Make not-so-much money by providing generic content on a subject until X level of popularity is reached, at which point you transition the audience into a not-astounding paycheck and the web property into a commodity valued solely in visits.
And the world moves on, nothing bettered, and very little changed, beyond a tiny shifting of money ownership.
Information Dilution. Instead of a site with dense, focused, relevant content, we can create hundreds of sites with watered-down information.
The more sites we have to sift through, the more money everybody makes.
Google has incentivized the web to dilute content.
Everybody starts somewhere.
I could definitely use U$ 20.000, it's more than a year and a half of my (post-taxes) salary here in Uruguay.
(And yes, I should look into consulting, etc. HN is a great way to nag me to move forward and it's good advice).
But, if what you say is true then surely you should consider writing a blog as described in the article?
This sounds like the "How to Get Rich Quick" book that instructs its readers to write and promote a "How to Get Rich Quick" book.
Where exactly is the common ground between writing something you believe in and writing and developing a blog with the explicit goal of an optimal quick cash exit?
Maybe putting some more time into it will yield rewards that don't appear to be sub-minimum wage?
"Detailed revenue breakdown of a gadget blog ($61k in dec 2007)"
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=216960
http://selfmademinds.com/200801/income-breakdown-for-decembe...
That sounds like paying for a link to me. Does it count as paid links to them? I always wondered about this kind of thing - I would never keep visiting an authored website if something like this happened to it, and I don't know anyone who would, so I've never understood what the buyer gets in this situation.
