Amazon's Mechanical Turk Program

While surfing online, I came across yet another program which is seeking paid content (and a whole lot more). Amazon.com serves as a kind of clearinghouse for tons of cheap writing projects (and many other simple task based online assignments) which they call HITs. Amazon calls the program "Mechanical Turks." It has been in existence for several years now, and there are some serious criticisms of the program.

For example, the wikipedia.org article dedicated to the program has the following to say:

Because HITs are typically simple, repetitive tasks and users are paid often only a few cents to complete them, some have criticized Mechanical Turk as a "virtual sweatshop." Because workers are paid as contractors rather than employees, requesters do not have to file tax forms, and avoid minimum wage, overtime, and workers compensation laws. Workers, though, must report their income as self-employment income. In addition, some requesters have taken advantage of workers by having them do the tasks, then rejecting their submission in order to avoid paying. However, at least some workers on Mechanical Turk are people who are middle class and do the work for fun.

I did sign up for the program and found a few writing jobs posted in the $2-8 dollar range that I might consider doing. Many of the jobs, however, only pay a few cents for 100 words or more, and I can see why they might be considered "virtual sweatshop" wages!