How much time for functionality and theme?

I'm thinking about something along the lines of ... a message and discussion board anchored by a community of bloggers and feature articles. Of course we can do it. Of course I would learn immensely from doing such an initial project. But is that an afternoon of work or a four month project?

Functionality? An afternoon.

Really nice functionality? A week.

Good looking? Depends on Dan's tempo of inspiration, but if you provide the
design then he can turn it into a Drupal theme in a week.

Awesome functionality that breaks the mold of these sites and ushers in a
new enlightenment and revolution? That's a four month project.

Building a community of bloggers... well...

ben

Considering that this is unpaid work for someone whose value to the collective is still unproven, is it too much to aim for really nice functionality and good looking?

Better yet, can we build it with all the functionality and a more or less generic drupal theme and later change the theme from semi-ugly to glorious? Are drupal themes the kind of thing that once a really beautiful theme is created all you have to do is a few quick changes to transform the entire site to display correctly in the new beautiful theme?

How long would it take to slop a new theme across the entire site?

Resolution