Pierre: No suit, no tie, but a big, fat wallet

"Hey there, I'm Ted".

"I'm Jeff, nice to meet you".

If this is what you hear, and the guy with an outstretched hand is in his mid-30s, then you'd better just give it a shake and a broad smile.

Just in case he is one of the few but wealthy dot.com survivors who has not lost his casual shirt.

Billion dollar club

With an average age of 36-and-a-bit, Michael Dell of Dell Computer, Pierre Omidyar and Jeff Skoll of eBay, Ted Waitt of Gateway and Jeff Bezos of Amazon have all built up fortunes in excess of $1bn (�700m) each.

America's forty richest under 40

Michael Dell, 36, Dell Computer: $16.3bn Pierre Omidyar, 34, eBay: $4,4bn Jeff Skoll, 36, eBay: $2,6bn Ted Waitt, 38, Gateway: $1,9bn Jeff Bezos, 37, Amazon: $1,2bn Source: Fortune

Michael - Mr Dell, that is - is the richest under 40 by far, with a personal wealth of more than $16bn.

But the others - Pierre, Jeff, Ted and Jeff - aren't exactly poor either; each of them dwarf showbiz stars like Tom Cruise or sports heroes such as Tiger Woods.

Tom and Tiger are ranked 19th and 40th respectively with their fortunes of $251m and $160m - not quite in the same league as the richest surviving dot.commers.

Ted: Wealth of charm

Even the Washington Redskins owner Dan Snyder is ranked below Vinny Smith of Quest Software, David Filo and Jerry Yang of Yahoo, and Rob Glaser of Real Networks.

But these guys' wealth - for the list of forty is almost exclusively made up of men - should not be seen as a recommendation to try to make it in the dot.com world.

After all, it would cost Michael Dell $12.4bn to hire every dot.commer laid off since January 2000 at a salary of $100,000.

So these days, making it in Hollywood or in sports may well be easier options.