Your best bets for making money with the help of your PC are more mainstream pursuits, such as Web site creation, computer consulting, computer repair, and technical writing, says Paul Edwards, co-author with wife Sarah of the book Working from Home. Edwards, a lawyer and lecturer, is perhaps the country's leading expert on home-based businesses. For years pundits have predicted that the Digital Age would usher in the paperless office and the cashless society. But computers have led to more paper, not less. And though getting cash may be more convenient with computerized ATMs, the need for it is no less great.
Significant change is in the works, at least on the money front.
Today you can carry out transactions using your personal computer and the Internet without exchanging cash. You can buy, and you can sell, and you don't even need a credit card. Online auctions have been the catalyst behind the innovations, says Mark Morgan, a research analyst who specializes in e-finance for the San Francisco investment bank Putnam Lovell. The biggest mover here is a little-known, meteorically growing, and controversial company named PayPal. PayPal Out of the heart of the Silicon Valley, PayPal has vaulted in little over a year from nowhere into first place as the world's largest Internet-based payment network.