You spent 6 years on this idea with nothing to show for it[red flag]. You say your bottlenecks are programmers, and that you couldn't convince anyone to join you [red flag]. Why did they not buy into it?

Instead of having you convince people, why not have some evidence to do the talking for you? Learn to put ideas into UI flow charts, functional specs. Show a paper prototype to customers and see if it is something they would pay for. Do whatever you can so that other programmers won't look at you like a "dreaded idea guy that wants 99% equity."

As for call IBM or try the start-up route, I would at least call them to see where they are with their research.