$1,279-per-hour, 30,000-core cluster built on Amazon EC2 cloud

Ars Technica reports about using the cloud which is in this case Amazon EC to run a 30.000 node cluster. Spreaded across different zones and running voor about 7 hours costing a $1,279 per hour it shows the power of the cloud at it's best. Of course using a cluster is particular interesting for computing jobs which can be parallelized but none the less using the cloud should be a lot cheaper then an inhouse cluster. Ironically it is like the old fashioned mainframe on which you rented computercycles in minutes, long time ago. Which reminds to Ecclesiastes 1:9 The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun. 10 Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is new? it hath been already of old time, which was before us.