So quite a lot has changed in the last 10 days.

My Web 2.0 prototype is officially on hold. Did I lose interest? Did I run out of budget? Did I lose faith? Have I been exiled to Camp X-Ray? In short, no, yes, no, and no.

As you may notice on my blog, my family and I are on the move in that most chaotic and stressful of british institutions, moving home. The British don’t have a normal system like in the US, its all very chaotic and expensive. The buyer pays for the survey, which can cost upwards of £1,000. And even after that, the seller could decide to pull out or take a higher offer, without compensating the buyer. Its all very much touch and go right up till the end. Add that to the fact that you have to pay 3% of the purchase price to the government for the ancient “stamp duty”, and you see how expensive a move in this country can be.

As a quick refresher, stamp duty is the oldest tax still administered by the Inland Revenue (the UK IRS). It was introduced in the late 1600’s to help pay for the war against France. Most interesting is the fact that Stamp Duty is what brought about riots in the American colonies in what was dubbed “The Boston Tea Party”. No, I am not making this up!

So, in short, my noble project (well, not that noble) is on hold for a while. The sad reality is that I do not have deep pockets, and every spare penny (or pence) is needed to afford this move. My wife and I love our house to death, but we need more space for inlaws, my son, and an office for me. First on the chopping block is my Apple G4 Cube which I converted into a PC-based Home Theater PC! I’ve kept the case, but am selling all the components.

So where did I get to with the prototype? Very close actually. I wrote the specifications, mapped out a high level technical design. Even started playing around with sample/test code using jQuery and Prototype within the lovely Aptana Web IDE. It sucks to be so close and have to do a full stop. I think considering that I am not flush with stock options or trust funds that I should be happy that I was close to being able to pull something like this off. Once I am back on my feet financially, then all systems will be go.

The moral of this story? Even if you think you can’t, unless you have a massive financial burden staring you in the face (like a house move), then you have no excuse not to try!