[Be el o ge]

2009 is the year of the cloud. Google started to support Java on its AppEngine platform, Microsoft released the Azure platform to run .NET applications in the cloud and if you’re running a Rails app you might want to take a look at EngineYards cloud offererings or Heroku.
Additionally to these PAAS (platform as a service) kind of clouds you find more open / configurable platforms: Amazons Elastic Cloud or Joyent are two examples. There are companies building up on these platforms like RightScale and Cohesive FT. Both are operating on EC2 and helping you manage the cloud.

Cloud services are a great way for startups to deploy their applications on a scalable platform without the need to invest thousands and eventually millions of $ to build up a reliable data center to deliver the service they have in mind. They don’t need to hire a whole staff to take care of their operations and they don’t need to sign expensive support contracts for hard- and software components.

One often mentioned concern about the cloud approach is security. There are applications which are critical: financial applications, applications in the health care space to mention two examples. One solution for this is the “private” cloud, meaning basically a private data center …

Next to security there is another point you should consider. I haven’t really thought about that by myself, not until I read this fantastic article on Forbes: Analyzing The Cloud.
In short: Who do you expect will your customers be? If you sell your product mainly to private customer or small and medium sized companies you’re probably fine. Bigger corporations tend to have already big data centers and complete staffed operation departments and it’s less likely that these want to move parts of their operation outside the company.