When it comes to untying the Gordian profit knot, the most successful of the Internet companies has been eBay. This massive auctioneer functions as a community, a marketplace that links people who sans internet would be unable to mingle. Communities thrive everywhere on the net - chat groups, message boards, blogging networks, and internet mailing lists. The dynamic of communities is one of the recurring themes one runs in to when analyzing the internet. ICQ - a popular chat program - links acquaintances, and peer to peer programs like Kazaa allow for the exchange of music and software in a communal way. Tools like these that simultaneously link many Internet users have come to dominate the Internet.

But making money off of communities is not always easy.

Ebay survives because it links buyers and sellers, charging a per-transaction commission. Other communities - B2B and G2B companies like Mediagrif, a Montreal based company - survive because they bring businesses and/or governments together in virtual exchanges to interact as buyers or sellers. The nature of Mediagrif's customer base allows them to charge large monthly membership fees, after all these clients have deep pockets. Kazaa ships its product with advertising software that operates in the background, businesses paying to have their adds shown. But how does one make money off communities of friends, acquaintances, and those with similar interests who want only to socially interact and search the internet, not buy, sell, or exchange? These users do not have deep pockets, and have gotten used to the free nature of the internet. Charge them a buck and they'll leave.

Stumbleupon started out in 2002 as a simple tool to find good websites on the net. Instead of using Google for their search needs, new members of Stumble (aka, the stumbler) are asked to input their personal interests, this information being used to locate what the engine believes the stumbler will find interesting. As one stumbles over and around the Net by rapidly clicking the ubiquitious stumble button located in a toolbar on the Internet Explorer window, one is asked to rate the websites that are found, enabling the service to get an idea of what users like and how better to search for them in the future.

The shared information and ratings of all registered stumblers is used to best locate websites. Thus people with similar interests can share sites they like, comment on them, and search for new websites to add to the existing pool. Collectively, the stumbler's ratings provide a ranking system that ensures the best sites tend to circulate the most, poor websites being filtered out. This is strikingly different from most search engines. Google, for instance, uses black-box algorithms to search the net - users don't really know how searches work, they only see the list of relevant choices. Stumble incorporates you, the new user, into the Stumble community and along with everyone else in the community make you its engine. The stumbler is able to benefit from the rankings and comments of other users, making the engine more human and collaborative than Google. In this respect the company seems more like an Ebay or a Kazaa; communities made up of contributing citizens. Search engines like Google and Yahoo, on the other hand, though effective, have provided impersonal and solitary experiences.

As Stumbleupon has developed it has expanded beyond a simple search tool. The communal and collaborative nature of Stumble allows people to meet, share interests, and communicate in a way that other search engines don't. By uniting its unique search capabilities with new features like blogging, email messaging, groups, and (in the future perhaps) chat and file exchange, it brings together many community-type functions that were previously separate and distinct, providing a one-stop fits all internet social tool. Stumbleupon has the potential to be the ultimate friend to friend network. The company brings searchers together by giving them a name, a face, and a personal webspace that puts blogging and messaging tools at the user's fingertips. It's search engine anchors the whole thing by pooling the interests of Stumbleupon users to locate and rate websites in a more efficient manner than Google and Yahoo.

Stumbleupon's success depends on it attracting a sufficient number of users so that it becomes self-perpetuating. A threshold number of users are necessary in order to hunt out new sites and provide suitable rankings for these sites so the engine can find the most pertinent ones for users in the future. With Stumble providing structure, the users must provide the content, be the content, and rate the content. As more people join, the company's database will grow and become more powerful, attracting more stumblers. At least that is the plan. Stumbleupon must work on becoming addictive, a resource people will not only want, but need in order to search and communicate on the internet. It must link people, create friendships, and enable relationships to form, kind of like the online dating services that flourish on the net. These companies have found that linking people romantically in our increasingly digital world is something people are willing to pay for. If Stumble can become not only a good search engine but lever its collaborative nature to also be an efficient meeting place for friends, it will reach into the same large user base the online dating companies, blogs, and chat groups are tapping. As the Stumble creators add new features that increase connectivity between stumblers, expect the addictive-level to increase, and the network's reputation as a meeting place for friends of similar interests to grow.

But how will it make money? The company's founders have to pay for food somehow. At the moment, Stumble earns Amazon referral revenue that pays for its server costs. Because it doesn't send out salary checks, the company is cash-flow positive, a positive early sign. In the future revenue could come from several sources. Advertising seems the easiest source. Given that Stumble is community-based and depends on the loyalty of its users, it must tiptoe carefully in this area. It is vital that the company preserves its integrity and the respect it has earned from stumblers. Annoying pop up banners would immediately turn new and existing users off, sponsored advertising and directed ads stand a better chance. Each stumbler is given a webspace of their own, a site that shows who they are, what they have rated, comments, their likes, and their dislikes. Because each user's interests are known by admin, it might be possible to place targeted advertising - advertising that intelligently links people's preferences with their commercial needs - on these spaces. These ads will appeal to the user, or any another visitor viewing that user's space, rather than the random penis-enlargement or secret camera pop-up ads that seem to populate the Internet. A program like this could be optional - stumblers either choosing to have their webspace host ads and friend's spaces reveal ads, or choosing to opt out entirely. Stumble could encourage its users to opt in and display adds on their page if there is some sort of profit sharing principle, where a small amount of add revenue generated by a stumbler's webspace is credited to a Paypal account. In a way, this would align Stumbleupon's profit motives with its users - both will seek to increase add revenue by attracting more people to their webspace. Alternatively, the company could auction categories to advertisers and route these adds to the screens of stumblers who have checked off that particular interest in their options box. It is important not to get ahead here. Until Stumble grows large enough, it will be very difficult to convince companies to even attempt to advertise.

If Stumbleupon chooses to stay relatively non-commercial, it might take the route that some blogs have taken. Optional payments or donations have been solicited by some of the more popular blogs to help pay for the survival and maintenance of their site, kind of like the end -of-show passing-of-the-hat by street performers. Loyalty and respect for the creators of Stumble might drive the users to help support the network they use and hold dear. The company might find this a useful way to stay up and running till community size is sufficient. Or, if it is content with what it makes through donations, it could permanently survive in this fashion.

And monthly charges? That depends how addictive the service becomes, how meaningfully it connects its users, and how high the charge is. Given the size of the Stumbleupon community and its growth trend, a marginal charge of, say, $1 a month would be highly lucrative for the company. Would users be willing to pay this fee, and are existing e-cash payment methods trusted and used by enough stumblers to be a realistic means for the company to charge $1 a month? Dating service match.com charges its customers $24.95 a month, its 700,000 clients generating $125 million in revenue and $36 million in profits. This impressive profitability demonstrates the willingness of match.com's user base to pay on a continuing basis for an arena that provides meaningful contact. Stumble could do what some dating companies have done; allow all content and searching to be free and perusable, but communication and interaction fee- based.

All these approaches to profitability depend on the community growing to a level in which it can either attract advertisers, count on the goodwill and donations of a much larger user base, or convince new existing users it is worth paying an online fee to be part of the network. This means that Stumble must continue to grow and attract new users, operating with little to no profits till some crucial point is reached. With a growing subscriber base of about 100 day, expansion will continue as it has, largely through word of mouth over the internet and the founder's friends and acquaintances, though some sort of old-world ad campaign might help. Relocation of the company from Calgary to Montreal would locate Stumbleupon in a much larger city, one known for its multiculturalism and its many links to other countries, in the end providing a decent real-world arena in which to network and promote its virtual arena.

In the end, no business plan is a sure thing. The only way Stumble will succeed is by continuing on its trial and error path and continuously adapting to the ever-changing environment presented by the Net, hopefully landing on that lucky square that ensures continued existence, and some profits for its founders.