Business 2.0 Magazine looks at scrappy entrepreneurs who are squeezing big money out of websites that tap into the latest news, trends, and search fads.

When word of a whites-only scholarship at Boston University hit the media last fall–drawing coverage from bloggers and biggies like ABC alike–Daniel Kovach smelled opportunity. His goal: to boost traffic to the website he runs, Scholarships Around the US. So he paid a writer to crank out “The White Man’s Guide to Getting a Minority Scholarship,” which reveals that some schools do offer scholarships to “nonblack” students–and added it to the mix.

Then Kovach planted a link to the article on recommendation site Digg, where it jumped to the coveted front page. That, in turn, led other sites to link to the article. And Kovach landed a top search ranking on Google for phrases like “white man scholarship.”

Such timely strategies have helped Kovach turn his year-old site into a $10,000-per-month cash cow (see correction below). Not bad for a 26-year-old who works about an hour a day out of his townhouse in Raleigh, N.C.

Media outlets have, of course, always exploited offbeat events and stories to drive traffic. But today it’s easier than ever to profit from a surge of interest in a particular topic. Some people simply aim for 15 minutes of Web fame and make a few hundred bucks by setting up a site around a topic, loading it with Google pay-per-click ads, and working social sites to link to it.

CNN Money