The one place were I see the internet as helping outdoor writers is in photograpy.  These photographers who have on line sites do seem to sell more images.  They do have to watermark the images they put up in their websites and monitor the use of those images.

You may know a great old friend of mine, Jim Foster? He is an outstanding photographer and a master at marketing his writing and photography. He put together a web site back before most of us took them seriously and he has sold many an image in just the way you describe.

You mentioned going to TOWA, I was a member of that group for most of the time that I lived in Texas. I have tons of fond memories of the days when Paul Hope was its main spark plug and the meetings were held in Austin every year. When he and so many of the other old timers passed away the hole they left made the meetings painful experiences for me and I had to quit going.