PaaS is dead, long live PaaS!

A guide for Ruby developers weighing PaaS hosting against self-hosting on a VPS. PaaS platforms offer out-of-the-box SSL, logging, rollbacks, and security updates, making them ideal for developers who want to focus on building rather than infrastructure. Self-hosting with tools like Kamal or Dokku is viable for cost savings at scale or learning purposes, but requires managing load balancers, backups, monitoring, and on-call responsibilities. The post recommends PaaS for most beginners and small apps, noting that even one hour of billable time often exceeds a month of hosting costs.