Former affiliate marketer sells eCommerce site for 3.35 billion (5)

The son of a teacher and a glassware importer, Cohen fixated early on becoming an entrepreneur. At 15 he discovered the dark art of affiliate marketing, collecting fees for referring customers to e-commerce sites. He got so good at it that he started banking thousands of dollars a month. While looking for a programmer to help build his affiliate sites, he met Michael Day in a Java chat room. Day dropped out of the University of Georgia to join forces with him, and in 2011 they sank $150,000 of their own money into an online jewelry startup in Florida. But after a visit to a Miami trade show, they felt intimidated by how much there was to learn about gems and precious metals and realized they had no passion for the business.