March 23, 2016 at 15:49Go to earnings: where, why and how to work for cryptocurrency
The crisis is 2016, but the interest in earning cryptocurrency on the Russian-speaking Internet is still as great as at the time when the bitcoin rate was at an exciting mark of $ 1000-1200. In difficult economic times, people are much more inventive in their search for sources of income: to the traditional for crisis times question “ how to leave Russia ” added “ how to earn bitcoins ”.
"To earn money." Nikolay Kuznetsov, 1882
At the same time, in order to find information relevant to the year 2016 on making altcoins, you have to filter out outdated data and resources for a long time and tediously on the topic “earn bitcoins for free without investing 1 bitcoin per day”.
We decided to improve the situation and prepared fresh material about working for a crypto: where is it better to look for such a job, what are the pros, cons and pitfalls in a cryptocurrency salary, which professions are the easiest to get offers on, how to organize the process of converting crypto into fiat. The material is based on real events: to prepare it, we talked with hired employees and freelancers who receive remuneration for working in bitcoins and its forks.
Is it even necessary to get paid in altcoins? There is no definite answer, but you can consider the advantages / disadvantages of this option and draw conclusions yourself.
Crypto salary benefits:
And now about the cons and disadvantages:
The resources and methods indicated below are selected on the basis of practical experience, the information is relevant at the time of writing. We do not pretend to be a complete list and will be very grateful if you supplement it and indicate the sites and methods that you use yourself. And also share your opinion, if you have experience using certain resources.
Any major cryptocurrency forum has a section on work. There you can dig out an interesting vacancy or freelance project, as well as publish a post in the style of “looking for work in a bitcoin startup”. Among the offers there is a lot of rubbish: affiliate programs, pay per clicks, frank “divorce”. But sometimes real treasures come across: you can agree on remote work according to your own American rate, make promising contacts and even arrange yourself a relocation to the EU, Asia or the States.
Cons: updating vacancies is not very common, there are usually no guarantees of payment, formal contracts are a rare thing, so there is a chance of not getting a salary. Most of the offers are one-time (project) work from private customers.
List of the most interesting resources:
Unfortunately, the largest and most popular resources like Freelancer.com , UpWork , Fiverr or its Russian counterpart Kwork do not allow you to receive payment in cryptocurrency, despite the absolute logic of this option, constant requests and feature requests from customers and contractors, as well as a large number cryptocurrency related projects. Fiverr went the farthest: since 2014, he added the ability to replenish the balance of an account with bitcoins, but this did not go further than this. And in the opinion of the head of Quark, who was told to us in a private conversation, it is better to stay away from bitcoins in our country: “While the government is thinking, whether or not to ban this currency in the Russian Federation at all“It’s dangerous for us to start working with her.”
So when searching for a job for cryptocurrency, you will have to forget about popular resources and turn your eyes to specialized freelance exchanges:
The vast majority of companies associated with crypto (miners, exchanges, coin casinos, etc.) offer them payment in altcoins as a pleasant option for employees. By the way, HashFlare is no exception - look at the list of our vacancies .
If you don’t like anything among the vacancies at HashFlare, open Angel.co - a platform for placing startups and searching for investments. Not so long ago, they opened the Jobs section, in which projects publish vacancies and are looking for specialists. There are many options for working for the RFP / percentage / share in the project, there are vacancies with relocation, deletion.
How to look for work for cryptocurrency in Angel.co:
Method 1: filter projects and companies by (keyword) bitcoin , cryptocurrency tag, dogecoin . We get a table with the results, in the right column for companies looking for employees, there will be a button “View Jobs”.
Method 2: go to the Jobs section and filter by the same tags. To search for a remote add the keyword “Remote OK”.
Yes, a very important practical advice: you do not need to register with Angel.co, fill out a profile for a long and tedious period and write to startups you like through this service. Except when you participated in the development of 3-5 famous projects presented on Angel.co, you live in Silicon Valley and (preferably) know Zuckenberg personally. Filling out an account takes a lot of time, and through Angel.co companies rarely respond, especially to unknown individuals from distant Slavic countries. Better go to the company website, find contacts and write to them directly. From experience, it is many times easier to get feedback and negotiate.
You can also search for companies and their contacts in CrunchBase : go to the search section, use the cryptocurrency, bitcoin filters, go to the companies websites and look for the Jobs, Career section.
Facebook
Through Facebook, you can probably find anything you like, including working for a crypt. Alas, with a high probability, writing a post with an attractive picture (a bitcoin coin in the hands of a naked girl) and a text like “Frontend developer is looking for work for bitcoins” is not particularly productive. If among thousands of your friends there were those who could help, you would have already turned to them. Although what the hell is not joking? This is Facebook and the famous hypothesis of several handshakes. If it does not work, you can do the following:
Practical experience is a great thing, it allows you to warn against mistakes of new applicants and suggest solutions that take a lot of time to search. A few useful and proven tips that can help you on the difficult path of exchanging knowledge and skills for cryptocurrency:
And of course, mining, as a way to earn money, has not been canceled :
"To earn money." Nikolay Kuznetsov, 1882
At the same time, in order to find information relevant to the year 2016 on making altcoins, you have to filter out outdated data and resources for a long time and tediously on the topic “earn bitcoins for free without investing 1 bitcoin per day”.
We decided to improve the situation and prepared fresh material about working for a crypto: where is it better to look for such a job, what are the pros, cons and pitfalls in a cryptocurrency salary, which professions are the easiest to get offers on, how to organize the process of converting crypto into fiat. The material is based on real events: to prepare it, we talked with hired employees and freelancers who receive remuneration for working in bitcoins and its forks.
Pros and cons of working for cryptocurrency
Is it even necessary to get paid in altcoins? There is no definite answer, but you can consider the advantages / disadvantages of this option and draw conclusions yourself.
Crypto salary benefits:
- You can win on the difference in exchange rate: if, having earned altcoins, you do not plan to immediately convert them to fiat currency, but wait for a more favorable exchange rate, you will get a nice salary bonus (in fiat equivalent), the size of which will depend on your trading abilities and patience .
- There are no unnecessary pieces of paper, problems and questions: it is very important for freelancers, lovers of cheating and ardent haters of bureaucracy. No one will ask where the equivalent of $ 10,000 got to your bitcoin wallet, and this same wallet will not spit out a message that you have exceeded the limits and now you need to go through verification / authentication, send a bunch of documents certified by a notary or appear in bank branch. True, this is all until the moment you do not want to convert your “coins” into cache.
- RFP is above the market: if the employer can offer only an exotic payment method, feel free to ask for more money, arguing this is an inconvenience. In addition, payment in altcoins is often associated with work requiring specific knowledge about these very altcoins (bitcoin startups, exchanges, etc.). Knowledge is scarce and, possessing it, you can get ZP above the market for your profession.
- Two in one - earning and long-term investment: according to some experts, the Bitcoin exchange rate can reach $ 10,000 over the next few years, thus, by postponing part of the earned bitcoins, you will significantly increase your capital.
- This is interesting: if you find a job in a crypto startup, you can learn a lot and pump skills in an area previously unknown to you.
And now about the cons and disadvantages:
- Possible losses: the exchange rate of altcoins is a difficult thing to predict, it can both rise and fall, significantly reducing your income. Predictions about $ 10,000 for 1 btc have no confirmation, with the same success for several years for 1 bitcoin in the market they can give $ 10.
- Do you speak English? If not, then it will be very difficult to find a good job for the crypto, the lion's share of the offers is located on English-speaking resources and is connected with foreign companies;
- Monopoly: if you are a fan of lightcoins or Dogecoin, we have bad news. Employers mainly offer Bitcoin; forks-paid jobs are extremely rare;
- Entrance is only for IT: work for coins, as a rule, is associated with IT projects and offers for specialists from other fields do not come across often. In the top professions: programmers, designers, marketers, arbitrageurs, testers, engineers, admins, copywriters / journalists, content managers, financial analysts.
Where to look for work for cryptocurrency
The resources and methods indicated below are selected on the basis of practical experience, the information is relevant at the time of writing. We do not pretend to be a complete list and will be very grateful if you supplement it and indicate the sites and methods that you use yourself. And also share your opinion, if you have experience using certain resources.
Forums and boards
Any major cryptocurrency forum has a section on work. There you can dig out an interesting vacancy or freelance project, as well as publish a post in the style of “looking for work in a bitcoin startup”. Among the offers there is a lot of rubbish: affiliate programs, pay per clicks, frank “divorce”. But sometimes real treasures come across: you can agree on remote work according to your own American rate, make promising contacts and even arrange yourself a relocation to the EU, Asia or the States.
Cons: updating vacancies is not very common, there are usually no guarantees of payment, formal contracts are a rare thing, so there is a chance of not getting a salary. Most of the offers are one-time (project) work from private customers.
List of the most interesting resources:
- Section on the work of Reddit : few offers, many who wish, the reputation in Reddit can influence the choice of artist. But, as always in freelance, the key is the ability to sell their services. For example, a small but strong development team here managed to find some very profitable orders, despite the Indians, dumping and competition;
- The famous BitcoinTalk forum offers many options for finding work: you can immediately go to the local Russian branch (this option is suitable for those who do not speak English). We advise the rest to look into other local forum threads (interesting offers from European and Asian customers come up), use the search query job and look at the Project Development section . Almost everything offers payment with crypto, in 99.9% of cases it is bitcoin. Often come across offers for copywriters, translators, content managers.
- The specialized BitGigs board is more likely alive than dead - new job offers appear almost every day. You can find jobs not only for developers, there are offers for photographers, graphic designers, music editors and video specialists.
Freelance exchanges and job aggregators
Unfortunately, the largest and most popular resources like Freelancer.com , UpWork , Fiverr or its Russian counterpart Kwork do not allow you to receive payment in cryptocurrency, despite the absolute logic of this option, constant requests and feature requests from customers and contractors, as well as a large number cryptocurrency related projects. Fiverr went the farthest: since 2014, he added the ability to replenish the balance of an account with bitcoins, but this did not go further than this. And in the opinion of the head of Quark, who was told to us in a private conversation, it is better to stay away from bitcoins in our country: “While the government is thinking, whether or not to ban this currency in the Russian Federation at all“It’s dangerous for us to start working with her.”
So when searching for a job for cryptocurrency, you will have to forget about popular resources and turn your eyes to specialized freelance exchanges:
- XBTFreelancer.com appeared in 2015, actively promoted on thematic resources, including BitcoinTalk, and, unfortunately, was largely occupied by customers and performers from third world countries. In this connection, “fat” offers come across not so often, but competition as on Elance during the worst years of the mass invasion of the Indians. Otherwise, everything is standard for freelance exchanges: orders are received by owners of the best reputation, dumping masters and talented sellers of their services;
- Coinality.com aggregator collects applications from several HR resources and freelance exchanges, including UpWork. The latter are not clear why they are needed, because they do not offer work for the crypt. Otherwise, there are no complaints: there is a lot of constant work from unknown and large companies, direct contacts of the employer are often published, you can search for offers in the region, there are deleted vacancies. To find them, in the location field of the search form, enter the value “Anywhere”.
- BitcoinVacancy aggregates posts and ads from other resources and allows you to publish offers directly. Here, basically, you can find a permanent job for professionals in the field of project development.
Cryptocurrency companies and startups
The vast majority of companies associated with crypto (miners, exchanges, coin casinos, etc.) offer them payment in altcoins as a pleasant option for employees. By the way, HashFlare is no exception - look at the list of our vacancies .
If you don’t like anything among the vacancies at HashFlare, open Angel.co - a platform for placing startups and searching for investments. Not so long ago, they opened the Jobs section, in which projects publish vacancies and are looking for specialists. There are many options for working for the RFP / percentage / share in the project, there are vacancies with relocation, deletion.
How to look for work for cryptocurrency in Angel.co:
Method 1: filter projects and companies by (keyword) bitcoin , cryptocurrency tag, dogecoin . We get a table with the results, in the right column for companies looking for employees, there will be a button “View Jobs”.
Method 2: go to the Jobs section and filter by the same tags. To search for a remote add the keyword “Remote OK”.
Yes, a very important practical advice: you do not need to register with Angel.co, fill out a profile for a long and tedious period and write to startups you like through this service. Except when you participated in the development of 3-5 famous projects presented on Angel.co, you live in Silicon Valley and (preferably) know Zuckenberg personally. Filling out an account takes a lot of time, and through Angel.co companies rarely respond, especially to unknown individuals from distant Slavic countries. Better go to the company website, find contacts and write to them directly. From experience, it is many times easier to get feedback and negotiate.
You can also search for companies and their contacts in CrunchBase : go to the search section, use the cryptocurrency, bitcoin filters, go to the companies websites and look for the Jobs, Career section.
Through Facebook, you can probably find anything you like, including working for a crypt. Alas, with a high probability, writing a post with an attractive picture (a bitcoin coin in the hands of a naked girl) and a text like “Frontend developer is looking for work for bitcoins” is not particularly productive. If among thousands of your friends there were those who could help, you would have already turned to them. Although what the hell is not joking? This is Facebook and the famous hypothesis of several handshakes. If it does not work, you can do the following:
- In the search for FB, enter a query like “bitcoin jobs”, and get a list of thematic groups ( for example ). Most of them are closed, so you have to knock in PM to the admins and ask to add you;
- And now there will be a life hack: on the same Angel.co, in the project descriptions, very often there are links to the FB profiles of startup founders. As experience shows, many of them easily add you as friends if you send a request. And the rest are added when they see other founders in your friends. Then everything is simple: 1) write PM and offer your candidacy, 2) wait until one of the new friends reposts the vacancies in your project and answers to it, 3) gather a crowd of such friends, open up the sales person’s abilities and create a post on the topic “looking for work for cryptocurrency, smart, handsome, brilliant.”
A few practical tips:
Practical experience is a great thing, it allows you to warn against mistakes of new applicants and suggest solutions that take a lot of time to search. A few useful and proven tips that can help you on the difficult path of exchanging knowledge and skills for cryptocurrency:
- Before you agree to work for altcoins, learn how you will convert them to fiat and how much you will lose on commissions. After a detailed study of the issue, everything may not be very profitable and rosy. We will publish a detailed article about the withdrawal of bitcoins in Russia a little later, but for now, we advise you to pay attention to resources such as LocalBitcoins and BTC-E (you can change the crypto to Russian rubles and withdraw to Yandex Money with a 0% commission).
- Fix GP in fiat, not crypt. This is a standard practice that 99% of employers agree to, allowing you to secure your income. Example: we agree on $ 2000, payment in bitcoin, at the rate at the time of payment;
- Follow the course and do not rush to change the entire crypt at once, especially if the financial situation allows. With a high probability, literally within 1-2 weeks you will receive a more profitable course. The exception is when you receive payment at a rate close to the maximum for the last 2-3 months. Then it’s better to sell right away.
- A reliable wallet / service for storing Alcoins is our everything. Each crypto owner in stock has a story about how he frantically saved a beer-drenched PC, in whose memory wallet files were stored or could not regain access to the online wallet tied to a lost phone. If you are interested, write in the comments - and we will make the same detailed material about which wallet to choose, and for now, we advise you to carefully select services / desktop applications, make backups as often as possible and store them in safe places.
And of course, mining, as a way to earn money, has not been canceled :