You would be surprised how much aggregate purchasing power "poor people" have.

As someone that lives in a third world country, the biggest companies are those that sell lots of products to the masses - not the boutique shops that sell to "middle & upper classes". i.e. the "bottom of the pyramid". In fact, Carlos Slim (the richest man in the world) has a ton of companies that sell to the bottom of the pyramid, and he is doing fine ;)

The businesses, here, that target the middle-to-upper classes tend to struggle.

So I am fairly certain there is a way to monetize this.

In fact, some users do want to pay to keep their site alive. So we just need to balance the amount that is paid and make sure resources are effectively allocated.

Carlos Slim has a govt-enforced monopoly. http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57369357-93/telecom-monopol...

So do many other companies in many other countries - including utilities in the US - but the owners are not the richest people in the world. In fact, they probably don't come in the top 10.

I say that to say that having a monopoly is not a guarantee of maximum success.

In the case of a true monopoly it pretty much is.

Well tell that to the local oil monopoly in Venezuela....whose coffers are being raided to feed populist urges.