Time for better thread: HOW DID YOU MAKE YOUR FIRST MONEY?

[tagtastic]

My family was moderately well off, and I have a total "saving money" addiction - so all the birthday money and Christmas money I got growing up I rarely ever spent, so I've always had a decent amount of cash.

My first serious money was made in high school, online advertising scams! [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

A couple friends and I setup a few legitimate web sites that were advertising driven and designed/hosted some websites for a few random companies. These were almost all break even or losing ventures.

I "expanded" the business by using our advertisers on password pages for a warez hotline server I ran. Basically forced people to click on the banners to get the password so they could download my warez/pron/music/etc. I also clicked on the banners a ton myself from various computers at school/etc. Unfortunately we got caught by our advertiser after a couple weeks of this. They cancelled our account - but they still paid us in full!

I set the system up again late senior year with a new advertiser. I dramatically accelerated the clicks after getting cable internet so I could upload the warez faster. Unfortunately the fully optimized system only ran for about a week, then Comcast called me and told me to stop. They scared me and that was my only option for broadband, so I didn't want to lose it. Same held true in college, if I lost my school internet connection I had no other choices - and I'd probably die w/o the internet [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

All told, I raked in about $5k from these scams, about half of it in the last 2-3 days.

Obviously this stuff was wrong/against terms of service/possibly illegal, but I never felt that bad about it. At this time (like 1996-2000), the online advertising industry was ridiculously profitable, I was filling dixie cups from the ocean. Bang, internet bubble bursts/stock market crash, now internet advertising is a very small fraction as profitable as it once was + the advertising agencies all have extensive fraud detection (because their margins are so much smaller), so something like this would be v difficult if not impossible to pull off now. Not to mention everyone can easily get warez/pron/music/movies free, fast and hassle free from torrent sites now.

[Ponies]

[ QUOTE ]
My family was moderately well off, and I have a total "saving money" addiction - so all the birthday money and Christmas money I got growing up I rarely ever spent, so I've always had a decent amount of cash.

My first serious money was made in high school, online advertising scams! [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

A couple friends and I setup a few legitimate web sites that were advertising driven and designed/hosted some websites for a few random companies. These were almost all break even or losing ventures.

I "expanded" the business by using our advertisers on password pages for a warez hotline server I ran. Basically forced people to click on the banners to get the password so they could download my warez/pron/music/etc. I also clicked on the banners a ton myself from various computers at school/etc. Unfortunately we got caught by our advertiser after a couple weeks of this. They cancelled our account - but they still paid us in full!

I set the system up again late senior year with a new advertiser. I dramatically accelerated the clicks after getting cable internet so I could upload the warez faster. Unfortunately the fully optimized system only ran for about a week, then Comcast called me and told me to stop. They scared me and that was my only option for broadband, so I didn't want to lose it. Same held true in college, if I lost my school internet connection I had no other choices - and I'd probably die w/o the internet [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

All told, I raked in about $5k from these scams, about half of it in the last 2-3 days.

Obviously this stuff was wrong/against terms of service/possibly illegal, but I never felt that bad about it. At this time (like 1996-2000), the online advertising industry was ridiculously profitable, I was filling dixie cups from the ocean. Bang, internet bubble bursts/stock market crash, now internet advertising is a very small fraction as profitable as it once was + the advertising agencies all have extensive fraud detection (because their margins are so much smaller), so something like this would be v difficult if not impossible to pull off now. Not to mention everyone can easily get warez/pron/music/movies free, fast and hassle free from torrent sites now.

[/ QUOTE ]

Those were the days.....
If I was 20 years old back then I would be rich right now.

[Mr. Mexican]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
My family was moderately well off, and I have a total "saving money" addiction - so all the birthday money and Christmas money I got growing up I rarely ever spent, so I've always had a decent amount of cash.

My first serious money was made in high school, online advertising scams! [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

A couple friends and I setup a few legitimate web sites that were advertising driven and designed/hosted some websites for a few random companies. These were almost all break even or losing ventures.

I "expanded" the business by using our advertisers on password pages for a warez hotline server I ran. Basically forced people to click on the banners to get the password so they could download my warez/pron/music/etc. I also clicked on the banners a ton myself from various computers at school/etc. Unfortunately we got caught by our advertiser after a couple weeks of this. They cancelled our account - but they still paid us in full!

I set the system up again late senior year with a new advertiser. I dramatically accelerated the clicks after getting cable internet so I could upload the warez faster. Unfortunately the fully optimized system only ran for about a week, then Comcast called me and told me to stop. They scared me and that was my only option for broadband, so I didn't want to lose it. Same held true in college, if I lost my school internet connection I had no other choices - and I'd probably die w/o the internet [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

All told, I raked in about $5k from these scams, about half of it in the last 2-3 days.

Obviously this stuff was wrong/against terms of service/possibly illegal, but I never felt that bad about it. At this time (like 1996-2000), the online advertising industry was ridiculously profitable, I was filling dixie cups from the ocean. Bang, internet bubble bursts/stock market crash, now internet advertising is a very small fraction as profitable as it once was + the advertising agencies all have extensive fraud detection (because their margins are so much smaller), so something like this would be v difficult if not impossible to pull off now. Not to mention everyone can easily get warez/pron/music/movies free, fast and hassle free from torrent sites now.

[/ QUOTE ]

Those were the days.....
If I was 20 years old back then I would be rich right now.

[/ QUOTE ]

No Joke, i was born in 85, but i think 77 would've been a tight year to be born

[schundler]

[ QUOTE ]
My bar mitzvah is where I made my first serious score for 3k+. That lasted me through high school.

[/ QUOTE ]

I got 20k for my bar mitzvah.

[lucksack]

[ QUOTE ]

My first serious money was made in high school, online advertising scams! [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

A couple friends and I setup a few legitimate web sites that were advertising driven and designed/hosted some websites for a few random companies. These were almost all break even or losing ventures.

I "expanded" the business by using our advertisers on password pages for a warez hotline server I ran. Basically forced people to click on the banners to get the password so they could download my warez/pron/music/etc. I also clicked on the banners a ton myself from various computers at school/etc. Unfortunately we got caught by our advertiser after a couple weeks of this. They cancelled our account - but they still paid us in full!


[/ QUOTE ]

I also did my first money with a variation of this, I had a games website and an mp3-website and had some banner ads deal for the games site. I then put a zero pixel frame, that loaded the banner ad link, on the mp3 site. 12 cents for each visitor. I was 12. Stopped doing it though because I thought it was wrong.

[manifest]

[ QUOTE ]
My family was moderately well off, and I have a total "saving money" addiction - so all the birthday money and Christmas money I got growing up I rarely ever spent, so I've always had a decent amount of cash.

My first serious money was made in high school, online advertising scams! [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

A couple friends and I setup a few legitimate web sites that were advertising driven and designed/hosted some websites for a few random companies. These were almost all break even or losing ventures.

I "expanded" the business by using our advertisers on password pages for a warez hotline server I ran. Basically forced people to click on the banners to get the password so they could download my warez/pron/music/etc. I also clicked on the banners a ton myself from various computers at school/etc. Unfortunately we got caught by our advertiser after a couple weeks of this. They cancelled our account - but they still paid us in full!

I set the system up again late senior year with a new advertiser. I dramatically accelerated the clicks after getting cable internet so I could upload the warez faster. Unfortunately the fully optimized system only ran for about a week, then Comcast called me and told me to stop. They scared me and that was my only option for broadband, so I didn't want to lose it. Same held true in college, if I lost my school internet connection I had no other choices - and I'd probably die w/o the internet [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

All told, I raked in about $5k from these scams, about half of it in the last 2-3 days.

Obviously this stuff was wrong/against terms of service/possibly illegal, but I never felt that bad about it. At this time (like 1996-2000), the online advertising industry was ridiculously profitable, I was filling dixie cups from the ocean. Bang, internet bubble bursts/stock market crash, now internet advertising is a very small fraction as profitable as it once was + the advertising agencies all have extensive fraud detection (because their margins are so much smaller), so something like this would be v difficult if not impossible to pull off now. Not to mention everyone can easily get warez/pron/music/movies free, fast and hassle free from torrent sites now.

[/ QUOTE ]

I made 30k in 6 months doing a variation of this. The only thing was that I ran 2 of the top 25 warez sites and used iframes instead.

And yes, if I was 20 at this time I would have been a millionaire. But no, 14 year olds who make $30k in 6 months doing absolutely nothing decide to buy $3000 computers to play red alert and counterstrike on it. Then proceed to go to Costco and buy $800 in chocolate and flats of pop.

[holdme]

i killed a man

[Split Suit]

first money came from filing for my parents business at ~$7/hr

real money came from shooting pool in 7th grade...that was great money at the time

[acelah]

Scamming shops out of gift vouchers by taking back 2nd hand playstation games which i bought in the shop opposite, until i got threatened with them calling the police. still made about £400 though in 3 months, I didn't think it was stealing then.

[Better Than U]

to make my first monies I raked leaves, at this point in my life I still rake...big pots for my moniezzzzzzz.