Yes, some blogs are profitable - very profitable

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Yes, some blogs are profitable - very profitable

Sam Zuckerman, Chronicle Staff Writer

Sunday, October 21, 2007


In 2005, when Silicon Valley entrepreneur Michael Arrington started TechCrunch, his popular blog on Internet startups, he saw it mainly as a chance to indulge his obsession with young technology companies.

But it turned out that Arrington had latched onto something big. TechCrunch became the go-to site for the scoop on new Web companies. And, as technophiles flocked to TechCrunch, advertisers followed suit. Arrington's blog morphed from a labor of love into a fast-growing business.

Today, TechCrunch has a full-time staff of eight. This year, it hired a CEO. In August, 1.25 million people visited TechCrunch or its affiliated blogs at least once, according to comScore Inc. It brings in $240,000 per month in advertising, according to Arrington, and pulls in additional revenue from conferences and parties. Most important of all, TechCrunch is in the black.

"When I started the blog, it was just a hobby," Arrington said. But, after a while, "It was pretty clear that I could make more money blogging than from anything else."

More quickly than most anyone imagined, blogging is growing up. From the blogosphere's anarchistic roots, a professional cadre is emerging that is creating an industry whose top-performing businesses now earn serious money. The industry is expanding at warp speed. Blog-based media could just be poised to elbow aside traditional print and broadcast outlets to become one of the dominant sources of news, information and opinion, many observers believe.

"As traditional media continue to contract, this stuff is going to expand," said Steve King, senior fellow with the Society for New Communications Research, a Palo Alto think tank. "The business models have caught up and you're starting to see little blog publishing companies that frankly are becoming not so little."

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http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/10/21/BUVJSNSTC.DTL