We've all dreamed of working from home harnessing the power of the internet, haven't we? You know, the dream where you get to spend lots of time with the kids at the beach. Or the one where you get to sleep in if you feel like it or meet a friend for coffee in the middle of the day.

Well, should you do it? Should you take the plunge? Take this quick quiz to see whether starting an internet business could work for you.

1.I expect that starting up my own internet business
will cost me:
a) Nothing
b) Between $100 and $500 per month
c) Over $500 per month, it's very expensive to start up

2.I expect that every day I will work on my new business for approximately:
a) 0 hours, after I've set it up, it should run itself
b) 1 to 8 hours
c) every waking minute

3.I believe that setting up an internet business is:
a) Easy, any fool could do it
b) Requires learning some new skills
c) Impossibly difficult, you have to be a technological guru

4.How long do you think it will take to be showing a profit:
a) within an hour
b) 1 to 3 months
c) 12 months or more

5.I believe that running an internet business is:
a) nothing like running a business in the "real" world
b) has many similarities to running an offline business
c) is much harder than running a business in the offline world

6.Advertising my internet business in some form is:
a) not necessary
b) essential, but relatively inexpensive
c) essential and very costly

7.Bookwork and time management are not my strong suit but I know:
a) that I won't need to do either
b) a certain amount of both is necessary to know where you are in any business
c) something I will end up spending many hours on every week

So how did you go?

If you got mostly a) answers then you have unrealistic expectations of what running an internet business will be like. Don't think about starting up until you've done a bit more research and have a better idea of what's involved, otherwise you'll just be wasting your money.

If most of your answers were c)'s then you're probably not the type of person who should try running a business of any kind, internet or other. You need a certain amount of optimism and faith to start any enterprise and frankly you're just too negative at this point in your life.

If you got mostly b) answers then you have a good idea of what you're getting into and now is the time to do it!

Running an internet business does take time and money. The good news is it takes considerably less time and money than running most traditional businesses.

Let's face it; overheads in the offline world are high. There's rent, vehicle expenses, licences, staff wages, advertising and more. Once you have a computer, your online expenses are quite low, but you will need to spend some money on advertising, on your ISP costs and possibly on other monthly fees.

You will need to learn new skills. There is a lot to learn when you first start but fortunately there are lots of places to go for information and you never have to become some kind of super computer wizard if you don't want to.

So, should you or shouldn't you? It's your decision!