I’ve started Turking it.
What’s that? you ask. Well, it’s a microjob program run by Amazon called the Mechanical Turk. It’s basically our incentive to see ourselves as single processes in an otherwise cosmic-level machine. It’s humbling, yet soothing at the same time.
We are a solid state entity. We breathe together and move together as one single will.
Yet when you draw close, there are a million tiny universes being born and dying in the blink of an eye. And in that brief flash of light, there’s a whole life spooling out untethered, a lashing photocosm of ecstatic living done by a being that doesn’t realize quite how small it is. It lives, breathes, and dies; and somewhere in there, amongst all of the pain and joy and mindless wondering, a job is performed and a change ripples outward, adding to the outcome, the Plan. Everything we do is somewhat preordained, it’s only the getting there that’s considered free will.
I like to tell myself that what I do has some meaning.
I hate to think that I waste my time performing largely mindless tasks for $0.50 a pop.
To be honest, I’m not that enthused about being in the freelance job market. I don’t mind working and I don’t mind being paid money, but there’s some part of me that will always like having some idea of what to do. Work isn’t something I want to think about. It’s a task I want to perform as quick and clean as possible, with no one yelling at me and none of the sense of guilt that screwing up on the job brings.
I hate to disappoint anyone.
There’s something nice about Turking. It’s soothing and monotonous. It quiets something inside me that I’ve never been able to positively feed before.
My mom had a serious gambling problem. I think I have some of her same sickness, though it’s showed itself in a different way.
I enjoy farm games and continuous puzzle games. I like the feeling of clearing levels and receiving that little bit of pop-up praise. It makes me feel good. It’s like the “Ka-ching! Ka-ching!” of a slot machine, but it doesn’t cost me any money, which is good.
I hate spending money.
Being cheap isn’t something I’m proud of, but I’ve been poor my whole life. I’ve learned to hold on to every dollar that makes it into my pocket. I mean, sure, there are some things that I’ll blow a stupid amount of money on, but freemium games aren’t them.
I’ll play the heck out of a freemium game, right up until it reaches the point where I either grow bored or the game starts not working if I don’t give it money. And then I’ll cut the old game loose and move on to a new game that might not be as much fun, but is free.
And that’s what I find myself liking about mTurk. It’s like a freemium game that pays me real money.
Just like with a freemium game, you start out at the bottom level. But as you play, you gain points that eventually let you start earning better and better Hits. As you prove that you know how to read and follow instructions, you have the opportunity to make higher amounts of money.
You start out earning $0.01-0.05 per Hit, which is near to nothing. It’s these low payment amounts that thin the chaff from the wheat. People without a somewhat obsessive personality or a desperate need for money drift away after a few weeks, off in search of other opportunities. Meanwhile, a real Turker just keeps grinding away, 20 Hits, 50 Hits, 200 Hits, 500 Hits, 1000 Hits, 10000 Hits, going from making $0.05 per Hit to $0.90 or $2.
As long as you have a reasonable level of intelligence, you can make money on mTurk. It might not be a lot of money, but it’s something you can put in your pocket. And if you have a particular talent or skill, you can make $200 on a Hit or more. But on average, just doing things like looking at pictures or decoding a messy receipt, you can earn $50 or more a month.
If you have enough Accepted Hits you will have a good rating that allows you to qualify for more jobs and basically proves that you are loyal and deserve to be rewarded. The more Accepted Hits that you have, the more money you can make. It’s like all those games where you level-up and receive gold or gems, only these ones can be used to buy things in real life.
mTurk keeps my attention by having all the aspects of a freemium game, but actually paying me money. It might be a hassle to find Hits that I like, but I’ve added a few names to my mental list. Though I wish there was a better way to search and that the results didn’t look so forbidding.
That’s one thing that I’d change about mTurk. I’d make it more user friendly. The interface wouldn’t be so stiff and joblike, you’d have the option to choose the Fun Theme where you could play through Hit levels to receive gems and cool stuff.
How awesome would it be if Amazon provided prizes for achieving certain level-ups? “You are now qualified to accept Hits in Level 7. You have been rewarded one (1) Toaster Oven.” You’re not required to review, but you get extra Hit points when you do. I’m not sure of the legalities of them offering gift certificates, as money and prizes can be seen as different things, but I imagine they could shoot a Turker one of the High Priority items off a Wishlist and write it off as a promotional item.
And mTurk would become a perfect, beautiful thing. Like Farmville merged with the unicorn that ate the Candy Kingdom and there were plants eating zombies that turned into cash lining my pocket. It might almost be too good. But I can dream.
* * *
Mini-Bio: HarperWCK was raised by Papa Smurf and Vanity Smurf in the humble splendor of the Smurf Village. She grew up drinking the sweet fermented juice of smurfberries while licking mushrooms for sustenance, which explains her skewed way of looking at the world.
She writes fiction that features romance and violence and superpowered people. If you want to check it out, you might take a peek at Allies & Enemies“, the second book in the Heroes & Villains series. It’s inferable enough that it can be read as a standalone novel.
