I became a Mechanical Turk-er about two months ago to see if I could earn a few extra dollars toward Amazon purchases. I had no expectations that it would be stable, steady, or adequate income - the HITs rarely pay more than 20 cents per session, it is literally slave wages. But since money is tight in my household from thousands of dollars of student loan debt, credit bills, and an overall tightening of my spending, I want to be able to buy the occasional book without dipping in to grocery money. At first, I would try any HIT that I was qualified for. Now I am much more selective – choosing only the moderate to higher paying ones (someone posted a HIT for “$0.00.” I wonder how many takers there were?) and the ones whose level of work seems worth the compensation ($.03 for 10 pages of photo labels? No, thanks). Thus far, I have focused on surveys and labeling photographs, hoping for bonuses but not expecting them. I have submitted over 200 hits with only three or four rejections (I really wish they would explain what the problem was), and have earned enough to buy a birthday present. In this economy, it is nice to have a way to legitimately earn extra money without selling body parts or becoming the only 34 year old PhD who joined a gang. People who expect to get rich Turking will be highly disappointed, but overall, it has been fun and economically helpful.