YOUR OPINIONS CAN EARN YOU CASH! (mouthshut.com)

Member Name: emmahancock99

Product:	mouthshut.com
Date:	06/06/01 (71 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: could be good money, way of expressing opinions on an international basis

Disadvantages: will they pay?, bad layout

Mouthshut.com

This is yet another opinion site, which pays you for writing opinions on a wide range of subjects, very similar to dooyoo and ciao. It is an Indian site, which is very keen to recruit new members, and become international, obviously all the opinions are in English so don’t worry about that! I have been using this site for a week or two now and have therefore complied a list of advantages and disadvantages.

JOINING

Registering is very simple, all you have to do is fill in a few very basic details, like your name, user name and e-mail address. Then you are immediately a member and can start using the site. There are a growing number of members joining this site all the time, and a very strong community spirit seems to evident (I was e-mailed a welcome by a couple of members after I joined!). they are doing everything they can to recruit new members and therefore help to increase the amount of opinions on the site.

HOW IT WORKS

The concept is very similar to that of ciao and dooyoo. All you have to do is find the topic you want to write an opinion on and click on ‘write my own opinion’ then make up a heading, opinion and list the pros and cons. Very easy to use with the added bonus of the site checking your opinion for spelling errors and highlighting them for you (very good if you are like me and your typing isn’t too good!!!). The opinion will then be on the site for all to read, it will go into a list on the homepage of most recently written opinions (it tends to stay there a lot longer than it would on ciao or dooyoo). You will then see it under the topic heading as a new opinion until another one is written.
Users can rate opinions like on other sites with the normal very helpful, helpful, relatively helpful and not helpful. You can view who has rated you to (hopefully) prevent revenge voting, and s you get paid for this you will find you get lots and lots of ratings.


REWARDS

These are in the form of MS points, which are a bit like dooyoo miles. They add up fairly quickly as they have good rewards at present. The go like this:
10pts for registering
5pts per opinion written
10pts for referrals joining
2pts for reading someone else’s opinion and 2pts for someone reading your opinion
1pt for rating someone else’s opinion
This tends to mean they add up fast especially since unlike other sites you actually get points for reading and rating other peoples opinions. Hopefully this will encourage more people to read other opinions therefore improving the quality of their own. Although there don’t seem to be many users the opinions do get quite a few reads, this is partially due to the Indians who are apparently desperate to read English opinions on things!

PROBLEMS

Unfortunately this site is not perfect, the rewards is the main problem as that is what most of us write these opinions for! As it is a new site (since Nov 2000) they are unsure about their reward system yet (yes, I know they should have sorted that out before they opened it!). At present they say that you have to have 600 MS points to claim and have been a member for 6 months or more. This is probably to discourage people who write a few opinions claim their money and leave and to protect themselves from damage. However, this does suggest that they may fold after a while (say 5 and a half months!!!). They also say that at present to claim your rewards you have to have an Indian address (hmmmmmm not too good for me!), and they are unsure what the MS points translate into yet! This means we could be slaving away for no money at all or very low rewards. However, they do promise to pay internationally very soon and claim that 600 MS points will be about £5, although they do not guarantee this. I also cannot find any guarantee that the reward will be money it mentions prizes a lot and they are
very vague about what they will be doing and refuse to tie themselves down to anything. This causes a major question mark over the site, as I am wary of putting in too much effort to find that it is all for nothing.
I am also finding it hard to find the topics I want to write on, the search facility is very poor and this coupled with the fact that in India they don’t have the same things as us makes it hard! I wanted to write about films, shops, Internet sites etc., none of which they seem to have on the site. However, they do have a suggestion area where you can suggest items to be included in the site.
I also find the site fairly difficult to use, possibly because I am so used to other sites but I find it cluttered and difficult to navigate. I think it could be laid out better and they could provide help for users more readily.
Apparently they also have a clause in the small print that once you have written the opinion it is theres to do as they please with eg sell it. therefore unlike dooyoo and ciao where they dont do this you dont have complete control over your opinion.

CONCLUSION

I think this site could be very successful if they sorted out the reward system, as at present this will discourage many users. There seem to be many people who have written a couple of opinions and no more while they wait to see what will happen. My advice would be: give it a go but be wary of putting in too much effort in case it turns out to be for nothing. In other words – WAIT AND SEE!!!

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