Hi! I've been refining all my business ideas I keep coming up with and along the way realised a good compliment to establishing blogs(with the long term goal of making money) and offering web design services and other info sites,is the web application.I've come up with a totally unique web app idea-2 actually. Although currently i'm more focussed on one.Seems the way to make good money online is through web apps.(with hard work of course) Firstly i plan to raise the capital via establishing blogsites and selling web templates and eventually web design services/logo designs. When my financial situation is stable then i can launch the web app. I've been doing as much research as possible to determine competition and as far as i can tell nothing comes close to what i've got in mind.I've already got a notepad file of potential competitors. Which means wow i've hit a jackpot OR there is a reason why its not been done OR it's just no one has thought of it yet.There is also the possibility someone is already developing it right now.. Ok,getting close to asking the questions. I know a little html and css but no server side languages. I was thinking of learning either php or ruby on rails. The worse case scenario is the web app fails but i have learnt 1 or 2 server side langages which i can continue to use or use as a fallback job option when i start my 2 offline projects. Alternatively, i could outsource the coding to a professional programmer,which i'm wary of-don't want a programmer to run off with the idea.[last week on A Current Affair 2 programmers threatened to hire a hitman to kill the person who hired him so they could run off with the idea!! it was recorded on tape and relayed on tv.The threatened guy contacted police!-scary!!] There is only 1 person (offline) who knows this idea,and immediately advised me to keep it to myself!..which is what i thought. I believe the web app can be scaleable so startup funding really isn't all important. I will be doing via bootstrapping but with rapid development and deployment. I have this sense of urgency that if i wait around and not do anything someone else will beat me to it. This perhaps is becuase i've read the ebook "Ideavirus". I'm hoping to learn rails within 3months and then spend 3months coding the app,if i take that path. So far i've estimated about AU$5000 in startup costs roughly if i do design and development/marketing/seo/management not counting outsourcing of other stuff. I've done as much as reading around the net as possible,and the following questions come to mind. Here's a list of questions- 1.Should i build the app myself after learning the language,and hire programmers later for maintenance and maybe fixing bugs? 2.Do i get a "innovation patent" (quicker approval process here in australia for that kind of patent) for the web app? OR is not patenting better at protecting the code? How should i protect this kind of idea,if i do outsource programming?(apart from confidentiality agreements) 3.Is it necessary to start a company in order to launch a web app? or can i just start the web app myself? Whats more successful? 4.Do you recommend starting a company? 5.Whether i form a company or not,should i outsource as much work as possible? 6.Do i need a physical offline team..or just do what i can and outsource the rest? 7.Are terms of service and disclaimers enough..is insurance a must when starting a web app?(i.e. I'm wanting to minimise legal costs) 8.I don't have the offline contacts required,outsourcing makes sense but then how do i entrust critical parts of business function externally? If i'm not clear on something just ask. I appreciate any advice and feedback so i can make some concrete decisions and move forward with this.I do have a few more questions which arent too important at this stage. Thankyou, arcanus