Another Money Ramble

There's money to be made on the Internet. I, for one, am interested in cashing in on this. There seems to be a certain level of freedom to really pursue the things that I have a passion for. I have had my go at working a standard job and although I didn't mind having a boss to answer to, it didn't really give me much change to go after my interests.

I don't delude myself into thinking that I could make enough money over the Internet to replace having a job. Although that would be nice, the optimal for me would seem to be having a part-time job done in the morning, and then in the afternoon producing the content that I would then put on the Internet, in however way it would be done. As I've mentioned in a previous post that has to do with this, I'm something of a morning person. I have that Puritanical notion of "work first, then play," and since I'm at my sharpest in the morning, that's a good time for me to work a formal job. Then once the formal work is out of the way, I feel more free to let loose and be creative, without the worry.

Apparently there's this thing out there called "passive income," where you don't really put much effort into things besides setup. You would, say, make a website, put ads on it, and then let it automatically generate income. After several years you'd be able to retire early and suck on piña coladas on some Jamaican beach for the rest of your life. Not only is that unrealistic... that's also boring, and I can't see myself ever really wanting to do that. I am not nearly materialistic or capitalistic enough to seek that sort of lifestyle. To be honest, I don't even want to be all that rich. As far as money goes, my goal is to have enough that I can make ends meet, and also be able to buy what I want without having to worry if it will put a big dent in my checkbook. But I would love to be able to do the things I am passionate about, and make money off of them. And the things that currently are my passions can actually be done on the Internet. My desire isn't to set up some automaton that makes money for me while I sleep the days away. Rather, it's to actually be involved in the content I'm making. The stuff that will eventually make revenue are, at least in some part, stuff that I put time and effort into creating.

It seems one of the easiest, and most popular, manners of making money on the Internet is with the use of advertisements. Those things that appear on the sides, top, and/or bottom of the website that most of us tend to ignore. I guess I'm not the consumerish sort of person, because I don't think I've ever seen an ad and seriously considering buying what it was showing off. But it seems people do. That's why they're so prominent. It looks like most serious websites that aren't kept alive by donation or out of the owner's expense has advertisements on it somewhere. Even Google or Yahoo searches have text-based ads on them! This is a passive system and can be integrated into other things I do. For instance, blogging (which I will mention). Put ads on the blogs. Or my personal website. As I keep refining these and adding content, more people will check them out. This may increase the number of ads getting clicked, and for each of those clicks, a little bit of money will be paid to me.

As I said before, it seems that you can make money by keeping an active blog. From what I've read, it's not so much the blog itself that generates money. Mostly it's advertisements. A related thing would be writing posts about a product, person, company, etc., that I could get paid to do. The main way to profit from this is simply having good content on the blog, stuff that makes people want to come back and see more. My Minecraft and After Adults blogs are two examples of this. Nobody else quite writes and plays like me, so there is some original content there, and I'd sure hope it's not bad.

Related to blogging is writing. Blogging helps develop my writing skills, and shows prospective employers what kind of talent they could expect from me. People will pay me to write stuff for them! It could be a product summary, a thesis about some topic, and what have you. Then there is story writing, which I have two blogs dedicated to. I could go one step further and turn them into e-books.

Freelancing is something else I've considered getting into. I kinda dislike it because it would mean I'd have a boss to be accountable to for the duration of the job, but there is a lot more leniency in who I pick as a boss. I could focus more on the fields I'm interested in, and the commitment is only as long as the assignment. Web development and writing are the things I'm good at online, so naturally the freelancing would mostly take place in these areas.

Recently, I've started getting involved in making YouTube videos. There are people out there who record themselves playing Minecraft, upload it to YouTube, and get money from it. The main ways are advertisements and donations. My style of Minecraft is a weird mix of technical and construction, with less emphasis on adventuring and more on achieving goals. There are all sorts of things I could do. The key to doing this is making myself unique. I had an idea for something called "The Ultimate City," a settlement built in Minecraft that is as automated as possible and self-sufficient. To make a video series of this being constructed and operated definitely would count as unique. If it's been done before, I certainly haven't run across it. Actually, I tried creating this City, but then university went in high gear and time just hasn't been available. Which is a shame because several people signed up to be on the team.

Then, of course, there is the idea of actually making something not related to any of those. Not just a blog or video, but an all-out project. An example of this is a game I tried developing a browser game similar to OGame. It even had a blog devoted to it. However, it seemed to be too out of my knowledge base to be accomplished, and as a result of lack of motivation it has fallen into inactivity. As well as being a magnificent test and testament of my coding skills, it would also be a possible way to make money. The three things that come to my mind are third-party ads on the sides of the pages, purchased Premium accounts that have special in-game features, and temporary upgrades which increase the efficiency of some mechanic. If the game ever comes into being as a start-up project I intend to maintain for a long time, a donate button wouldn't hurt either.

Being the leader type, I could go one step larger and start a group or company that does something. I have flirted with the idea of starting a programming company. In addition to programmers there would also be artists, a CEO, a financial officer, and probably other roles. This is something that would require a good part, if not all, of my time.

A simple Google search shows a great many ways to make money using the Internet. The possibilities abound.

This is all about creating stuff. I have a drive to create. If I could get some magical software that netted me $2,000 a month every month then hey, I'd be happy. ($2,000 does sound like a rather low goal, but I'm a single person and not terribly materialistic.) I'd still put my time into creating stuff. Realistically, though, that's not going to happen, so I will need to utilize what I'm good at doing and have a drive for. Make stuff, build community, monetize. Enjoy life.