I own an inn that probably has a hundred different light bulbs on site.
After seven years, I've got a bucket of dead CFLs that I need to get rid of. Unlike incandescents, I can't just toss them in the garbage, but I admit I've been saving the dead CFLs to count how long they last. These are supposed to be 10 year bulbs, but for the most part they've lasted somewhere between six months and two years. On the other hand, I've got some bulbs that have been around since the previous owners and have thousands of hours on them.
First, it's obvious that an incandescent bulb produces a superior light to a CFL. The old style CFL take a couple of minutes to warm up, which doesn't work in some contexts. The newer ones seem to reach peak light in about thirty seconds. Still, in a guest bathroom, starting with 50% light just doesn't cut it. The light quality itself is less like a morgue than in the older bulbs, but it still isn't as good.
Second, CFLs burn out rapidly when they are used for a few seconds to a few minutes at a time. I went through three bulbs in two years on a staircase my kids use frequently, shutting the light on and off ten or twenty times a day, before I finally wised up and put back in an incandescent. I'd gone through three bulbs for probably a hundred hours of total lighting.
On the other hand, I have some lights in the front room that are on 14-18 hours at a stretch, and some exterior lights that are on for 8-14 hours at a stretch (depending on the time of the year) and these lights do not burn out until they've got thousands of hours of use, apart from the occasional dud bulb. I'm clearly saving some money and electricity here.
So, based on my experience, CFLs are a waste in situations where the bulb is used for short periods of time and shut on and off frequently. In cases where they will be switched on once and used for longer periods, they make good economic sense.