Padbux, Scam or Not?

I was recently referred to Padbux and thought it might be worth giving a try.  The ads claim that you get 15 cents per ad click and the minimum payout is $1.00.  I created my account and jumped in to look around at the site.  The ads provided only pay $0.01 instead of $0.15 as stated.  The minimum payout is $3.00 instead of $1.00 as far as I can see.

My first day I was offered 8 ads and my account had $0.10 in it from registration.  I went through the ads and earned $0.08.  Basically you click on each ad, a new tab opens, after it is open 20 seconds you type a 2 digit verification code, the page closes and you go on to the next ad.  While the 20 seconds is counting down you can be in another tab doing whatever you want.  This is nice because I only spent about 15 seconds actively dealing with the ads.  However, the next day I logged on and only had 5 ads available and earned $0.05.  For logging on to the site twice I have $0.23 in my account that I can withdraw once I reach $3.00.  At $0.08 earned each day, you should earn $2.40 in one month if you logged on every single day.

Is Padbux a scam?  That is a hard question to answer.  You can "rent" referrals and you can "upgrade" your membership, these ideas seem a little scammy to me.  I would declare the site as a definite waste of time, but not a scam just yet.  I will continue to log into the site for a few weeks and see what I can declare after that.

Padbux pays via Liberty Reserve, AlertPay, and PayPal.  They pay you for referrals as well, so as always my referral link is below.

http://www.padbux.com/?ref=ryanlthornton

MinuteWorkers Scam?

Ashley referred me to this site, she wanted to know if it was a scam or not.  It is similar to Amazon's Mechanical Turk, but a much crazier idea.  Instead of having organizations create the jobs, users can create jobs. For anyone trying to make money online this is huge!  Instead of trying to get referrals and the like for other sites you can pay people to do these things.  Pay people to sign up for other sites, like/favorite YouTube videos, or bookmark your blog.  The sky is pretty much the limit.

You can complete these offers to make money, but I found something else that I thought was worth mentioning.  Minute Workers has a forum that includes site related boards as well as general discussion boards.  After 50 posts are made on your account they start to pay, the general payouts are:

New Post: $0.01

New Thread: $0.01

Per reply to your thread: $0.01

If you decide to just cash-out instead of reinvesting your money, Minute Workers has 2 options available.  The standard cash-out minimum is $10 with no fees.  You can also cash-out at $2 for a 10% fee, which is a pretty cool difference with this site.  Minute Workers pays via PayPal and AlertPay.  As far as I know this service is available from any country.

One important thing with this particular site, just like Mechanical Turk, is to only accept jobs that you are able to finish.  Minute Workers has a reputation value assigned to each member and if it dips too low they will delete your account.  The reputation is based on jobs accepted and then compared to jobs completed.  When you join your reputation will be 100%, 75% or above is acceptable.  Reputation rules are not in place until after you complete 10 jobs, a notification will be sent if you dip below 80%. On Minute Workers all jobs are approved within 7 days.  If an employer doesn't approve/deny your proof of the job, Minute Workers will automatically approve the job and credit the money to your account.

As always, this site allow for referrals and will reward you for them.  As far as I know the bonus is $0.05 per signup and $0.10 after they complete a successful job.  I don't think you get further bonuses after the referred person continues working.  My referral link/banner is below, if you liked my review I would appreciate it if you signed up using my link.

minuteworkers.com/register.php?ref=ryanlthornton

No Blogging Today

Sorry everyone, it is a really hectic day today and I won't be posting anything on any of my blogs today.

Who Is Behind MegaTypers.Com?

I was looking back through some of my blog posts and I am really curious, Who Is Behind MegaTypers.Com?  I can't seem to find anything, but I really want to know.  I have a feeling after doing some research that the pay per 1000 images might be going up due to the rise in popularity of MegaTypers.  If anyone has any info on this site, let me know.  I still think it is a waste of time, but I am really interested in it.

They claim that they offer services to convert scanned papers into editable digital documents.  Why can't I do that, why do I have to do captchas only?  It almost looks like they are doing the captchas for blind people, but I need confirmation on that. Over on ProTypers.Com they say the same thing, but a little more straightforward.

Are we helping the blind avoid captchas?  Or is this just a way to make us feel better about what we are doing?  If this is the truth it will make MegaTypers/ProTypers feel like less of a scam to me.

Sign up for Mega Typers at http://www.megatypers.com/register and use my referral code DDR.

Update: YouData.Com

I received this in my email on Friday night.  I couldn't stop laughing, just the thought of someone sending 49 cents is hilarious to me. When I got home I logged into PayPal and found this:

So I finally found a legit place to make money online!  Hold that thought, there is a little problem with YouData.  I earned this money and now have to wait until other offers are listed on my account.  I logged in again today and nothing.  This is the problem with good sites they only have a few offers available, but they do pay real money.

I will keep an eye on my YouData account and I will keep you all updated.

Looking for Guest Blogger: Fiverr.com

I am looking for a blogger that has experience with fiverr.com.  Working a full-time job doesn't give me enough time to work on a site like fiverr.  For those that don't know fiverr.com is a place where people sell services for $5.  Services range from funny little things to really serious services.  You might find someone that will sing Happy Birthday to you in Spanish.  On another hand you could find someone that can re-design your website for $5. 

I know of 2 people personally that work on fiverr and they make decent money, a little over $100 USD per week.  They have something I don't have, a very unique skill.  One of them can speak Latin fluently and the other has an amazing singing voice. 

If anyone is interested in writing this post please let me know!

Update: YouData.Com

I got a chance to look into YouData.com today and I have a good feeling about this one.  I also read some other bloggers that have used it, other bloggers that I trust.  The initial sign up and survey takes about 15-20 minutes and then you are off to making money.  The only problem is that the site is fairly new and they don't have many ads to view right off the bat.  Once I was done with my profile, I spent 1 minute looking through ads and earned 50 cents.  The site told me to come back later when more ads should be available.

I can't personally confirm it, but another blogger I spoke to said that she gets paid weekly on Fridays and they do not have a payment threshold.  She has made something like $10 USD over the course of a month.  Not bad for spending only 1 minute a day, 25 days per month.  If you figure it out for her time she is making a little over $20 per hour.  Not something to make a living off of, but the automatic deposits to PayPal are nice.  I will post a picture of my PayPal next Friday to see if this is legit or not.

YouData.Com

While looking for more sites to review, I saw another blogger mention YouData.com.  It seems to be just a site where you watch targeted ads and get paid for it.  I will be looking into this site over the coming days and I will update you all on my findings.

As always, if anyone has experience with YouData please let me know in the comments below!

Case Closed: Superpoints.com

Superpoints.com Redemption Threshold by Membership Level

It is official, I am closing the case on Superpoints.com.  I was looking through the site when I stumbled on the picture you see above.  It seems at my current membership level, I can only cash out once I reach 2,500 points.  At the next level (Refer 2 Friends), I can cash out at 1,000 points.  If I refer 5 friends I can cash out at 500, which was my previous goal.  The reason I am closing the case is because requiring referrals is ridiculous and pointless.

I know that I can make fake email addresses and fake Superpoints accounts, I am not going to do that because it isn't worth my time just for $5.   I'll let the account sit and months from now collect all my lucky mails and see where that puts me, but I am putting no more effort into that site.  I can't say whether it is a scam or legit, but I am going to call it a scam regardless.

Stay At Home Mom

Ashley (my fiancee) mentioned the other day that she would like to start looking for a job 10 weeks after Tobias is born.  She would like to work 2nd shift so that I can be home with Tobias, but hopefully still have enough time to spend together.  While I would love to have a 2nd source of income, I don't want her to get burned out.

We got to talking about possible stay at home ideas.  We all look for ways to make money online in our free time, but what if you can dedicate 30-40 hours per week?  Many respectable companies, like Verizon, employ stay at home moms to field customer service phone calls.

We will be looking into various places to find work over the coming weeks and we will share with you our findings.  If anyone is aware of a good place to start looking, please let me know.

Update: Bing Rewards

Ashley's Bing rewards Search and Earn

 

My Bing rewards Search and Earn

 

In the Bing Rewards rules it states that multiple people in the same house can indeed earn rewards.  Ashley and I both have a Bing Rewards account and we earn our points each day.  Her account always seems to make more credits than mine does, so I looked into it.  She can earn up to 20 credits daily and I can only earn up to 10.  Also her daily rewards tend to be worth 1 more point than mine are.

 

Also on my account referral offers keep disappearing and reappearing with different values.  Microsoft must be restructuring this program. 

If you signed up for this program, let me know how many you can earn each day.  Also, if you have multiple people in your house get them to start earning you points.  I just cashed out 250 Microsoft points today and a friend of mine earns for me and is sending me 125 later on today.

Call to Arms: I Need Ideas!

This blog, while a big passion of mine, is very hard to write for.  I need new sites to try and the time to do so.  If anyone would like to suggest sites that they have had a good experience with or people that would like to write guest posts, I am down for that.

I will keep trying on my own to find new content and I will try to continue to update this blog daily.  I just don't want my readers to give up because I can't come up with new content.  I have 3 new sites that I need to look at in the coming days and I will post as soon as I have a chance to look into them.

SwagBucks.com: Is it a Scam or Not?

SwagBucks.com Logo

I completely forgot about SwagBucks.com, I had tried them out a few years back and gave up.  I gave up because I moved and didn't have internet for awhile.  This is just like CashCrate or Superpoints in that they give you points for doing certain things.  I received a birthday email containing 50 SwagBucks which reminded me about the site.  I have left the account sit stale and it has 110 offers sitting in my email ready for me to bang out.  I currently have 134 SwagBucks and need 450 to get $5 from Amazon.

As always this site rewards for referrals so I have my referral link below.  I will update you all as I progress.

http://www.swagbucks.com/refer/goober814

Case Closed: Project Payday

I was honestly going to give Project Payday a shot, I had read good reviews that I thought weren't biased.  I read through everything on the Project Payday site and started to grow more and more concerned.  I did a little research and found that Project Payday is CPA (or Cost Per Action) and that the owner of the site must be rolling in money at this point.  Once I reached the end of the info, Project Payday either wanted $34.95 or 1 TrialPay offer.  First off I avoid TrialPay by any means necessary.  Second if I am making the owner of the site money, why pay him to join?

I looked up some more reviews until I started to find some honest people that admitted that while you do make money on this site, it really isn't worth it.  Unless one of my readers talks me into it, I am closing the case on Project Payday.

Reinvesting Money Earned Online

There are an awful lot of people online trying to earn money everyday.  Everyone that I know starts with the get paid to sites such as MegaTypers, Superpoints, CashCrate, and the like.  Out of those people, most of them gave up when they didn't make much and quit trying.  A few people I know took the money from those things, blogs, and selling items on eBay and reinvested the money.  Those few people are the ones that I looked to when I started and said, "That's what I want to be."  Now those people are making a living on the internet and have quit there days jobs (except for one of them).  That one that didn't quit his day job is smart and he only works the minimum hours to get health insurance.

Now when I say reinvest this is where it can get a little foggy.  Some people take the money and buy items to resell on eBay and others went into stock trading.  Auctions and stocks can be some of the most difficult ways to make money.  eBay particularly because of the sheer amount of competition and stocks because of our economy.  One of my acquaintances did it right (in my opinion), he took the money that he made and bought a domain name and web hosting.  He created a site, referred to as a micro niche site, and sold eBooks. Basically he took a very specific subject that people are interested in and found someone that wrote an eBook on the subject.  He studied the eBook and the subject for awhile and then created an information site that answers the basic questions people would have.  He sold advertising space on the site and earned money from that and then he also earned money from the eBook sales.  Anyone that needed more information would buy the eBook.

This wasn't an overnight success and this certainly isn't the last the internet heard of him.  He did a lot of work to get traffic to his site and worked on it constantly.  When he started to make money from the site, he reinvested into a total of 5 more of these sites.  At any given time he has 5 active sites and up to 5 sites ready to go when something goes wrong. 

His income isn't anything to shake a stick at either, he is currently making a minimum of $45,000 yearly.  That number fluctuates, but he hasn't made less than that.  That is how much he needs to live comfortably and any additional money is reinvested into his "company".  In his eyes the greatest part of this is that he is making money on autopilot and doesn't have to do much work each day.  He is able to work 40 hours a week at his day job and still makes money while on vacation.  I can't say that everyone would succeed at this, but it is definitely something to think about.  I would like to get into something similar, but I just need to earn the capital before I start.

Project Payday

I haven't looked into this yet, but I have an iffy feeling about this one.  I think they pulled me in because they don't claim you are going to make thousands.  They are talking about making a little over $200 in the first month and never really making over $2500 a month.  I will take a look at this over the next few days and hopefully be able to provide a review for it.  If you would like to check it out for yourself, head over to:

http://www.projectpayday.com

Update: Superpoints.com - Halfway There

I am halfway to cashing out for $5 on SuperPoints.  It doesn't even seem worth it, but I just want the money for peace of mind.  I am still having nothing but bad luck earning points with surveys.  I am just relying on LuckyMail and the Super Lucky Button to earn points now.  I am still looking for more sites to try and I will need some time to sit down and look into them.  Once I find something worthy of writing about I will post up an article.  I am still having great luck with Bing Rewards and I have earned around 800 points between Ashley and I.  I haven't spent them yet, but I am thinking about a Gamertag change.

Busy Day

My apologies, but I won't be able to write a post today.  I didn't have time to research anything over the weekend due to Ashley's baby shower.  I will do some research tonight and post an update tomorrow.  Thank you!

Update: Amazon Mechanical Turk

So I decided to do a little "turk-ing" last night and I figured I would test out how much I am really making per hour.  I picked a HIT that had a lot available and they each paid at 5 cents.  The only issue with this HIT was that it required more work than I'm used to for these types of HITs.  In 1 hour I did 125 of them and I was on a computer with 1 monitor which slowed me down a bit.  Today my account was updated and $6.25 was added to my account.  This surprisingly isn't too bad for working on the internet, now keep in mind that this is money that can only be used for shopping on Amazon.  

My only suggestion is that once you find something you are good at, stick with it and keep going.  There are jobs out there for people with specific skills that pay more money, but I haven't found anything within my skill set at this point.

I would be curious to know if any of my readers have tried this yet?

Update: CashCrate.com

Well it seems that CashCrate.com may just be another one of the sites with a plethora of offers, but no real way to make consistent money.  I tried a couple of offers today and I will see where that takes me, but I have a feeling I will be giving up on this site completely.  It is another one of those refer people and make money sites and if you don't join in the beginning it is hard to make any money.