For about seven years, the IT industry and its pundits have been infatuated with the “cloud” – specifically Amazon Web Services (AWS). Tech startups and their investors have flocked to AWS with inflated expectations on the notion that cloud economics were better than hosting applications themselves. After all, start-up resources are tight, agility is required, and any time not wasted on infrastructure management can be put toward business and product differentiation. It all makes sense, but start-ups and investors alike are now finding that much of AWS’s promise is not being met. After as much as seven years of doing this “cloud” thing, many are having second thoughts about a cloud only solution. AWS was expected to deliver reliability, cost savings, flexibility, and good support, but these benefits have not been realized and it’s the customer that suffers.