Cloud providers offer so many products with so many nuances that I'd posit it's practically impossible to do a satisfying pricing comparison that's even halfway comprehensive. That's not the fault of the author, certainly, but the title makes it come off as something far more comprehensive than it actually is, and as a result comes across as disingenuous.
Amazon’s policy is even better than that (IMO). They know that no one reads things before meetings, so it’s accepted that everyone will quietly read for the first part of the meeting (as much as half the total meeting duration). Then (and only then) when everyone has finished reading the same material does anyone speak up to ask questions or share input. Saves a lot of time in meetings, although it adds a lot of time in preparing documents. I suspect it probably nets out to positive time savings and am confident it results in more informed decision-making.
This isn’t the complete picture. It’s true that the vesting schedule gives you only 5% of RSUs in your first year, but employees’ cash signing bonus is increased to offset that. So if the total compensation target for a role is generally $500k (say, a principal engineer or a director, maybe?) and your salary is capped at $160k, you’d be given a signing bonus of $500k-$160k-(total stock vest x 5%) in cash. It’s not as though you’re paid significantly less when you start, it’s just that how you are paid is different.
Cloud providers offer so many products with so many nuances that I'd posit it's practically impossible to do a satisfying pricing comparison that's even halfway comprehensive. That's not the fault of the author, certainly, but the title makes it come off as something far more comprehensive than it actually is, and as a result comes across as disingenuous.