Microworkers as a freelance writing site?
@SpikeTheLobster (6403)
June 16, 2011 9:44am CST
This is an interesting development. For those of you unfamiliar with Microworkers, it's a place where employers post little, easy, quick tasks and pay a small amount for their completion. It's a neat idea: a few cents for a few clicks, basically.
Just now, I was looking through my list of available tasks and noticed that someone had posted two article-writing jobs. One was a rewrite (for $1 or so), the other was an actual "create an article on this subject, using two of these key phrases..." jobs for $3.50.
This is new: I've never seen a writing job on there before. OK, so I'm not going to write 300+ words for $3.50 but it occurred to me that a lot of people would. That pay's better than a lot of places, for starters.
As a user, I was a bit freaked out by it, to be honest. Interested, but freaked out. If it's picked up as a way to use the site, I can see the whole thing becoming flooded with low-income, high-output offers - which would potentially kill the site.
As an employer, I wonder how the person is going to judge whether the job has been done 'correctly'. How do you judge quality or do you just accept the task as complete if the key phrase is there often enough and it makes vague sense? Surely adding "must be perfect English" would make it virtually impossible to complete the task?
Any opinion on using Microworkers in this way, either as an employer or a user?
5 people like this
11 responses
@GardenGerty (160708)
• United States
16 Jun 11
I joined because of a post by someone else here. If links are added to a discussion or the discussion seems to be promoting another site, MyLot will delete the discussion. It is not "so rewarding" but it is not terrible either. Just another site to earn a few cents. It is a US based task site.
1 person likes this
@GardenGerty (160708)
• United States
16 Jun 11
I would do it, depending on the topic. If it was one I could do easily. I worked for an overseas broker for much less per word. Did not like it. At least here I would have a choice. When I used to research websites while doing those jobs I noticed that the English was far from perfect in these content oriented sites. When I got criticized for writing some things properly, and then also was assigned to write a lie by changing names on an established script, I said " No More" The rate you names is not much lower than some on Textbroker.
1 person likes this
@GardenGerty (160708)
• United States
16 Jun 11
My daughter writes for Textbroker, but she makes more than I would as she tested better on her tests. I am signed up for so many sites, but I just am not doing what I should be. I had rather MyLot, etc. I guess.
1 person likes this
@SpikeTheLobster (6403)
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16 Jun 11
And I'm sitting here on MyLot when I have 3 jobs I should be finishing... 
1 person likes this
@SpikeTheLobster (6403)
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16 Jun 11
That's interesting to know (about Textbroker). I can't use them, since they're US-only, and I've become a little pickier about my rates since it's been a while and I generally produce good quality stuff. I guess I'd do it if it were a subject I could write about without any research, now that I think about it. But it wasn't - it was interior design or something. I can't even tell the difference between eggshell and white. 
1 person likes this
@KrauseHome (36448)
• United States
19 Jun 11
Personally this is a site I have not heard of yet. Might be worth looking into if it would not take much time to earn there. I am always trying to find New ways to make a little bit of extra $$ out there. Just wish I had more time to do so. But I will check into this site and see if it looks like something interesting for me.
1 person likes this
@padu19 (1441)
• India
17 Jun 11
Microworkers indeed is a good site to work in. As you say, there are people who would like to go in for some writing tasks. Also, the same person can earn some extra cents by voting for someone, creating email id or subscribing to someone's interesting videos in youtube. There are a good variety of jobs there. But at times, I wonder how fast people are working. because by the time I complete the task almost 200 people would have completed it and the task would have got ended. I have missed a few easy tasks that way!! 
But, I still like working in microworkers, because they ensure that even if a person misunderstood the requirement and completed the work incorrectly, he always has the chance of taking of other jobs. Atleast after a month, the rejected tasks will be hidden and the employee's percentage will shoot up. 
By the way, I am waiting to earn 10 more cents to earn my first $10 from microworkers.
But, I still like working in microworkers, because they ensure that even if a person misunderstood the requirement and completed the work incorrectly, he always has the chance of taking of other jobs. Atleast after a month, the rejected tasks will be hidden and the employee's percentage will shoot up.
By the way, I am waiting to earn 10 more cents to earn my first $10 from microworkers. 1 person likes this
@SpikeTheLobster (6403)
•
17 Jun 11
Tasks are normally locked for 5 minutes so you can complete them, as soon as you hit the "I accept this task" link. That should give you enough time to finish up (especially if you're not actually sitting and waiting on a page for 3 minutes like they ask you to... which I suspect most people are doing).
I'm quite pleasantly surprised by the site, to be honest: it pays fairly well for such simple jobs (depending on the employers) and there's usually at least ONE job everyone can grab.
Congrats on your first payout - mine took about a week, I think.
1 person likes this
@SpikeTheLobster (6403)
•
17 Jun 11
Those are the ones I do as well. Makes me wish I had a PR9 blog about everything and anything, so I could do all those high-paying posts.
@topffer (42156)
• France
16 Jun 11
I remember that they had some writing tasks in 2009 when I joined, but I did not used this site in 2009. The only writing tasks I do today are small comments on Youtube and tweets. Does they check your writing ? definitely not. I like to have some fun with tasks, and I have made some bad puns and jokes with these comments. I remember a comment for the glory of a prince of Dubai where I made a comment so obsequious that it was ridiculously funny : I have been paid. Yesterday, I did a $0.15 tweet to send to a New York Times article about a trial around a patent for processing digital copies of checks. I read that the inventor earned $400 millions with it. The employer was asking to support this poor guy. I twitted "As a press baron I support xxx"... and the tweet has been paid one hour later
.
.1 person likes this
@SpikeTheLobster (6403)
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16 Jun 11
It's up to the employer to check whether the job is done: I guess if they're asking 100 people to tweet something, they're probably not going to check them all! So, as a press baron, got a job for me?
1 person likes this
@topffer (42156)
• France
16 Jun 11
I am sure they checked... the number of my followers, and nothing else, and I have often noticed this. When an employer requests 100 words for a comment on a blog, if you put a very good comment with 99 words, you will not be paid, but a stupid one with 101 words will be paid, so why not having some fun ?
You are probably more qualified than myself to be a twitter press baron and develop your own tweet empire.
.1 person likes this
@r0ck_r0ck (1952)
• India
17 Jun 11
Its perfectly normal, i don't know about microworkers but i can tell, articles are sold around that 1$ to 3$, sadly i see here in mylot tasks people offering 50cents for a 600 words article which i think is ultra cheap and unfair, so if you are confused about the rates of the articles, that's what they actually are.
1 person likes this
@SpikeTheLobster (6403)
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17 Jun 11
It wasn't the price (I'm familiar with the wide range of decent and very indecent offers around), it was more the oddity of seeing article work on that site - which isn't really built for the potentially complex relationship between a writer and employer.
@anujain75 (1059)
• India
16 Jun 11
Microworker though a good site for writing article, but still, i prefer core freelancing sites. Because i get work in bulk. Second of all, you can directly interact with client. Two, three good clients can provide you year long writing job.
In microworker you can't contact with client directly.
Even in terms of payment, I prefer freelancing site over microworker, you can ask for advance or for escrow as well
1 person likes this
@SpikeTheLobster (6403)
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16 Jun 11
I agree - the bid sites are a lot better and direct clients are the best. Still, it intrigued me to see the section "Write An Article" on Microworkers when I'd never thought of it as a writing market.
The Microworkers payment system is effectively the same as escrow (though not exactly the same, obviously). No advances but since the job would only be for a single article, that makes sense.
I can see people using Microworkers as a way of getting a cheap batch of articles, though - pay a bit, send it out to 20 people, you have 20 articles on your subject in very short order. The delays for an employer would be minimal.
I'll have to run a test and see how quality looks some time. I love doing little experiments like that.
@rocking61279 (182)
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16 Jun 11
Yeah no doubts about that micro workers is a good and legit site but the problem that i have and many others too that if the employer thinks the blog is not generating much traffic then the employer rejects the offer this has happened to me 2 times so keep the whole concentration on other offers they might be less paying but there is a sense of certainity in that..
@SpikeTheLobster (6403)
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16 Jun 11
You can raise a support ticket for those: if you've completed the task and pasted your proofs in, the employer's decision will be overturned (I had two like this and one has already been credited to me - the other's on its way soon).
@monasharma (967)
• India
16 Jun 11
Hi spike...This is one more writing site then....bt I think the tasks and offers are much better coz they consume little time..
If they pay nice then it would be great site in the writing sites....
Thanx.....
1 person likes this
@SpikeTheLobster (6403)
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16 Jun 11
I'm a little wary of it but - as Gerty said above - if the pay's right, why not?
At least with Microworkers you know the funds are already there. I'm just a little suspicious of the criteria employers will be able to inflict (and thus avoid paying).
