American web working abroad
JFred: People do this from all over.  I have a friend here in Jerusalem who is a translator between Japanese and English.   Having made many contacts when in Japan, all the work is now done over the web in an apartment in Jerusalem.I do web development, but I find that meeting people over the web to do this is not easy.  Anybody could be anywhere and trust is a problem.  Some people have a talent for self promotion, and some don't.  The web is loaded with self promoters and spammers.  Standing out on the web is hard.  Business tends to be about personal relationships and personal trust.I observe that the people who make contacts on the web are very talented bloggers.  Joel Spolsky and 37signals come to mind, also Raganwald. Oh, and of course P. Graham and ycombinator...