You don't have to "need" it to admire the scope of what they created. Hardware AND software engineering at its finest solving some very hard problems.

I look forward to scoring some beefy Milan boxes with weird rails for cheap on ebay because the firmware only loads OpenSolaris.

OK, this comment was not really helpful. The article described some really interesting tech. Trashing tech or people who are excited by it does not really make things better.

It's ok to have heroes.

Not only is that not really relevant, but I'd argue Tailscale is actually very useful even to many people who don't feel like they currently "need" it.

I can understand Oxide (though current vmware apocalypse might make their appeal bigger than expected), but Tailscale?

Tailscale's biggest proposition is that their VPN software is, arguably, the easiest I've ever managed. There systems that are better integrated in some environments, systems that provide various niche features, etc.

But Tailscale is simplest to use.

I'm assuming that 1% will make their efforts worthwhile. It is impressive regardless of whether or not you're going to use it.