So Justice Gray asks (in his own inimitable way), what do you do when inspiration hits and you get the urge to maroon yourself on an island working on the Next Big Thing©?

I've been wrestling with similar questions, on a much smaller scale (and from his description, it pretty much had to be), with Flamingo. The more I think about the features I want to add, the more I think there's commercial potential.

But the more I think about the commercial potential, the more I also think I don't want to deal with it. I talked it over with a good friend of mine ad nauseum asking, "What should I do? Should I add this feature? How should I bill? Should I bring in other coders? Do you want to code for me for free?" And since it's music based, there are also a ton of issues around copyright laws which is definitely something I'd rather avoid (although in the Bahamas, copyright laws are seen more as guidelines).

In my own situation, I'm also dealing with the fact that I already have a full-time+ job working from home plus several other side projects, one of which actually pays. And I live in the Caribbean for Jayzus' sake! What the &*%$ am I doing behind a @#&! computer all day anyway?

So this brought me to an alternate road to success albeit one that will take much longer and one where the benefits are more subtle. In it, I work sporadically, but diligently, on this project and focus more on making it a collaborative project.

I.E. I'll post the code along with some blurb about certain sections and offer it up for discussion. For example, "I used Atlas for this section because..." and "I decided to go with TableAdapters instead of rolling my own Domain layer because..." and so on and so forth.

Since making this decision, I have eased a tremendous amount of personal guilt at not having worked on the project. As in, I don't feel as bad at slighting you, the developer community, as I do Joe Hick in Alabama who may want to use this application to listen to his collection of The Irish Rovers' Greatest Hits online.

The road to success I referred to earlier has a lower payoff  in the event of success but also a lot less risk. The intent is that the idea and the app catch on with the development community which pays off in the form of reputation and potential opportunities in the form of interesting consulting contracts. If it doesn't catch on, I've still advanced my coding skills.

What I like about this is that there is no second-guessing what the general public really wants. And more importantly, I can work on what I want to, when I want to. So while I probably won't become a millionaire overnight, the fact is I'm not doing too badly for myself now anyway.

And besides, I'm a hillbilly who likes his sleep.