the basics of running a service stack (web, app servers, data stores) on AWS. some good benchmark figures in the final slides

'an expressive toolset for constructing scalable, resilient [service] architectures. It works in the cloud, in the data center, and on your laptop, and it makes your system diagram visible and inevitable. Inevitable systems coordinate automatically to interconnect, removing the hassle of manual configuration of connection points (and the associated danger of human error).' Looks like a pretty neat cluster deployment tool; driven from a single configuration file, using Chef, integrating closely with AWS and providing many useful additional features

'a UNIX init scheme with service supervision' - philosophically similar to daemontools, widely packaged, LSB init.d-script-compliant, BSD-licensed

still fantastic advice, even after 4 years.  I think it's time for a re-read

good scaling advice from Linden Labs' Ian Wilkes (who doesn't seem to have a blog, sadly)