So as most of you know, my day job is working at one of the big boys in cloud infrastructure hosting. As such I've gotten to learn a TON about different cloud types, and etc... As part of my big drive to do a startup, I've gotten the run down of a few cloud providers, and have been trying to work out who gives the best bang for buck for my startup idea. In the meanwhile, I figured I'd do a post on different *major* types of clouds, and some examples of each. So without further ado, here're the major types of clouds :

Infrastructure as a Service or IaaS

This is the big one, and probably the one with the most examples right now. Essentially, you can look at this like an abstracted utility style version of what you have in your company data centre, and/or even your desktop type computing is moving into the IAAS model. Usually, this comprises of computing, memory, and storage in the cloud in different shapes, sizes, and/or forms.

Some examples of IaaS clouds are:

Rackspace Cloud (Cloud Servers, Cloud Files, Cloud Load Balancer), and then of course Amazon AWS (Amazon EC2, Amazon S3, Amazon EBS).

Note: This is also usually what gets melded into the form of 'Public', 'Private', and 'Hybrid' Clouds. Public being the above mentioned two, Private being a dedicated installation (usually), and then Hybrid being a mix of the two (again, usually).

Platform as a Service or PaaS

This is basically something along the lines of 'you load your app on our servers. We care about the servers, and the scaling, and you care about the app'. It's another level of abstraction above the IAAS model which allows you to focus on your application, and less on your infrastructure, while of course being a huge positive for the developer focused market, this isn't always the best option and in many cases creates vendor lock-in though a reliance on the underlying platform, and as such, the vendor. This is also one of the easiest ways to get locked into a platform, although over time the vendors are moving to a less 'one-sided' model on this front, and starting to adopt more open standards (such as SQL for example).

Some examples of PaaS clouds are :

Heroku, EngineYard App Cloud, Google App Engine.

Software as a Service or SaaS

This is the last line of Cloud Vendors. Essentially, this is where a company produces software that makes sense for you to allow them to run completely. The only thing you need to do in these cases is pay for them, possiby integrate with them, and then of course use them. This of course has the highest possibility of vendor lock-in with your data residing inside their application, but also this has the least outlay as you don't have to pay to have an app built, or keep it running, you simply use it. This is proving to be the most popular for buisness applications due to the instant on nature of the applications.

Some examples of SaaS clouds are :

Google Apps, ZenDesk, SalesForce

Comments, Questions, Ides? 

So, for those of you who know know me you'll have heard me say at some point or another that I want to start a startup, some have asked why, others just kinda assume. If you're wondering why, it's pretty easy to explain. I want to invest myself in something that I can help guide, shape, and mould and have true ownership in. As such, I've been reading a bunch of articles, and figured I should share some of them :

Joel.is: How to Start Your Startup in 4 Steps
URL: http://joel.is/post/5507881155/how-to-start-your-startup-in-4-steps?44977aa0

My biggest take away was that you should work on something you would use, something you're passionate about, something you'd buy, I didn't see this in any of the other articles, but I figured I must have missed it, because surely everyone believes that, right? I can't sell meat products if I'm a veggie, I can't sell cars if I don't know how to drive, and love driving for that matter, and startups are no different. Again, quick, small, simple, fast!

Joel.is: Fear of Not Shipping
URL: http://joel.is/post/3830271787/fear-of-not-shipping?1fcd2400

It's ok to push something that's not perfect, just get it out the door, and be willing to fix it fast. Now, there comes a point that your mistakes cost you too much, but initially, you're riding a coaster, and taking the chance is sometimes worth the risk!

BufferApp: Idea to paying customers in 7 weeks
URL: http://blog.bufferapp.com/idea-to-paying-customers-in-7-weeks-how-we-did-it

My take away from this article was pretty huge. Keep it simple, do it fast, and it's easy to get it out the door quickly at first, it will get better over time!

Paul Graham: Ideas for Startups
URL: http://www.paulgraham.com/ideas.html

Ideas are not worth millions of dollars, execution is! If you think you have a million dollar idea, someone else may have already thought of it, and they may already have executed on it, but if you execute on it in a million dollar way, the most insanely easy idea can be worth much more than that million dollar idea someone else thinks they have... Facebook is a great example of this!

Paul Graham: How to Start a Startup
URL: http://www.paulgraham.com/start.html

Understand your customers, don't do it alone, and have an idea... that's really what you need. The rest of the article covers funding and different insights around that, which are actually really great insights. Read it!

Paul Graham: Ramen Profitable
URL: http://www.paulgraham.com/ramenprofitable.html

This one is a great article to focus on. So many startup founders I've met are very much focused on selling as soon as they hit their 'mark'. While this is great, it's not always going to happen. Focusing on being Ramen Profitable is something that makes sense, and helps you focus on the important things, instead of the pay-day.

Paul Graham: The 18 Mistakes Startups Make
URL: http://www.paulgraham.com/startupmistakes.html

This was an epic article. The big take aways for me are that you shouldn't try do it alone, you should do it lean, and fast! It's a great article, and for those who don't know who Paul Graham is, you should google him. Oh, and location matters, if only for your ability to know people to help you... you can do it from anywhere I'm sure, but it's easier when you're surrounded by other startup minded folk at every turn.

StartupLawBlog: The Moonlighting Survival Guide
URL: http://www.startuplawblog.com/2011/08/05/the-moonlighting-survival-guide/

So one of the things that you should be mindful of is your current employer (most folks are going to start something while working for someone else) and their policy about moonlighting, and what your rights are. This is a good place to start, if only to get the creative juices flowing around possible stumbling blocks.

Chris Dixon: Developing New Startup Ideas
URL: http://cdixon.org/2010/03/14/developing-new-startup-ideas/

This article is around sharing your idea. Many of the folks I've spoken to over time are more about being protective abotu your idea than Chris is. It's a refreshing change, and in all honesty when I took one of my ideas and started to socialise it, I got a better feel, and more ideas on how to extend, and make it more reflective of what I wanted it to be. The more I talked about it, the more I worked further through my plan, and the more ideas I had.

Chris Dixon: Why Shouldn't You Keep Your Startup Idea Secret
URL: http://cdixon.org/2009/08/22/why-you-shouldnt-keep-your-startup-idea-secret/

Again, share, share, share :) It's not a secret, someone else has probably had it before, and you need help to execute it... Interesting NDA note on the bottom... keep it in mind!

BigBangTechnology: How To Poach A Startup Employee
URL: http://bigbangtechnology.com/post/how_to_poach_a_startup_employee

It's easy, just offer them something better than they currently have... what a statement, and how much impact it makes. Finding the right people may not be easy, but when you do, getting them isn't actually as hard as some folk make it out to be.

comments?

I just finished watching through this interview set by the 37 Signals peeps of Jason Seats and Matt Tanase of SliceHost fame. Very interesting view on startup integration with the mothership. (Disclaimer: I'm a Racker, I now work for Rackspace Cloud, although I never met these two guys... it's a big place, and I'm sad I didn't).

Really interesting watch... kinda makes me want to do a startup... or at least, makes me want to do one *again, and again* even more!