4chan is running out of money

Usenet/netnews is the complete antithesis to centralized forums.

No.

Amezou(person) started the Amezou. Nisimura Hiroyuki cloned Amezou and started 2ch.

Then, nameless person cloned 2ch and started Futaba channel.

4chan cloned from Futaba channel.

Due to its position as the nexus of "internet culture" for at least a few years in the late 2000s, 4chan is very special. It is one of two major general purpose chans (the other being 8chan). All other chans, including 8chan, define themselves along the lines of "4chan but...", "4chan without...", "4chan with...", or similar. And if they don't now, they started that way.

8chan is the only one that has gained and kept a large enough dedicated userbase for significant content and memes with broad appeal to originate from there. This is a unique consequence of its origin.

Most living alt chans are specialized supplements to 4chan (the "4chan with..." category), and make no apologies for it. Many 4chan regulars frequent one or two: I enjoy cyberpunk literature and content, there's a chan for that. Some people hate the lack of a board dedicated to drugs, there's a chan for that. But most still go to 4chan, at least nostalgically, often in search of a long-gone "board culture" that we loved years ago. And 4chan remains the single point where chan culture blends, posting style is standardized, and memes catch fire.

8chan was not born as a supplement to 4chan. Like many failed chans, it was created when 4chan moderators did, or were perceived to be doing or planning, something to anger users. But 8chan and the controversy that popularized it were different. Usually moot's missteps become jokes. GamerGate convinced a significant number of people (more precisely, a subset of white male teenagers, henceforth "gators") that there really was a vast conspiracy to indoctrinate the youth using video games. 4chan's moderators were judged to be part of the media element of that conspiracy. From that point, 4chan permanently lost the trust and loyalty of gators. They went to 8chan, closely followed by far-right goons who take /pol/ very seriously and would become inconsolable when moot did routine pranks like background music or wacky CSS. Somehow this was a diverse enough group (in interests, not background) to put 8chan in direct competition with 4chan.

If 4chan folds, I predict 8chan alone will get the bulk of the users unless a direct spiritual successor emerges. Board closures probably wouldn't matter to users, neither would ads or upload limits. It's more a question of whether those measures would actually solve the money problem.