AWS is quite expensive. It's not the case that it's cheap. Rather, you pay more for convenience.
The idea that startups "must" pay AWS or equivalent is the kind of idiotic junk that only rags like the NYT could come out with. Nothing stops you buying your own hardware and racking it. For many companies that's in fact a better option than paying for cloud services!
I don't expect anyone will actually be racking their own hardware, but "AWS or CGE only" still sounds pretty narrow to me. Are VCs really going to object to Oracle's bare metal setup, or RackSpace with OpenStack?
The idea that startups "must" pay AWS or equivalent is the kind of idiotic junk that only rags like the NYT could come out with. Nothing stops you buying your own hardware and racking it. For many companies that's in fact a better option than paying for cloud services!