There are other ways to be free that don't require ads! As long as your revenue engine benefits from lots of traffic, then giving stuff away (which is cheap on

There are other ways to be free that don't require ads! As long as your revenue engine benefits from lots of traffic, then giving stuff away (which is cheap on the internet) will be one way to get that traffic. One example is 37 signals. Their blogging (free content given away) gets them traffic, and they can take a shot at converting that into customers for their paid for products. No ad vendor in sight.