alt Hacker NewsIIRC Google had no monetization at all until ads. Even then the cost of providing search with ads is orders of magnitude lower compared to running LLMs.
IIRC Google had no monetization at all until ads. Even then the cost of providing search with ads is orders of magnitude lower compared to running LLMs.
They made money by licensing their search technology to other sites, as well as selling physical search appliances for businesses. They were considered by some to be struggling to find a way to monetise well.
Computational cost is indeed higher than search (though remember, search has been heavily optimised for many years!), but search and web companies were one of the lowest cost, highest-margin businesses in human existence. Many higher-cost businesses have been supported by ads.