Deployment /can be/ a git push away, but that's only on the extreme end with things like heroku. You mentioned cloud. Cloud has cost sinks every so often (in terms of time).

Cloud has much value but please dont' consider it a panacea.

You can get a lot of value out of those 30 minutes installing a webserver; and it can save you a significant amount of cost.

Not to mention when you want to actually scale you'll see the reason why pretty clearly, unlike in cloud providers where inefficiencies can just suck up money until you notice.

And I definitely take exception to the "every _second_ you spend doing something other than business is a waste" because by that logic I shouldn't use the bathroom or take time to have a coffee.