If you're like me and have too much time on your hands, and not enough money, you may want to try a few of these things if you aren't already. Much of this is going to be a rehash of material you might find on /r/beermoney, so you may check there for more information. I should mention that these methods are not a substitute for a job, but they can be done usually quickly and pay for things like groceries. Something to keep in mind $.1 per minute is $6 per hour. You should probably not shoot for lower than that unless you think it will unlock something that pays more than that.
General Crowdwork The kind of work that you generally associate with mTurk. Sometimes it's surveys, sometimes it's training AI, and sometimes it's things like giving feedback on products. Usually it's pretty low paying, but that's not always the case.
- mTurk The original crowdwork website. Used to be peoples' go to for easy work, but is pretty barren nowadays due to Amazon's neglect. You can probably still make a few bucks per day on there through surveys and some batch work if you put in effort. More work becomes available as you pass certain "qualifications" like amount of tasks completed successfully. You can take a few qualification tests here if you want to get a start on work that might otherwise be closed to you. If you're feeling stuck on your overall amount of approved HITs (tasks), I'm going to include a list of requestors that approve pretty readily. Check /r/mturk to learn a bit more about it because its design is a bit arcane at this point.
Requestors that I use:
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MLDatatlabeler : Requires taking an approval qualification. One of the only decent batch requestors left on the site. Tasks are almost all "bounding box" AI training. Pay is usually pretty low, but occasionally you can find some work that pays $15 an hour or so. I think this is an official Amazon account, but I'm not sure.
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Pickfu / Sellametrics: Give your opinion on products without the threat of being screened out
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Audiokite: Give your thoughts on largely folk bands
Caution:
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p9r : Long time requestor that now bulk rejects work
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Ooga: For profit surveys. Can pay, but you might find yourself screened out of most work.
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Prolific The gold standard in online studies at the moment. Pretty consistent work with decent pay ($6 to $13 usually). There is no wait-list for this anymore to my knowledge, so you should be able to just get started. More information here: https://old.reddit.com/r/ProlificAc/
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CloudResearch Connect Direct competitor to Prolific with similar pay but less work. You can usually find studies posted here during normal 9 to 5 weekdays. Any other time is going to be pretty sparse. The main difference is that you can rate the "requestors" at the end of each survey. More info here: https://old.reddit.com/r/CloudResearchConnect/
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Swagbucks Very low paying site largely based around surveys for products, as well as clicking affiliate links. You can also submit receipts for cash back on your groceries. Has been around for 2 decades or so. I used to use this to pay for my World of Warcraft subscription.
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Paid Viewpoint Another product based survey site. You may get screened out of some of the surveys.
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Intellizoom Another product based survey site. Owned by the same company that runs Usertesting. I got screened out of so many surveys on this that I gave up on it, but it is an option if you think you can game it.
Project focused
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UserTesting Test websites for cash. I've never used this, but I've heard that it's a bit more time and attention intensive. It is likely higher paying.
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Data Annotation Largely AI training. Has a preliminary test prior to getting approved. Supposedly high paying, but I've never been approved due to their likely long wait-list.
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UHRS Microsoft's AI training site. The layout is pretty frustrating, but the pay can be on the higher end.
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Dscout Video interview based marketing research. More time consuming, but can pay pretty well.
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Focus groups: Can be found online and are usually the highest paying
Transcription Transcribe audio clips into text. Usually labor intensive with bad quality audio clips.
Cash Back
It's kind of like a credit card rewards program, but you have to submit your receipts. Most of these largely cater to grocery purchases.
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https://receipthog.com/
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Credit Card Cash back programs: You can probably find one that pays back anywhere from 2-3% if you put in a little effort. Worth it if you pay for everything via credit card anyway.
Free cryptocurrency
Usually involves watching a 1 to 3 minute video and answering a few questions. Can be extremely sporadic. Check coinbase and coinmarketcap occasionally to find these.
Passive income
This will usually involve already having some cash to spare, but you also don't have to do anything.
- Savings accounts are currently paying around 5% APY
- $SPY's dividend is usually around 3-4%. You can also try $SCHD which is like a dividend stock exclusive version of $SPY, but you might find that the overall performance is worse.
- I bonds (US Treasury notes) are guaranteed to beat inflation over their lifespan.
- Foreign bonds: No idea on how to do this legally, but countries like Brazil are paying 12% APY on their bonds right now. Might be an option if you want to do a little research.
Miscellaneous
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Sign up for class actions (These usually take years to settle, and might not pay out at all YMMV)
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Drop shipping?
Skill based
- Smut writing
- Drawing porn (furry or otherwise)
- Graphic design
- Translation work
- "Bug hunting" Involves finding and reporting problems with the code in websites. YMMV.
Online jobs with hours and the like You may also see /r/workonline for more information
If you have your own suggestions, please add them below.
If you're halfway decent at writing, you can also try your hand at publishing smut digitally. There's info on how to go about doing this on r/EroticAuthors.
I think it's funny as hell but on a serious note it's a potential way to create a residual income. Maybe you won't ever make it big like Chuck Tingle has but it's possible to get a respectable amount of money coming in by taking this route.
I hear good things about furry porn too, but both of those things are a bit beyond my capacity artistically. Translation work might be good for that kind of thing too.
EDIT: I will add this into the guide.
I may or may not have done such visual art; it can still be kinda hard to break into the "industry" but it can pay alright as far as commission based freelance stuff goes
I hate to ask, but how does one "break into" an industry like that?
It's more getting noticed and creating a presence to where you can have regular commissions & clients. I'm loathe to shill and advertise for myself which can make such things a bit difficult
Another skill-based opportunity is going for bounties for bugs in code and hacking bounties.
From what I hear, companies pay out those bounties in the same way insurance pays out claims. As little as possible no matter how much in the right you are to receive the money
Not a suggestion, just my experience with mTurk. (I work a few hours a week in an office all by my lonesome with no cameras or supervision, so I figured out a way to burn about 30~40 minutes on HITs)
As a frequent mTurker from the USA... I'd probably recommend estimating down to a few dollars on a good day instead of $5~$10.
Lots of tasks are locked behind requirements of having 100's of accepted HITs already and I've noticed that its getting harder and harder to find short $0.01 tasks to pad. Its rare that the "you have to pass a test to qualify for these HITs" or "you have to request permission to work on these HITs" tasks actually have anybody on the other end to accept the test results or request for permission.
About a 1/3 of the HITs on the first page just link off to other "survey" sites that loop you through an infinite series of survey qualifiers that rarely bring up an actual survey... and it will take longer to "get matched" with a survey than the mTurk HIT time limit. These do seem to use the same submitter's names so they can be avoided even though there doesn't seem to be a way to automatically filter them out.
Well over half of the HITs that I see on my "You Qualify for This" are for $0.01 and they can take 5 minutes (at a minimum) to complete. I once checked out a penny task that, for $0.01, expected you to answer something like 100 questions related to 100 different images.
Many of the surveys are specifically not formatted for cell phones, which sucks if you only have a cell phone, because the actual research (University or Market varieties) when they trickle in do consistently work and pay out (even if its only $0.15 to $0.25 cents) for a reasonable amount of time.
It has been a while since I've come across HITs that seemed reasonable but the actual task was often impossible. There used to be a cargo ship company that would submit HITs to look at scans of Bills of Lading for some information... but about every second or third scan just wouldn't have the required information anywhere on the document (and the instructions were very explicit that the information MUST be found and it ALWAYS has a specific format). A chunk of my "rejections" were from this.
Attention checks and "are you a robot?" checks are the worst. Just got rejected for failing an AI check where the question was something like, "Bill is happier than Susan." The possible answers were "Susan is sadder than Bill", "Bill is sadder than Susan" and "Bill and Susan are both sad." Somebody being happier than somebody else doesn't make the other person sad.
I have to turn off all my "safe web browsing" extensions and my computer's VPN for mTurk to work. Though I've got a cellphone with a VPN service that works as a hotspot that doesn't make mTurk unhappy so long as I'm using a server in the USA, which is how I access the internet without trying to figure out a way to use the company's internet.
I'd probably recommend estimating down to a few dollars on a good day instead of $5~$10.
Hmm, that has been my experience over the last year, but I just figured that was because I was doing most of my HITs after I got off work. I'll probably change that.
Lots of tasks are locked behind requirements of having 100's of accepted HITs already and I've noticed that its getting harder and harder to find short $0.01 tasks to pad. Its rare that the "you have to pass a test to qualify for these HITs" or "you have to request permission to work on these HITs" tasks actually have anybody on the other end to accept the test results or request for permission.
There is a way to find and take some of the qualification tests without having to contact anyone, but I was too lazy to actually find the link. I'll try to get that edited in a little later. I do agree that getting hundreds of approved HITs to really do anything is a steep ask, which is why I might include the names of some requestors that can help people get to that level. I think 500 approved HITs is where most requestors have their standard cutoff if they qual for that kind of thing at all.
About a 1/3 of the HITs on the first page just link off to other "survey" sites that loop you through an infinite series of survey qualifiers that rarely bring up an actual survey... and it will take longer to "get matched" with a survey than the mTurk HIT time limit. These do seem to use the same submitter's names so they can be avoided even though there doesn't seem to be a way to automatically filter them out.
That is part of the reason I never fuck with anything but academic surveys on there. You almost never get screened out of them, and they pay better than most other tasks. I'm sure there's a way to get consistent approvals on them, but I don't know what that is. Can you drop the names of a few requestors that you think might be beneficial to people (and are able to be accessed)?
It has been a while since I've come across HITs that seemed reasonable but the actual task was often impossible. There used to be a cargo ship company that would submit HITs to look at scans of Bills of Lading for some information... but about every second or third scan just wouldn't have the required information anywhere on the document (and the instructions were very explicit that the information MUST be found and it ALWAYS has a specific format). A chunk of my "rejections" were from this.
Sounds like p9r
I have to turn off all my "safe web browsing" extensions and my computer's VPN for mTurk to work. Though I've got a cellphone with a VPN service that works as a hotspot that doesn't make mTurk unhappy so long as I'm using a server in the USA, which is how I access the internet without trying to figure out a way to use the company's internet.
Has Amazon ever given you a hard time about the VPN? It was my understanding that they'd ban you for that.
There is a way to find and take some of the qualification tests without having to contact anyone,
You can, when there is a Qualifying Test or Request Permission option, click on the button for HITs that you don't yet qualify for and there'll be a list of criteria and their codes with a link to the Test or Request. But it has been my experience that I rarely get any indication of what my test results were and none of the HITs that I expected to be available had I been approved show up.
Can you drop the names of a few requestors that you think might be beneficial to people (and are able to be accessed)?
I'll see about paying more attention to the Requestor's names and the HIT requirements and make a short list later. Give me something else to do while I do my "almost but not quite bullshit" paying job. I guess a "Naughty/Nice" list will be on them with Christmas coming up.
Has Amazon ever given you a hard time about the VPN? It was my understanding that they'd ban you for that.
So, when I had a Windows OS and the NordVPN application installed, I would just be straight up blocked from being able to log into mTurk if the VPN was on. The log in screen would load to a looping, "Verify Your Identity" screen.
Cellphone hotspot with a VPN running: Haven't had any problems logging into mTurk, accepting HITs, or having submitted HITs rejected. So I'm guessing that, as long as it doesn't seem like I'm using a VPN to get around a HITs attempts to limit submissions by IP address or by Day or whatever... nobody is going to care. Though I'd probably try to pick a server near where you've told Amazon you actually live just to be on the safe side. Especially since some of the HITs have geo-location criteria.
