I like Azure...but admittedly because I get MSDN credits through a work-paid subscription. People are usually surprised to learn you can run Linux there. In fact, if you go to
VMdepot you can even find FreeBSD images
No OpenBSD yet, alas...
It's not my favorite place to host a VPS, honestly, but it's certainly comparable to Amazon EC2. Besides the pricing model (which makes bandwidth expensive), lack of a console irritates me. Also, their Linux templates are goofy...e.g., the CentOS one has a swap partition but doesn't turn it on, etc. Still, mine there have been bulletproof. I do like the external firewall, which is like Amazon's, and the portal is very pretty.
Their PaaS idea (the original pre-VM Azure) was interesting but never caught on. I'm not sure how much any of the PaaS models (Google's, etc.) have caught on, unless it's someone buying a SaaS they want to extend (like Salesforce).
I wrote an article for LinuxJournal on Azure:
http://www.linuxjournal.com/content/linux-azure%E2%80%94-strange-place-find-penguin