This was not surprising considering many startups were using Amazon's S3 storage services as a CDN. A couple of companies were using amazon's web services to build a CDN on top of it, so it was a complete no-brainer for amazon to launch one.

A CDN is a different beast when compared to running the other Amazon Web services. Werner Vogels says Using a global network of edge locations this new service can deliver popular data stored in Amazon S3 to customers around the globe through local access. (http://tinyurl.com/5xxuxe)

It will be interesting to see Amazon's definition of an edge location, and the network + geographic spread of servers.

I like it because it's one less sales person I need to talk to.

Probably the most obvious business move ever. They've had the framework for it, they just never labeled it as such.

What, servers only on three continents?

Amateurs.

It'll be a great option for folks, but traditional CDNs do offer additional capabilities like streaming, which S3 cannot do right now.

I wonder whether there will be also https support. That was one main reason why cachefly didn't work for me.

HTTPS and CDN's don't really mix too well because a CDN is by definition a man in the middle.

wonder what their speeds will be like compared to other CDNs

with online video / rich media exploding CDN are killing it right now. smart move by AWS.

You can already do this through a CNAME.