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Is there any money to be made building map mashups?

We made a bit of money doing this and this and we could probably create a successful small business from this model. But, there’s a better way. To see how, you have to think of the mashup as a pizza.

Both have a crust: the pizza crust is made from white, whole wheat or even spelt flour; the map mashup crust comes ready-to-bake from Google, Yahoo, Microsoft or DM Solutions.

Then, you pour on your favorite tomato sauce or AJAX framework, and finally layer with toppings: the pizza gets green peppers, sundried tomatoes and mozzarella cheese; the mashup gets coffee shops, homes for sale or beer stores.

And both are delivered to your door in 45 minutes — or it’s free!

Back to the original question …

But, where’s the money?

The toppings.

And, I’m not referring to these toppings (they’re very expensive, difficult to use and go stale pretty quickly).

I’m talking more about what you can grow through a co-op.

I created a co-op a few years ago at the now defunct, publicgis.com. Here’s a thriving example and here’s another. They’re positioned to attract the innovators on the web and, as nature might dictate, could wither away.

The next phase and a good way to start making money is to expand this co-op to reach out to the early adopters and early majority and on a far more populous platform.

Can you fill in the rest?