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Summary Description Simon Vandore looks at the sharp end of running a dot com.

Introduction
At 9.30am Emma found Jeremy slumped over his steering wheel. Fast food wrappers stuffed into paper coffee cups said he'd spent the weekend in his car. She ignored the smell and slid into the passenger seat.

Body
"You OK?"
"Good to go."
He turned the ignition and headed for the city office. The coder kids were waiting.
"It still doesn't work. Can't see the ports and won't recognise standard user input. Crashes and we don't know why. Might take another six weeks. Michael is not happy."
"Michael?" said Jeremy. "He's here?"
"In the server room."
Jeremy ran down the corridor and opened a door. His business partner was playing with a knife, pressing it against his skin. A paring knife from the kitchen, it looked like. There was already blood on his shirt.
"Er . . . you ready?"
"As ever," replied Michael and placed the knife in the sink.
Programmers stared as Emma, Jeremy and Michael headed back to the car. They crossed town and walked into a hotel where they freshened up.
When Emma saw them next, Jeremy had shaved and Michael wore a jacket to hide the stain. They walked downstairs and into the hotel's restaurant. The journalists were waiting.
"Ladies and gentlemen, good morning!" Michael said. "Welcome to an exclusive preview of what we feel is the next step in . . ."
Emma beamed as she handed out the media releases. Jeremy ran the technical presentation, and by 2pm it was all over the Web. Tomorrow it would be all over the financial pages, because they were getting very rich.
It was all going just great.

*****

Michael raised the knife and looked around the room.
It was January, the silly season. He might even make television. The audience was smiling from his jokes and full of five-star food.
This was his third dot com in nine months. The media still hadn't noticed what was happening at the first, and this time he was joining a big company. The money was right, there was an established product base and they were giving him real power.
Light from the cameras flashed on the blade and made him blink. It was time.
"I'd like to thank the people who make these great products that improve our lives; the guys on the ground, the design team. This," he said looking the knife, "is dedicated to all of them."
He cut the cake and grinned. It was all going just great.

Vandore appears every Friday on Newswire. You can contact Simon Vandore at svandore@acptech.net.