What is Amazon Mechanical Turk?
Mechanical Turk is a service offered by Amazon that allows users to complete small tasks (HITs) for small payments. These HITs stand for Human Intelligence Tasks and were founded by Amazon on the basis that humans can perform some tasks better than computers. For example, you may describe an image and receive $0.25. This may seem small but completing these mundane tasks can add up and you can find yourself easily making $10 an hour.Is Mechanical Turk a Spam?
Mechanical Turk has been around since 2005 and is a part of a publicly traded company in the Nasdaq stock exchange. It has paid out millions of dollars to its users, however it has been noted that there are some companies with unethical business practices that use Mechanical Turk users for shoddy pay.
How can you avoid these Scammers
- Stay away from HITs that ask for your personal details such as your name, address, credit card details or your SSN.
- There are internet forums available that discuss MT scams and which are too good to be true. These forums are Turker Nation and MTurk Forum along with a few others.
- Avoid HITs that offer really high pay for virtually none of your time. These are usually scams and if people could make $10 for 5 minutes I think that everyone would be using MT.
- Do they pay you in time? Sometimes these unethical practices include companies rejecting your work on the grounds that it is "inadequate."
Pros
- A lot of different kind of work is offered.
- Payments are easy and only a $10 minimum needs to be met.
- Can make a decent amount of money with some patience.
Cons
- Can often get boring.
- A lot of low paying assignments.
- Can take some time to learn what earns you the most money.
Overall Impression
Mechanical Turk is a great way to make extra money for yourself, however making a full time income is near impossible. There are some reports of users making up to $500 a week but you would find yourself working some crazy hours with those amount of profits. If you find yourself in need of some extra spending money, Mechanical Turk is a great way to make yourself some extra cash. It is important to read the directions carefully on all HITs otherwise you run yourself the possibility of not getting paid in full. Also, the better the work you do, the better the HITs are for you. Best of luck to you teens making money online!
