> The one time somebody tries to use some managed service that goes overbudget by 3000%, and the after action figures out that it would have been within the budget by using <open source technology> in EC2, they just do that instead
This impacts casual dabblers too. More than once I've seen HN comments on how someone is wary to experiment with cloud computing because a single screw-up can lead to an essentially unlimited bill. Judging by HackerNews anecdotes of when this does happen (unexpected overruns of thousands of dollars), there's a reasonable chance Amazon will refund you out of good will, but that's not enough to lay the fears to rest.
Linode let you pre-pay, for instance, but (to my knowledge) this isn't an option offered by Amazon, Microsoft, or Google.
This impacts casual dabblers too. More than once I've seen HN comments on how someone is wary to experiment with cloud computing because a single screw-up can lead to an essentially unlimited bill. Judging by HackerNews anecdotes of when this does happen (unexpected overruns of thousands of dollars), there's a reasonable chance Amazon will refund you out of good will, but that's not enough to lay the fears to rest.
Linode let you pre-pay, for instance, but (to my knowledge) this isn't an option offered by Amazon, Microsoft, or Google.