While pure-play media sites try to figure out how to offset ad sales declines by charging readers, it seems that social networks—surprisingly—are making faster progress at getting their users to pay up. The latest example is teen-friendly social net myYearbook, which says it’s now profitable because of a subscription and virtual goods-based business model that has increased revenues by 120 percent vs. a year ago.

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Other networks like hi5 have begun to diversify their revenue streams with virtual goods and even downloadable games, while social game and app developers have also been making money by getting users to pay for credits and virtual goods. The biggest challenge these sites face with getting these revenue streams to scale is that the payment platforms aren’t streamlined: users need to enter a credit card for every different app or subscription, and for younger users, getting their parents’ buy-in can be a deterrent.