[dmourati]

Disagree. Twice the headache. Put all your eggs in one basket then watch that basket. Get bigger, repeat. I'd go from 2 to 3 faster than 1 to 2.

[timr]

I don't think he was making an argument for ease of maintenance, but rather, reliability per dollar. Even if you've got two crappy datacenters, you're at least redundantly crappy.

[Nrsolis]

That only works if you value sysadmin time at $0/hr.

[zorlem]

You need a capable sysadmin anyways. It makes sense to pay her/him to design and scale your "platform" properly, especially if you're making any money from it.