For my observe I decided to focus on a new app/service that i recently discovered. “Earn bitcoin” is a service that essentially pays people to take surveys based upon their personal network connections. It also allows popular companies with big executives to connect with people who are interested in their opinions/advice, all while being compensated; you can select an amount from $1-$20 per question, and if you are not a company executive, you can money by taking surveys that pay $1 (give or take) each. You fill out questionnaires based upon your knowledge and interests, and from there you are selected to complete surveys.
What i find most interesting about this service is that in order to create an account, you must connect with LinkedIn; I assume this is so that the service can analyze your contacts and history to select surveys for you. In addition, in order to connect with company executives, you must connect your gmail account as well. These interesting guidelines can definitely affect the desirability of signing up for such a service, especially if you don’t have either of the accounts. While I understand why these are put in place, it always makes me a little suspicious when services ask for your other personal accounts or info – I myself have yet to connect my gmail account to this service because when I initially tried, it obtained all my email contacts and wanted to send out emails to all of them – and that definitely scared me away. While I have taken online surveys for money in the past, the twist with this service is it pays you in bitcoin; this gives your money the potential to increase without you doing any extra work. While this is an incredibly enticing idea, it also means you can lose your money at any second. That being said, I am not entirely sure if I will go through with the whole registration process, especially if I put my time into this serice and then all my money is lost. A nice twist, however, is that it gives you an option during registration where you can pick 1 of 4 charities to donate to.
