Online get-rich-quick schemes don’t have to be evil

I’m a lazy person. I am cool what that. In fact, ever since I was a little boy I’ve been fascinated with get-rich-quick schemes (GRQS). Except back in those days GRQS usually involved at least one of the following:

• Pyramid scheming
• Thieving or outright scamming
• Huge amounts of capital and connections and experience and ungh…

I didn’t have a chance of pulling one of these off nor did I want to.

Then along came the Internet. And sure, there are still countless questionable acts occurring every minute online. But what has fascinated me recently are the online GQRS that are at their core either fun and/or valuable, and innovative.

Three in particular have caught my eye.

First, there is the infamous The Million Dollar Homepage. Some guy sets up a site where advertisers could buy a pixel for a dollar. The site gets huge buzz and ends up pulling in a million dollars. Dozens of copycats appear, and none of them succeed. Main Lesson: Online GRQS are one-shot deals. Do something original. Although maybe there is room for innovation within this model… Check out MyBowlAd. Think Million Dollar Homepage meets Super Bowl ads. Fun.

Second, there is the One Thousand Paintings project. An artist paints one thousand unique paintings, each one with a unique number on it (1-1000). He then sets up an interesting pricing system that creates an incentive to buy early (and in the process creating buzz). The artist ends up selling most of the paintings and nets a lot of money (I’m guessing in the tends of thousands). Main Lesson: People like GRQS when they involve art. Create something beautiful (and unique).

Third, there is the The Sheep Market. This one’s my favorite. A guy commissioned Mechanical Turk workers to draw 10,000 digital sheep, all facing to the left. He then turned each sheep drawing into a book of stamps, and sold each book for $20. A nice idea in concept, but most of the sheep look kind of budget. I believe he’s only sold a couple hundred at most. Main Lesson: Don’t get sloppy. Make your GRQS service/product desirable, and make it scarce (10,000 was way too many sheep).

I ‘ll also mention Why Are You Here – Right Now? (a crowd-sourced book using Mechanical Turk workers) and One Red Paperclip (a trading-up experiment that spread thanks to the Internet). Moderate successes both of them. And just plain fun.

I gotta believe there are more opportunities out there to carry out a fun (while ethical) GRQS experiment. Something that creates a little cultural value for society, but also maybe nets the creator a bit of cash.

Any more ideas?

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