The money is still out there, you just have to work harder/smarter to get it.
1. Free hosts started redirecting foreign traffic and/or you are not marketing to it.
English is only 43% of all online traffic, that means you are missing out on 57% profit possibilites.
http://www.glreach.com/globstats/index.php3
2. The internet went through a major growth where newbie surfers abounded, the surfer growth has slowed, and the newbies are now tgp surfing veterans
http://www.netvalley.com/intvalstat.html
3. The number of websites was small compared to the number of new surfers, the number of new websites has exploded at a much higher rate than the growth of surfers.
http://www.zooknic.com/Domains/counts.html
Summary = More experienced surfers, less newbies, more websites, more free porn.
RD