Apokarteron said:
I think Google, with the excellent, free, email subscription of 2GB+ and the Google Earth and all of the cool functions. One question: What does Google get out of the free emails and Google Earth? Where do they get paid from to work?
they make a hell of a lot of money through ads, like the ones you see on this site, people will pay to be listed in there then google will pick relevant results and put them there, then whoever owns the site will get paid a small amoun, but google will keep the most money. i think i read once that google makes $8.6 billion a year just from advertising, though i'm not sure if thats true, and thats only the advertising side, there are loads of other ways for them to make money, like the advanced user thing in google earth, that requires a subscription, so more cash for google.
Whatever they do they have a great way of making money, but still being able to provide most (if not all) of their services for free to the world.
Also stuff like google answers, people will pay for the most stupid of questions to be answered! just look at a few here
http://answers.google.com/answers/currentquestions
each one may not be much, but the few dollars here and there all add up, to make a nice little earner
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