Seriously, think how little money it takes to live, and fairly comfortably - probably only about $20,000 a year. That's nothing for any of the multi-millionaires that roam this site. There should definitely be some kind of criteria to determine whether a person is promising (such as what they've done on their own time), but besides that I don't see any problem with the idea.

I would like to point out going to grad school is a great way to live like that and be around creative types.

Edit: Wow that's an old post NM.