Sounds like an interesting project. I'm a temporary freelancer, currently 'drifting' between work. I've done extensive work on linux dealing with distributed network analysis using C, and web based applications using PHP/MySQL.
Based on how complex the scope of the project, i.e. how effectively you want the software to 'befriend' the spiders without jeopardizing their implicit trust, and the model for 'staying on top' (central server synchronization, p2p exchange, self AI maintaining, etc.), this project is not going to come cheap.
After the project, I've failed to deliver. ;)