I believe when this economy recovers, conditions will be ripe for launching a consulting business. So that said, I'm beginning to research now. I'm trying to decide if Los angeles/Orange Country or San Francisco / Bay Area is a better place to focus my efforts. I'm also debating how important it is to actually be *based* in my target market. Here are my assumptions: Los Angeles - much more marketing saavy city, much less technical. As a technologist I beleive I have greater demand and less competition? This assumes I want to offer a more black-box solution that I can develop form my own office and employ outsourced labor to augment my labor pool as needed. San Francisco - Technology center of the universe and hourly rates are likely higher, but from what I understand, unless I have the pedigree for starting a consulting company there (Stanford MBA, capital, etc) its going to be much more difficult to get started, because its a lot more major companies, less $50-100k entrepreneurial projects. I also have heard that the bay area is ideal for an independent technologist to make a high wage and work on site in the yahoo and google cubicles of the world, but a lot less opportunity exists for me to take the work off-site and black box the solution, using my outsourced labor etc. How valid are my assumptions and conclusions? Anything anyone can add or detract? Thanks in advance.