"I've got a great idea for a website!"

Being in my line of work is great. It's fun, challenging, rewarding and all that. It definitely beats flippin' burgers. But if I had to think of one major drawback, it would probably be the fact that few people know what I ACTUALLY do, nor to they understand the complexity and worth of it.

Much like somebody who works on cars for a living will get a phone call from a friend looking for some cheap labor any time their car is acting a little bit funky, I've had friends approach me with a look on their face that says it before their mouth ever does. "I've got an idea for a web site!"

This generally yields one of three outcomes:

1. Their "idea" is actually something they've already seen and think they have an original variation of (they don't).

2. Their "idea", though slightly original, is something that would generally take an entire staff of programmers months, if not years, along with LOTS of money to actualize. The friend expects me to make this happen by myself with no monetary backing whatsoever.

3. They really just have a domain name in mind, which is in no way descriptive of what the site will do. Odds are they also haven't bothered to check that domain for availability, which means I will have to, only to find that it's a porn site laden with viruses.

Sometimes I get a combination of those things.

Now let's set aside any conflict of interest of making web sites on the side whilst gainfully employed by a web design company. Let's just throw that non-compete clause in my contract out the window.

If some friends of mine have a band and they want me to design them a simple site or fix/add features to their existing one, that's really not a problem. In fact, I'm happy to do that, considering these friends in bands will often get me into shows for free and things like that. Plus, being friends, I get to take more artistic liberties than I would with a client and, if they don't like it, I can tell them tough doodoo.

But when a friend (or worse, an acquaintance) comes up to me with a glimmer in their eye and mutters this post's eponymous phrase, only to pitch to me something like "A Facebook for people who hate Facebook. Call it Hatebook." or any variation of search engine, my blood runs cold.

I try to calmly explain the complexity of what they're suggesting, and the workload they would be asking me to take on during my free time. That's when I usually get hit with "I'll help you!" I don’t want to knock any of my friends’ abilities or their intelligence in anyway, but the odds of them being any actual help to me are nil.

So, were I to take on any such project, what I would essentially end up doing is a boatload of work while someone with no real knowledge base in my profession feeding me “suggestions” while offering no payment for my time. What’s not to like about that situation?

So I guess all I’m really saying is, if you’ve got a “great” idea for a website, before you approach somebody in the web biz on their free time (honestly, if there’s a beer in my hand, it’d better be the best idea anybody has ever come up with), make sure you have a serious grasp of what that idea entails. Google is an amazing resource for the unknowledgeable to get a basic understanding of what they’re looking for and how feasible it is.

And if you’ve really got a REAL idea for a website, along with the commitment (financial and personal) to making that idea into a reality, well, you know I do this for a living, right?