I read a terrific post about social media revenue at the Anthill Online LinkedIn group today.
http://tinyurl.com/nxm992 
In it, Kim Wingerei said:
"....trying to sell stuff on social media sites is not just difficult, but it may even be contrary to the very purpose of what social media is about:
sharing and interaction between like-minded people".

This reminded me of the goldrush analogy:
where the people who made the money were the Chinese, by selling shovels etc to the hapless gold diggers.
So how does this relate to making money from social media? 
If it's hard for a Twitter or a Facebook to monetize their core activities because people don't want them to change, maybe the answer is to monetize their non-core activities.

Take a superior video navigation tool, for instance............
letting users navigate video with more precision than clicking on page after page of thumbnails.....
a web service they can access as a gadget, where advertising appears alongside their search results.
Would they accept these ads in return for enhancements like this?
My bet is 'yes'.
Tools like this are a step beyond the fun-oriented Facebook apps we see so many of today.
But social networks that allow tools of high utility to integrate and share revenue stand to deal themselves into the 'Chinese at the gold rush' story. 
What other tools are candidates to play this kind of role in monetizing social media?