How do google, myspace, facebook... founders make so much money? I never pay to use those sites?

[Leila]

And I never pay attention to the ads. This boggles my mind.

[Alison]

because they have shares in other compaines online and offlin so tyhe can hav enough to kee themselves gingalso funding depending on hits

[flicka09]

Not sure---maybe sponsors and those types of people???

[Val]

People pay to advertise on those sites.

[ns]

Everytime you go to a page with an advertisement they make a very, very small amount of money. With the massive amounts of traffic that can add up very fast.

[dim]

Once they've started their company, they sell shares of the company to people who want them. Plus, once their company is famous enough, they're more than likely able to sell advertising space to people.

Just because you don't click those ads doesn't mean NOBODY does.

[rtfm]

Whether you actually pay attention to the ads or not doesn't make a difference. Ads placed on major sites like you're asking about are not "pay per click" ads. The sponsors pay big bucks to the site owners for the privilege of having their ads appear on your monitor. They figure that enough people *will* pay attention to their ads to make it worth their while.

[The Mrs.]

They all sell advertising space. That is where they get a good chunk of their money from.

[mr.mathico]

They get money from advertisers. They pay a lot to advertise on a site like these. People constantly use them everyday.

[imisidro]

You may not pay attention to the ads, but others are. Hence, Google's advertising revenues are $21 billion in 2008 http://investor.google.com/fin_data.html

Note that they have ads where just by viewing the page, they get paid. Not all ads are cost per click where they earn only if the ad is clicked on. They also have ads by CPM or cost per impression.

And advertisers come to them in droves to advertise. That's why they make so much money from advertising