Occasionally I fool around with a site called http://quirky.com. They make household products. Their schtick is that members suggest designs for products, which are voted on by other members, and the in-house staff picks some of these products to develop. If you vote for designs that win, fill out questionnaires, etc., you get "influence points," a minuscule percentage of the profit. If you make more than $75 doing this they will give you real money. Less than that can be used as a store credit.

I interact with it because I like seeing what people come up with, and voting lets me be cranky about marketing. (I spend a lot of time saying "This isn't useful" and/or "There are already too many products like this.") It scratches my itch labeled "I want to do something that's mindless but that gives me the illusion I'm being clever."

I usually earn a few cents a week, and end up spending it as a store credit.

This week I unexpectedly got $42, mostly from a docking station called Converge, which I don't remember influencing very much, so I'm not sure why they are paying me a whole 0.17% of the kitty. A few weeks ago I bought a Converge for $40, so now it feels like I got it for free.

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