When all you have is a great idea...

[Gabriel Gunderson]

Dear Abby... er, PLUG,

I'm pretty funny about business ideas.  I try to think of cool new
businesses all day long.  It's something I enjoy doing (I get it from my
dad - ever the entrepreneur).  I can't take a shower or a walk without
"working" on one of them.  While it's yet to make me rich, I do enjoy
using the spare brain cycles.

When all you have is a great idea, where do you go with it?  Do you
share it and risk others taking it?  Should you care, or is that being
silly?

Usually, I don't take the ideas too seriously and I share them with
others with the hope they may do something with it.  Anyway, I came up
with an idea this week that really stands out in my mind.  It's an
advertising business that's 90% technology (Open Source) and 10%
whatever else.  An advertiser wouldn't come up with it on his own, but a
technologist might.  It is very, very targeted and I'm betting has a
*very* high "click-through" rate.  I believe it would be *extremely*
easy to sell.  I'm certain it's not currently being done by anyone else.
You can see why I would be excited.

The problems are...
1) Only a med-big company could pull-it-off.
2) A partnership with someone like Google would be needed.
3) It needs to be rolled-out in large cities all at once.
4) Significant upfront hardware cost.

Where does that leave the guy who doesn't even have time to shovel his
walkway but has a killer idea?

What would you do?

Sincerely,
Underfunded in S.F.