Ok, I made 1974 bucks doing this in 2006 (and Guru and CRZ got CDs out of the deal). I spend several hours a day goofing around with it, but mostly TV watching time.
Has anyone else found the "gravy train" on the web?
In 2002, my buddy turned me onto selling lists on eBay of wholesalers around the country that sell high-end clothing brands. You're not selling merchandise, just lists of places that do on a Word Document. She emailed me a copy for free, then I sold it for anywhere from $0.99 to $3.99 a piece, depending on what kind of auction I set up. Once someone won the auction & paid, I would simply email them the list.
It started off slow at first since none of my feedback had anything to do with the lists, but once had built up about 10 or so list-related positive feedbacks, it started to take off. At my peak, I made about $150 bucks in a month, but my average was around $120. Not too shabby for little/no actual work. I had a copy of the list at home, one at work, and I hosted one online. So no matter where I was, I could email off the list to the winning bidder usually within minutes of payment.
That is until eBay made a new rule that you cant list namebrands or items in your auction that you're not actually selling. They started cancelling my auctions left & right until I finally stopped listing all of the awesome brand names you could find on the list. Then I stopped getting traffic from people doing searches for "Fendi", "Fubu", "Jordans", etc. and my sales went down the toilet :(
Ok, I made 1974 bucks doing this in 2006 (and Guru and CRZ got CDs out of the deal). I spend several hours a day goofing around with it, but mostly TV watching time.
Has anyone else found the "gravy train" on the web?
Wait, as in one thousand, nine hundred seventy-four dollars? How many hours did that take? Several hours a day could be 700-900 hours - do you think you are clearing $2 per hour?
I was making around $.20/hour when I was doing it. It just wasn't worth it.
For my answer: Nothing. I've lost money on everything I've done via the web besides my ING Direct savings account. This includes this site, even after considering our ads and affiliate programs.
I sell random bits of junk on ebay and craigslist.
At one time I was involved in a college level math/science tutoring service which has since been dissolved. I made around $5/hr/student to answer their questions and help them with example problems through an IM client.
Ken Kennedy debuted a new finisher: Jeff Hardy fans will insist on calling it the Swanton Bomb, but it looks WAY more devastating when not performed by a 180-pound fruitcake. -Rick Scaia 06.12.2006
You wanted the best, you got... Out of Context Quote of the Week.
"They're plump, ripe, and priced to move. Get your fat Samoan today!" (Packman V2)
Freshman year of college, I signed up for AllAdvantage (I think that's the name). You know, they pay you a pittance to have ad banners on your screen while you poke around on the Web. Everyone told me it was a scam and that I'd never get paid... until I got the check for $25. By that point, I'd signed up for about five other programs and downloaded every single program I could to cheat them (for instance, moving the mouse automatically and browsing a pre-selected list of Web sites). Then my computer blew up and/or those companies went under, so that was the end of that.
Originally posted by DJ FrostyFreezeIn 2002, my buddy turned me onto selling lists on eBay of wholesalers around the country
I'm a big Ebay seller. I go around to Goodwill's and find nice looking items that are in really good condition and sell well on Ebay. You can find a sports jersey or a pair of athletic shoes at Goodwill for $2 and then get $40 for it on Ebay. I mostly do it when I need some extra money for one of my kids upcoming birthdays or for Christmas presents for the whole family. I can easily make $300 to $500 a week if I put my heart into it.
Hey DJ Frosty, you wouldn't by any chance have any lists for electronic or video game wholesalers ? Or where I might find them on the web ? I've always tried to find out where you can get that stuff dirt cheap like alot of major Ebay sellers do, but I have had no success.
Originally posted by DJ FrostyFreezeIn 2002, my buddy turned me onto selling lists on eBay of wholesalers around the country
I'm a big Ebay seller. I go around to Goodwill's and find nice looking items that are in really good condition and sell well on Ebay. You can find a sports jersey or a pair of athletic shoes at Goodwill for $2 and then get $40 for it on Ebay. I mostly do it when I need some extra money for one of my kids upcoming birthdays or for Christmas presents for the whole family. I can easily make $300 to $500 a week if I put my heart into it.
Hey DJ Frosty, you wouldn't by any chance have any lists for electronic or video game wholesalers ? Or where I might find them on the web ? I've always tried to find out where you can get that stuff dirt cheap like alot of major Ebay sellers do, but I have had no success.
From my research a few years ago, most of the legit places won't sell to you without a tax id number. Things might have changed in the last four years though (I was thinking of starting my own video store to compete with my idiot owner).
I've always thought that I could make it big off of Ebay, but I could never come up with something that I thought would sell well that I could get for a good price. Sure, I have a couple of foreign wholesalers bookmarked, but when I look through the products that they offer I'm overwhelmed with choices and lack of expertise on most markets. OR the items that I do have a little knowledge about AND can purchase readily (Computer Hardware, Software, & Accessories, etc.) are sold on razor-thin margins to the general public which make them even riskier.
Originally posted by drjayphdFreshman year of college, I signed up for AllAdvantage (I think that's the name). You know, they pay you a pittance to have ad banners on your screen while you poke around on the Web. Everyone told me it was a scam and that I'd never get paid... until I got the check for $25. By that point, I'd signed up for about five other programs and downloaded every single program I could to cheat them (for instance, moving the mouse automatically and browsing a pre-selected list of Web sites). Then my computer blew up and/or those companies went under, so that was the end of that.
Yeah I remember AllAdvantage. I'll second the word that they were legit, as I got checked from them too. It wasn't much, but it was better than most that was out there, that is until they turned sweepstakes-prizes-only.
Those who know what's best for us must rise and save us from ourselves.
So I'm tempted to dive into Amazon Mechanical Turk, but apparently you have to report the money you make from this on your taxes? For those that have done this, can you shed a little insight? Amazon's own FAQ tells me nothing, and I don't want to get audited over twenty cents.
1) I posted several classified ads, some online and some in a few strategically selected newspapers, advertising my copy editing skills. I charge $0.50/100 words, and will edit virtually anything except contracts. Most of the things I read are in the 1,000-3,000 word range, so I make $15 on a big paper. But twice I've had grad students give me papers of more than 20,000 words.
I've been doing it for about six months, and business is picking up. I have a few recurring customers. I get college students wanting papers proofed, office workers wanting business proposals read or a few other random little things. Twice, people have wanted cover letters in the range of 200 words read, and since 40 cents isn't really worth my time, I charged them 20 bucks.
Originally posted by drjayphdFreshman year of college, I signed up for AllAdvantage (I think that's the name). You know, they pay you a pittance to have ad banners on your screen while you poke around on the Web. Everyone told me it was a scam and that I'd never get paid... until I got the check for $25. By that point, I'd signed up for about five other programs and downloaded every single program I could to cheat them (for instance, moving the mouse automatically and browsing a pre-selected list of Web sites). Then my computer blew up and/or those companies went under, so that was the end of that.
Yeah I remember AllAdvantage. I'll second the word that they were legit, as I got checked from them too. It wasn't much, but it was better than most that was out there, that is until they turned sweepstakes-prizes-only.
Count me as another former user of AllAdvantage ... I installed that taskbar on every PC in the college computer lab; not sure if anyone ever left them open when they started surfing the net, but I made some chump change out of the whole deal.
Any (small) amount of coin I made off the internet mostly came from affiliates (Amazon, Art.Com, etc.) off my old website ... I was also briefly hired to man the Boston Celtics channel on the old Rivals.Com, but I was hardly able to live off the income coming in from that (this would be JUUUUST before the dot-com bubble burst, so I was still naive enough to think I could make a living off of it).
Even if you don't get a 1099 you have to report the income. It's not a get out of taxes free card for you - its just not enough to meet the threshold for the other company to have to do the paperwork.
Report everything. Talk to a tax expert.
I'm definitely paying too much in taxes as we aren't anywhere near profitable here, but due to the way we structure the bills I get all the income and CRZ pays all the bills, so I end up getting hit with the taxes. It's all "free" money anyway since neither of us depend on it for our livelihood.
I'll probably actually incorporate us at some point and it will require an accountant (or we will become an LLC and still need an accountant) but really we're talking about under $500 total in revenue for the site a year, so it's not worth it right now.
I figure if I ended up giving the government back all $500 of it I still wouldn't be too hurt, so I don't mind overpaying right now.
I write for a website, www.AssociatedContent.com Anybody can sign up and submit articles on any topic you want. Most people who write there get $3 - $5 an article so it's just a little extra money but lately I've been making about $8 or $9 an hour writing for them.
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Our property management company just dropped off a big vase of chocolate-covered Oreos. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. They knocked off the previous champion, the can of Brown and Haley Almond Roca we got from our international freight forwarder.