A belated update to say thanks for the invite you gave me then - I had registered my interest with aviary way back when but never made the list, so thanks to you I got to play.
I have now actually *bought* an aviary account, so it would have been a loss to them! I bought it in part to support them (i want some of the apps they plan to build!) and in part because apps like these actually allow me to work on other people's computers, allows me to use an old second hand laptop on the road instead of having to buy a fancy up to date machine, and of course also when not in windows.
I really need to learn the tool properly though, all I have done is basics and dabbling
And to the people who have tools - I have tools on my main machine(s) on windows for vector (freehand and xara and canvas and some more I'm afraid I am bulimic with vector, and do near nothing with them!) and photography (photoimpact, psp, acdsee - no photoshop!) but I have to lug my 17" laptop with me to have access to them, and on my desktop if I boot to an alternate OS I don't have them either. With tools like aviary I can consider buying an old laptop second hand with 512M or 1G or ram as my memory and CPU are used only for the app and the viewing, all the juice for the image processing itself is on the server. And obviously it works on BSD, Solaris, at a friend's house etc.
It will be a long time before webapps become my main apps, but it is nice to know you don't have to always take your stuff with you.