IAN, and others in the same boat.....There has got to be a TON of unemployed talent on XOC. Talent that perhaps could be applied with some ideas and networking?. to give an example, the Travel industry is suffering from a lack of affordable technology soloutions that are very simple to program as long as the right idea is there. I have often wanted to network and give ideas to "out of work" programmers who could easily make some bucks "inventing" desktop/database tools and resell them.

One company made a mega search engine that collected data from all the travel sites such as Travelocity Orbitz etc. and displays them with the 3 best quotes (Including airline quotes). searching 31 sites in one entry is brilliant. they are now starting to market this to travelagencies who were hit by web bookings....

I bet the handfull of regulars here who are IT/Programmers could do something with their sparetime that could have an impact and create an idea that would yield a future.....

just a thought.