When you can't turn on your computer to get work done, you can still grab a good old-fashioned pen and legal pad and get more work done in peace and quiet without phones, fax or email to distract you than you could ever get done when things get back to "normal."

It struck me last night as I struggled to get my high- speed Internet connection going again that I was much more stressed over getting a stupid piece of hardware to function than I was over driving 50+ miles to find gas just two days before!

In fact, looking back, I was more proud of fact that on Saturday I found what was probably last cold six pack of beer in all of Southeastern Virginia than I was about my last successful online product launch!

And after spending many days and nights in dark, I realized that Internet represents ultimate convenience, but it's also ultimate business risk because so much can happen to shut Internet down or prevent you from accessing it.

If recent events taught me anything, they taught me these three truths about life:

1. Life is fragile and valuable - don't take it for granted.

2. Nothing is more important than safety and well- being of family and friends. Sometimes it takes a calamity to remind us.

3. Anyone who depends on Internet for their entire livelihood should seek to diversify how they make their money - just in case Internet disappears one day when you least expect it!

A file is anything that you have in a file other than www.yourselectedname.com with same server. Example; www.yourselectedname.com/yournamedfile

A WYSIWYG (WHAT YOU SEE IS WHAT YOU GET ) editor, is helpful and is sometimes supplied by your host. All this means is that you can make a webpage in same way that I initially typed/created this document in Microsoft Word. That is to say, font, colour, spacing, paragraphs, indents, caps, etc, are as you see them ( without html tags or other coding ). Anyways, you can get such an editor from other sources, if your host doesn't supply them (search engine, again ). Free html editors are widespread and some knowledge of this is worth effort.

You can buy your own products with re-selling rights, meaning that after initial cost, all of profits are yours. Digital products are simplest as they are deliverable via internet (downloadable to purchaser, almost instantly ). In some countries, electronically deliverable product are tax exempt. These products include e-books, main advantage being their deliverability, both from seller and buyers point of view. These are normally in PDF format due to its cross-platform compatibility ( viewable on Macs and Windows ). The software for creating e-books is widely available, again, some having more security features than others. A virtual book cover to display on your site is easily done and customisable. If you have a topic/report/information of widespread appeal, you are more than half way there. An affiliate program can be set up to sell for you. One particular company will even track your affiliate sales. In my opinion, this is cheaper that POD (printing on demand), but perhaps lacks traditional literature appeal. Indeed, both are relatively new concepts and both concepts are good.

Selling any of above "editors", or indeed creating them, if you have experience in that area is done via a website. An affiliate program will boost any sales if your product is "saleable", and of reasonable value. Imagine it, you might have been through a war, tragedy, illness, abduction by aliens, non abduction by aliens, or just about anything, and people will want to know about it. You are not over hill, if your memory or imagination is relatively intact. Neither are you below hill if you are young, assuming you possess one of aforementioned attributes, let alone, two. You no longer need to belong to an exclusive or traditionally "tight" club to gain exposure. A website is REAL MAGIC. P.S. A platform such as this website is invaluable.

Only your imagination can stop you now.