Before the 1990s most computing was done on mainframes that were expensive and difficult to access, because that was simply the state of hardware.
Then we had a couple decades of software running on ...
Mainframes remain a backbone for financial tx processing today (>85%) because they’re cost effective for very high base load
For loads where there’s significant variance, “cloud” has gained significant foothold because it can be (not is) more cost effective
The important difference is that cloud is just someone else’s data centre over which you have zero control, AND one which incentivises centralising control and access to those hosted instances, machines and applications
Running your own servers reliably effectively and efficiently is becoming easier with tools like Proxmox .. but infrastructure remains a pita
Highly analogous to what we’re observing with ⚡️ and LSPs and the tradeoffs for efficiency, ease of use, and risk of capture
For loads where there’s significant variance, “cloud” has gained significant foothold because it can be (not is) more cost effective
The important difference is that cloud is just someone else’s data centre over which you have zero control, AND one which incentivises centralising control and access to those hosted instances, machines and applications
Running your own servers reliably effectively and efficiently is becoming easier with tools like Proxmox .. but infrastructure remains a pita
Highly analogous to what we’re observing with ⚡️ and LSPs and the tradeoffs for efficiency, ease of use, and risk of capture