Online Labor Markets
Below are links to and notes on several examples of online labor markets and enabling technologies that support these markets. If you have other examples (or examples of mistakes in my descriptions), please email me. Here is a recent NYT article on online labor markets.
Major General / Programming Sites
- oDesk is a rapidly growing site
that encourages buyers to offer work on hourly terms. The site provides very robust monitoring tools: workers download software that tracks the time that they spend working on projects. The software also logs workers' keystrokes and even periodically takes screenshots of their screens. Because this monitoring allows buyers to observe workers so closely, oDesk does not permit buyers to dispute hourly charges; workers are therefore guaranteed payment for their hourly work. oDesk seems to be the most ambitious among the online labor markets &mdash its corporate motto is "Changing how the world works."
- Guru.com allows buyers to post jobs and
solicit bids from workers. The site seems to be more popular with
"firms," which appear to be loose conglomerations of freelancers.
- Elance is probably the largest and
most well-known general site. The main work categories are Web
& Programming, Design & Multimedia, Writing & Translation,
Administration Support, Sales & Marketing, Finance & Management,
Engineering & Manufacturing and Legal. As of January 2009, 137,597
workers have registered with the site; since 2005, workers have
collectively earned $141,767,674.
- rentAcoder.com focuses on
computer programming. Programmers work on a strictly fixed-price
basis. After a project is awarded to a bidder, the buyer places the
agreed upon amount in an escrow account. Payment is not released
until the buyer approves the work. If there are disputes, the
company provides arbitrators.
- GetAFreelancer.com is a
Swedish general site that has operated since 2004 and uses the
fixed-price / escrow method. As of January 2009, 718,222 users
(including buyers and sellers) have exchanged $30,477,400 on
343,233 projects.
- iFreelance is a general
site with the same basic model as Guru, oDesk and Elance. Very
little data is available without registering with the site.
- ScriptLance
Software Testing
- uTest provides software testing
using a pool of workers who are paid to find bugs.
Buyers (software companies) seek testers with certain demographic
characteristics, including software sophistication and the
platforms used. uTest selects matches from its pool of
registered testers. The testers report bugs and make suggestions and
are paid for verified bugs and helpful reviews.
Design
- 99 Designs allows buyers
to sponsor design contests, usually for logos or specialty events.
The buyer states a price that they will pay for
the winning design and a date when they will choose the winner.
Workers then submit designs as small, thumbnail images which the
entire community can view and vote on (these votes are not in any way binding).
One interesting feature of this market is that it is one of the few
real-life examples of non-political all-pay auctions. As of January 2009, the community
had 25,100 registered designers who submitted 1,152,786 designs
for 15,993 contests and received $3,465,314 in prizes.
- CreateMyTattoo.com is just like
99 Designs, but for tattoos.
- CrowdSpring
- iStockPhoto
is a royalty-free photo exchange that allows photographers to upload images and sell
them to individual buyers. Over 50,000 photographers have contributed over 4
million photos.
Advice & Search
- BitWine provides a network of freelance advisors
who charge clients a per-minute rate for consultations. Advisors
are ostensible experts in some field, such as nutrition, travel,
coaching, technology, etc. Consultations occur over the
voice-over-IP (VoIP) technology Skype and payments are made through
PayPal. BitWine takes a percentage of transactions fees.
- InnoCentive
- ChaCha
Advertising
Micro-Tasks
- Amazon's Mechanical Turk
is unique in allowing workers to perform simple, piece-rate tasks like captioning
writing captions for photographs, extracting information from scanned
documents and transcribing audio clips for money or store credit. Unlike other sites, workers may begin a task as soon as it is posted, and the buyer reserves the right to accept or reject work.
- LiveWork
Patent Validation / Invalidation
- Article One Partners
is a private firm that helps corporate clients invalidate
patents. A network of "AOP Associates" who have registered with
the site can earn up to $50,000 for providing evidence of
patent-invalidating "prior art."
- Peer-to-Peer
Patent Project also provides patent assessment, but it is not a true
contest or market. The project is sponsored by the US Technology
and Patent Office and NYU Law School and patent reviewers are not paid.
Finance
- LendingClub facilitates
unsecured lending between individuals.
-
- Kiva
- Prosper.com is a
for-profit peer-to-peer lending site similar to LendingClub. As of
January 2009, the site claims 830,000 members and $178,000,000 of
loans.
Enabling Techologies and Organizations
Worker's Rights
- Turk Opticon is a website and Firefox plug-in
that allows Amazon Mechanical Turk workers to rate "Requestors" who post work on the site. The Firefox
plug-in allows workers to view the ratings in real time before deciding whether or not to accept a task
from the requestor.
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