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A comment on It is hard to recommend Google Cloud. Parent comment

Re:It is hard to recommend Google Cloud by jmillikin on Sunday September 22, 2024 @04:34AM (#41615589) 

  > I get it, it was a "consumer" product essentially, hence selling the
  > business to Squarespace instead of someone like Cloudflare.
Ironically, I moved all my Google Domains domains to Cloudflare. Their revenue from being a domain registrar is likely a rounding error compared to their other products, but (1) now they have my credit card on file for value-add services, and (2) sometimes people with corporate spending authority ask me for advice about who they should buy cloud services from.

Grocery stores don't make their money from selling bread and milk, but a store that doesn't sell bread and milk is run by fools.

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Re:It is hard to recommend Google Cloud by hakanito on Sunday September 22, 2024 @05:29AM (#41615833)
The obvious go-to choice was Cloudflare for us too, but then it turned out you can't use CF just as a registrar (at least on the basic plan or equivalent), you need to use Cloudflare's nameservers as well... But we use Google's Cloud DNS for everything, so that was a showstopper. In the end we went with AWS Route 53.

CF could probably get a lot more customers if they would allow you to use custom nameservers for your domain.

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Re:It is hard to recommend Google Cloud by BehindTheMath on Sunday September 22, 2024 @08:03AM (#41616469)
Why not Cloud Domains?
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Re:It is hard to recommend Google Cloud by deepsun on Sunday September 22, 2024 @08:57AM (#41616720)
you mean google cloud domains? They shut it down together with google domains (it still runs, but you cannot register a new domain).
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Re:It is hard to recommend Google Cloud by bartekrutkowski on Sunday September 22, 2024 @05:35AM (#41615874)
If I'm not mistaken, it is possible, but not on the free tier.
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Re:It is hard to recommend Google Cloud by paulgb on Sunday September 22, 2024 @06:01AM (#41615992)
I don’t think it’s the case even on a paid tier, if it is I can’t find any reference to it. There are a lot of posts on their community support form where the recommendation is to use another registrar. https://community.cloudflare.com/t/use-cloudflare-registrar-...
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Re:It is hard to recommend Google Cloud by remram on Sunday September 22, 2024 @10:40AM (#41617404)
I do see an option for custom nameservers on my dashboard, followed by a button "upgrade to business".
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Re:It is hard to recommend Google Cloud by duskwuff on Sunday September 22, 2024 @12:02PM (#41617950)
That option means "your nameservers are now ns1/ns2 on your domain but they still map to Cloudflare", not "you get to pick your own third-party nameservers".
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Re:It is hard to recommend Google Cloud by remram on Sunday September 22, 2024 @02:52PM (#41619092)
I see, thanks.
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Re:It is hard to recommend Google Cloud by re-thc on Sunday September 22, 2024 @06:46AM (#41616162)
> CF could probably get a lot more customers if they would allow you to use custom nameservers for your domain.

Why would they want that? The whole point of CF as a registrar was so you could use the other services. The registrar is sold at cost. It's a way to lock you in.

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Re:It is hard to recommend Google Cloud by hakanito on Sunday September 22, 2024 @02:11PM (#41618801)
It would lower the barrier to switch to Cloudflare for new customers, and once they are inside with a credit card on file it’s arguably easier to explore their product offerings
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Re:It is hard to recommend Google Cloud by re-thc on Monday September 23, 2024 @02:40AM (#41622981)
It's already "free". How much lower should it be?

So that's not the use of the domains. It's to make it easier / lock in existing customers.

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Re:It is hard to recommend Google Cloud by homebrewer on Sunday September 22, 2024 @05:20AM (#41615782)
They shouldn't have any revenue from registering domains because they sell them at cost. It's probably the opposite because of all the overhead (which is of course compensated by pulling in more clients as you explained).
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Re:It is hard to recommend Google Cloud by ptman on Sunday September 22, 2024 @10:12AM (#41617202)
Revenue is not profit
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Re:It is hard to recommend Google Cloud by ac50hz on Sunday September 22, 2024 @05:00AM (#41615680)
Great analogy.
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