Poorly written argument full of red herrings. From what I can tell, their answer to the "why aren't you in the cloud" question is that they "love computers so much that they want to do it all themselves because it's so fun".
If I asked you why you were eating pizza and you responded "because I like pizza" would you still consider that a red herring argument?
All they are saying is that they are not in the cloud because they don't want to be in the cloud and because they quite like not being in the cloud. It works for them. Why is that expression at all controversial?
If they'd labeled their blog "Why being in the Cloud is a bad idea" or "Why being in the cloud would cost Stack Exchange a lot more" or "Why nobody should ever use the Cloud" then I could see the reason for the dispute. Then their arguments would be very unconvincing.
It is certainly valid for Stack Exchange to make a choice because it fits within their culture and then explain that that is why they are doing it. You might think it's a dumb decision and that's fine. But they clearly are not trying to convince you that they've made the best possible decision. They're just saying that good or bad, they've made the decision that they want to make. And it's clearly a decision that has been working well for them so far anyway. So why do people keep bugging them about it?
You're correct about alternative titles for the blog post. However, the assumption is that on a technical blog, readers would expect technical answers--at least I did. You're not going to tell your boss that the next product should be developed in Java because you like Java. They want concrete reasons.
Would you have preferred a gigantic stack of technical chaff designed to rationalize and obscure the fact that they're doing whatever seemed like fun at the time? Because I'm sure we can find you some examples. ;)
And taken on those terms - not on the cost accounting of cloud vs local - it makes sense to me. Is it a convincing "no matter what" argument against cloud hosting in all cases? I'd say no - there will be cases where sheer scale or fluctuations in scale make cloud hosting more attractive. as the article admits.
