There was a TV show in Japan where a man had to stay in a room until he managed to win $10000 of value in sweepstakes. I wouldn't say you can make a full-time job out of trying to win sweepstakes, since he ended up staying in the room for about a year.
If a naked man locked in a tiny apartment can make 10k/yr doing what is essentially admin work, then it's completely plausible that a disciplined and skilled engineer with web scrapers, computer vision, custom Python scripts and pants could make 100k+ working part time.
Don’t be so certain. These sweepers are usually entering every possible sweepstakes they can. While you might be able to automate the entries and do it in 10 minutes instead of 3 hours a day, unless you start doing fraud like multiple identities, there may simply be no more sweepstakes to enter.
If you could automatically enroll yourself in every sweepstakes legal for your locale, then you could also offer that service to anyone else interested. People could pay you 5 dollars a month to get automatically entered into every sweepstakes.
Of course, this scales badly. The more people who take your service the less valuable it will be as the odds of winning will decrease. Perhaps the natural balancing point would be somewhere where you could still profit. Might be best to charge nothing but take a cut of the winnings. That way people wouldn't be discouraged from joining by the diminishing likelihood of winning, and the chances that someone from your pool would win would only increase over time.
Like with plenty of such ideas, the answer is to do it anyway - scale it until it breaks, making sure you're always making profit yourself, and then call it a day. Enjoy your money and do something else. A while later people will forget, and someone else will do the same thing.
(The real answer is, of course, to not do this at all, because it's unethical. But that consideration doesn't stop everyone, unfortunately.)
> He started with nothing (including no clothes), was cut off from outside communication and broadcasting, and had nothing to keep him company except the magazines he combed through for sweepstakes entry forms. After spending 335 days to reach his target, he set the Guinness world record for the "longest time survived on competition winnings".
Wow, that sounds extreme.
But then again I remember there was a contest in San Diego where the participants had to stay 15 hours a day on a roller-coaster and many suffered lasting bodily injuries.
I was surprised when one day my stepdad had a fancy gaming mouse. I asked him how he got it and he shrugged and said “I entered a contest and won”. I’m so cynical I didn’t really believe anyone won stuff out of contests, but I guess you’ve got to enter in the first place to win.
Yeah one day my dad dropped his business card in a bowl at the local Yamaha dealer and won a brand new GSXR 750. He rode that ninja bike to work daily for at least 10 years.
It is similar with extreme couponing. I worked at a pharmacy chain in the US, and had a few regular customers that did such a thing. Absolutely amazing what folks can get for little money, though sometimes they had to invest start-up money to get going. After a while, it snowballs and you are paying $10 for $175 worth of stuff.
But the time invested is not small. One of the regular customers did the stuff until she had a child: A baby takes up a lot of the time and mental energy that she previously used for coupons. I think she had months of supplies stocked up before giving birth, though.
I have a good friend who does extreme couponing to supplement her income. I have actually even seen her get paid to buy things due to retailer miscalculations.
Her garage is stocked with such things as laundry detergent, deodorant, various cleaners etc which she sells on Facebook and Craigslist. It does involve a decent amount of time, but she has it organized with folders and does the couponing purchases while shopping normally.
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