what's the best way to play with cloud as independent project?

I am interested in play with new technology and the cloud things is one of recent interest i want to focus on. I want to know whether there is a way for me to try and do some experiment for free. I know google app engine maybe a way. But what if i want to have more supportive platform and try some other thing like building the Cassandra cluster.

Is there any way I can have a good start? Such as free cloud data storage, or some academic projects opening to everyone? or even the raw server. I am thinking whether I should s开发者_JS百科etup a test server at home. :)

Maybe the amazon stuff? but it seems that cost is a little high, but free for academic project.

Anyone have suggestions? Thanks for all reply.

StackOverflow isn't really the best place for this question, but if you're interested more in free hosting in the cloud, well, Heroku is awesome. It's free for your first "dyno", and it scales beautifully.

Amazon Web Services has a free usage tier.