive focus on end-user performance. Our platform enables frontend teams to do their best work."
2cnd: "Developers love Next.js, the open source React framework Vercel built together with Google and Facebook. Next.js powers the biggest websites like Twilio, for use cases in e-commerce, travel, news, and marketing."
3rd: "Vercel is the best place to deploy any frontend app. Start by deploying with zero configuration to our global edge network. Scale dynamically to millions of pages without breaking a sweat."
4th: "Accelerate with your team
Frontend development is not meant to be a solo activity. The Vercel platform makes it a collaborative experience with deploy previews for every code change, by seamlessly integrating with GitHub, GitLab, and Bitbucket."
Etc.
Etc.
Etc.
I get that it's something about making apps, something related to react, and that you're 'obsessive' etc. but nowhere do you seem to describe what this is, or even the thrust of it.
Is it a framework, a hosted service for files, servers, lambas?
Even your docs. introductory page doesn't say 'what the it is':
https://vercel.com/docs
I think many of us won't be bothered to 'try' something that can't be described in anything but 'higher order abstractions' (i.e. 'made for you', 'performs well', 'respected by others').
It's like your missing 1 or 2 very key sentences that would really help.