It’s interesting the extent people will go to these days to make money on the internet! An interesting trend has emerged whereby ordinary individuals are using the internet to get donations for personal causes that might range from anything from money to save their dying business to money to “leave my cheating husband”.
Even more amazing is there are actual websites where you can upload your sob story and for a small monthly fee they’ll handle the donation process for you and send you the proceeds through Paypal. A visit to some of these websites revealed such headlines as:
Single Mom-Ex Husband Left Me-Help Me Pay the Bills!
Cancer Survivor Needs Assistance with Bills
Hospitalized Disabled Veteran Needs Help!
Help My Cousin Pay for Her Brain Surgery!
Some were a bit more self serving such as:
I Need $100,000 to Start a New Business!
Need Money for Dance School! Please Help!
Some posters were appealing to the soft hearts of animal lovers by asking for donations for their dog or cat.
Just how well does this rather unconventional tactic work? There are some reports of success including a paramedic who consistently earned more than $1,000 a week in donations from his website. Others report lesser degrees of success raising anywhere from nothing to several hundred dollars per month. But, when you consider how little is being done to earn this money, it’s still rather surprising.
A quick look at the website http://www.cyberbeg.com shows this concept in action. A participant can sign up to receive their own page where they tell their story, arouse pity, and solicit donations. Donations are sent directly to the participant’s Paypal account. The site bills itself as a site of “hope” for those who are in need of an infusion of cash. This site with it’s unique concept has received media attention from a variety of outlets including the New York Times and CNN. Could cyberbegging become big business?
While some of these solicitations for donations are, no doubt, legitimate, it’s questionable whether the majority are. To have a Paypal account which is required to list on a cyberbegging site, you need to have a bank account or credit card which means the cyberbeggars are probably not completely destitute. As with anything else in the world of internet money making, there are people trying to take advantage of the generosity of others.
This type of system is also encouraging people to be passive and promoting the mentality that you can “get something for nothing”. It would be far better to help these people in need find legitimate ways to earn money on the internet by offering something of value to the public. To develop a small business that can be sustained seems like a better investment in the long run. The old adage, “If you teach a man to fish you feed him for a life time” has never been more true.
