that's my suggested headline - but feel free to change it. Further to my comments on the Aweb discussion, the SaaS evangelists have expended many thousands of words on our site on the subject and to be frank, I am beginning to view the debate a little like medieval theologists arguing about the number of angels that can dance on the head of a pin.

One gripe I would have with blog-driven conversations is that they operate like mind maps, leading you off into all kinds of tributaries and diversions. they are not good at distilling knowledge and insight down into logical, easily digested formats that get the message across more powerfully. In this way, a well structured article is pretty much like a piece of computer code that programs the reader to think and behave in a certain way.

This is your mission - deliver me 500 words or so in an agreed, signed statement that tells accountants :
* what SaaS is
* why it should be important to the financial management community
* the benefits it can confer
* the risks (perceived and real) it may involve and why they should not be frightented of it
* what they should look for from a potential SaaS partner
(You can go up to more, if you need it, but the more verbiage, the less clear your argument will be, I suspect. If required, I am happy to run a series of articles on the topic - as typing the brief, I have already expanded the envelope a little)

I'm interested to hear Dennis' latest stance, which I take as a bit of a wake-up to the debate. It gels with my attitude that focusing on the tech is an age-old mistake. Experience suggests that the accounting software market has become very brand-driven and I don't see SaaS putting a dent in that yet.

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