The future looks bright for dotcom flyers - the average bubble economy worker makes more than $100,000 a year while their boss runs around organising their dry cleaning.

A survey has revealed there are 2.5 million black polo neck new media luvvy-types in the US. They love their jobs, they take their pets to work, they're young and hip and they're far too busy enjoying their jobs to take holidays.

What's more, they are so valuable that their bosses will basically do anything except wipe their arses to keep them from straying to a cyber-rival - including free massages, stock options and dry cleaning.

Meanwhile, they're rolling in it - the average Internet staffer makes $104,000 per year - including $84,000 salary and benefits. That's three times the national average according to the Industry Standard, the San Francisco-based magazine behind the survey.

Apparently, 51 per cent of them claim to be "very happy" (how dare they!), while 14 per cent say they regularly put in more than 12 hours a day (only 13 per cent get paid for overtime).

"For the past two years, this workforce utopia has held the attention of everyone from Wall Street to Main Street," the company's Maryann Jones Thompson writes in the survey.

"But it wasn't all about money. It was fun. What other job could a college graduate walk into at 10am wearing shorts and sandals? And spend days with his dog at his feet, working on projects that required real brain power - then leave at 9pm with a belly full of free food, a few happy-hour beers and a big fat check?"

Other statistics gleaned from the survey show that most of the Net economy staff remain white (83 per cent) and male (around 66 per cent). The average age is 33.8, and a quarter of workers reckon they'll have a new job by this time next year while 80 per cent are looking. Only 64 per cent of holiday time is taken, while 58 per cent work at least one weekend per month.

As for the office perks, 15 per cent get free massage, two thirds can dress how they like and 31 per cent get a dry cleaning service offered by their boss.

The Register management would like to point out that it doesn't hold with all these new fangled dotcom freebies. What's wrong with forking out for a few beers for staff on a Friday night down The Old Monk pub? ®

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