Sure but they're not selling ads because the lack of ads is the unique selling point of the consumer product. It's a loss leader to build the brand for the b2b / gov stuff.
If they junk up the consumer experience too much users can just switch to Google who, obviously is the behemoth in the ad space.
Obviously there's money to be made there but they have no moat - I feel like despite the first mover advantage their position is tenuous and ads risk disrupting that edge with consumers.
Some of us remember when Google was just an upstart and anyone who wanted to do anything serious used Altavista or MetaCrawler. Even the behemoths can get taken out.
If they junk up the consumer experience too much users can just switch to Google who, obviously is the behemoth in the ad space.
Obviously there's money to be made there but they have no moat - I feel like despite the first mover advantage their position is tenuous and ads risk disrupting that edge with consumers.