Making a living off the internet is it possable?

 I see alot of websites up forsale every day on www.sitepoint.com . And it makes me wonder, if the website is making $xxx.xx a month why sell it? I see people selling websites that they say are making $400+ a month, some $1,000+ a month. I just dont under stand it. Unless these people are making $10,000's+ a month why would they want to sell a website making so much money?
 Which brings me to my question. Is it possable to make a living off the internet? Enough money to pay your taxes, health insurance ect and bills? Right now I waste away $50+ a month on video games. I could add to it and turn that money into developing websites. But I would want some kind of a return on my investment. I would like to hear from some people that are making money off of the net. Big or small amounts.

The key to making money on these sort of developments is diversify both in terms of your advertising but also what sort of sites you are working on.

I sold a site for a few thousand dollars recently why?
I had a second site in the same niche which was number 1 for its SERP and was getting far more traffic, my network of mini sites was currently supporting 2 sites equally and that was a drain on my resources, so while it was profitable the site was draining and making it harder for my first site to grow. As part of the deal the new owner has agreed to keep a link to my other site and I to his on the principle sites. mean while the network can shift to a single site and I can focus content and link building on just one site.

Many people look at proxies and directories as a good start to making money, and on the whole their are some great ideas but I still favour the mini and niche site, check out Niks payment blogger site it has step by step to starting a range of websites.

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It is definitely possible to make a leaving from the internet. I think that the most important thing to this direction is to keep on spending the money you earn in order to make more, until you reach your goals.

Now as $50 per month is not a big amount, I would suggest you to get back in the proxy business. At least until you make some money to invest somewhere else.

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yep it is possible. esp if you live in a third world country like me where the dollar exchange rate is high.

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Yes right, its possible, try different things Proxies, myspace, arcade, directories and video sites are a good start.

create more sites to get a network (and more earnings), use the proxy business at the moment you earn enough to rent a dedicated server (the proxy business is so good as your host)

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I forgot, if you're able to create some unique websites and you have at least 2-4 hours a day for promotion and development you can live from the earnings after ~1 year

Looks like my dream is a possibility...just the waiting for the cash to start flowing now.

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Looks like my dream is a possibility...just the waiting for the cash to start flowing now.

I guess you need to read my last comment again, as Nick told you before installing a forum is not enough.

Some FREE hint: Promote your directory to get every day at least 50-100 submissions (without your owns)

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I think the difference that makes you living from the internet, is when you learn how to work smart.

Of course this happens after some time (maybe a lot of time) working hard, but after that you can see things clear.

But in general if you are persistent I can't see a reason why you shouldn't live from it.

 I heard google is cracking down on proxy websites, is it still a good idea to start one? I was thinking about building a network of websites geared twards adsense. Do you think its a good or bad idea?

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MFA site (==made for adsense) belong to the past. At least I don't know someone who make serious money from such sites, and the reason is the duplicate content. The only way to achieve that with MFA is going black hat, and I wouldn't recommend that to anyone as it will probably cost you your adsense account.

On the other hand proxies are not about Google or SEO. The promotion you follow there is totally different. Check this article regarding proxies for more information

 Thanks for the nice read on Proxy's Nikolas, its a nice idea but 3TB of bandwidth  , well that just scares the crap out of me. And to only build a proxy to have it banned is not a good idea also. I am looking for a more steady income. I would be happy if I had websites that payed for a dedicated server and any thing more than that is a plus. My goal is one day make enough money off of the internet where my wife and I no longer have to work. I know I have seen people do it, so it can be done. The big question is if I can do it.

I think if I had half of the skill you do with SMF I would be home free. Your website is just amazing I havent seen a better SMF forum to date. I have alot of really nice ideas, I just need the money to get them out there.

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Thanks for your good words

Let me tell you a real example that may work for you too. I made a proxy site that was making about 300-500 per month and sold it for $3000. That amount is enough to buy an established site or pay to develop one of your ideas

BTW the bandwidth issue can be solved if you can disable hotlinking. I had an incident too that I used 3TB of bandwidth because a p0rn site hotlinked my site.

Nikolas how do you disable hot linking?

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Nikolas how do you disable hot linking?

It can be done with various ways. You can do it with php, .htaccess or even from your control panel (if you are using cpanel)

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My oldest proxy is 9 month old and has still visitors (500-1000 a day)

Olaf how much bandwidth is your proxy using? Thats one thing that worries me. I am scared of a huge bandwidth bill.

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Olaf how much bandwidth is your proxy using? Thats one thing that worries me. I am scared of a huge bandwidth bill.

with CGIproxy I used 1.5 TB bandwidth (6 proxies),  I changed all my proxies to phproxy now (since a few days) and used in two days less than 30GB (with the same traffic)

Thank you for that information Olaf, my worst fears were right. I should just scrap the idea of running a proxy on a VPS I dont want to run the risk of going over on bandwidth.

Olaf do you mind if I ask you what your server specs are? And if its dedicated or colocated?

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Thank you for that information Olaf, my worst fears were right. I should just scrap the idea of running a proxy on a VPS I dont want to run the risk of going over on bandwidth.

Olaf do you mind if I ask you what your server specs are? And if its dedicated or colocated?

Its a dedicated server:
P4 - 2.8 with 1GB memory (I need to upgrade to 2 GB)

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