This thread should have been started MONTHS ago - but I urge all who are interested to start immediately.
Anyone born in a country or a citizen of a country that sent less than 50,000 immigrants to the US last year is eligible to enter the Green Card Lottery - it is a federal program that gives 50,000 Green Cards to people from those countries refered to above.
The DEALINE FOR APPLYING IS JANUARY 7th 2005. Ladies (and men for that matter) from Russia are INELLIGIBLE (because there were more than 50,000 immigrants from Russia last year) but ALL of the other FSU countries are eligible.
Please check the Department of Homeland Security's website. And so it soon. All the details can be found there. It costs nothing to apply.