Like you, I'm from the generation that grew up treating "computer" as synonymous with "personal computer", i.e. something on a desk or in one's lap. For some reason I can't quite articulate, it saddens me that a new company with "computer" in the name is focusing on those other things called computers in far-away buildings that we can't access. I hope that once Oxide starts making money from servers, it can branch out into workstations. Then, to me at least, it will more fully live up to the name "Oxide Computer". Yes, I know this association is more emotional than logical, but there it is.
One of the things driving things into "the cloud" is because the hardware companies can buy can't compete on performance with the hardware that Google/Amazon/Microsoft/Facebook can make. That drives businesses to move things to the cloud. However some things _can't_ go to the cloud (legal reasons of all sorts for one) and so are stuck with an inferior situation. Assuming you had the money, there's nothing stopping you from putting a server rack in your house. If there was a company selling such hardware, maybe the trend to putting everything on the cloud would change.
Here's a thread from last time this came up: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23979042