In the world of celebrity, no one is a plain star anymore.

Anybody who gets more exposure than, say, the inside of a bank vault, immediately becomes a megastar; not a superstar - that's so seventies - but a megastar.

The humble cast list or dramatis personae is a relic of the Empire.

If you are on silver screen, stage or TV you are a hyper-galactic-nebula-busting-media-sensation of the highest excellence, regardless of experience.

So it is with software development. Not even fresh-faced graduates are programmers any longer.

Title inflation has hit hard over the years and now a graduate enters the industry as a developer - a title previously reserved for experienced coders.

The term analyst-programmer, passed over and old-fashioned, has been long since assigned to the recycle bin.

Nowadays, principal developer status is reached within two years of starting a career and CVs proclaim the level of architect just as soon as the first design model is flashed around the project team. How much more exciting it is to be called an architect; a technical title but with a hint of creative romance so long missing from the world of computing.

This is all harmless enough you say; it's natural for people to blow their own trumpets and inflate their experience in order to get a better position. But is it really without its dangers?

A fresh breeze is blowing through the IT job market after many months in the doldrums, and as reported in Computing (16 September) Jane Binner, associate director of leading recruitment firm Computer People, said, 'Prospects for IT jobseekers are the best they have been since the late 1990s.'

When the job market expands, salaries are not far behind and money is a difficult area for recruiters.

The old adage is that if you pay peanuts you get monkeys but what happens when wages are on the up? Today's decent salary today becomes tomorrow's salted pub snack. The good staff you have today and want to hold on to spill through the door before human resources has a chance to ask who hid the bananas.

Salary is a large part of the picture but the emphasis needs to be wider. Job satisfaction is immensely important and in IT, that often translates as tinkering with computers.

Too many people forget that satisfaction means more than just the money. The technology that's on offer and access to the latest innovations have to be intertwined as a package of incentives.

In an industry moving faster than a speeding train, people are also attracted by the prospect of continuous learning and keeping up with hot technologies.

The fact these technologies have a limited track record does not stop employees from wanting to dabble, and a wise company will limit a project that wishes to take on board new software tools, methodologies, concepts or platforms.

With the rising employment prospects, relieved developers can breathe out and start leveraging their CV for maximum money and technological kudos.

Escalating pressure will be put on bosses to get with the latest trends as staff eye the job sites for better pay and better CV points.

There are plenty of developers who sat through the recent darkness using old - but perfectly serviceable technology who now see the opportunity to come into the light and update their skills.

Role inflation probably is harmless for celebrities and developers alike, and we all want to be well-thought of, but inflationary salaries give you more to consider than just the resource costs.

Developers do not know for sure if new technology will really make it quicker and easier to build software, but they are quite willing for your company to take the risk.

William Knight is a software developer and writer on IT issues