Sinnataggen and some Cloud development thoughts...

"if the cloud were a child, it would be an angry two year old. The challenge for the industry now is how to make it through the terrible twos."

According to Gartner, the important criteria for a cloud development platform include:

• Interoperability: how well does the platform integrate with other web assets like open id and google maps?
• Collaboration: how well does the platform support source code control and social programming (Facebook meets SVN)
• RIA & mobile clients: cross browser and cross smart-phone support. According to Mark, reach wins over richness - supporting more browsers is more important than supporting more widgets.
• Legacy: ability to integrate with enterprise data, security and web services
• Performance: ability to scale significantly with no additional effort/programming
• Longevity: the market momentum of the platform vendor - will they be around in 3 years? The winner will be less about the raw technology and more about the quality of partners and customers the vendor has attracted.

Reference:

• http://architects.dzone.com/articles/the-cloud-is-angry-and-other-l