[onethumb]

The cost (I assume you're talking about "my time" cost?) is unbelievably low, mostly in part due to good software. It "just works".

Specifically, Arq Backup, for example, lets you simply add/remove providers at will. It's happened multiple times, Amazon Drive changed (or went away? I forget...), Google Drive changed their Enterprise policies, etc... No big deal, I just deleted the provider and added another one. I still had plenty of working provider backups, so I wasn't worried while it took a day or two to fill the next provider. (Good argument for having 2+, I'd argue 3+ providers...)

Using notifications from your sync apps/systems/scripts/whatever is essential, of course, in case something fails... but all the good software has that built-in (including email and other notifications, not just OS, which helps for remote systems).

At this point, it's nearly idiot proof. (Good for idiots like me ;)

[creer]

I meant more monetary cost. Nominally cloud storage for one unit of storage and one unit of time is perfectly "fine". Except that it adds up. More storage, indefinitely held, multiple hosts. Data which needs to be copied from one to the other which incurs costs from both. Add to this routine retrieval costs - if you "live this way". And routine test retrieval costs if you know what's good for you.

So last time I looked, unit costs were low - sure. But all-included costs were high.

[onethumb]

Certainly some of this simply comes down to "how valuable is my data?".

Currently, given the extremely low (and dropping YoY) cost of storing cold data at rest, the essentially free cost of ingest, and the high cost of retrieving cold data which I almost never have to do, the ROI is wildly positive. For me.

And since all of these things (how many providers, which providers, which storage classes, how long to retain the data, etc) are all fine-tunable, you can basically do your own ROI math, then pick the parameters which work for you.