Elance: whether you want a proofreader, programmer, designer, or pretty much anything else, elance probably has it. You can post the work you need done, and the “elancers” will bid for it.
Odesk: Same concept as Elance, but also allows you to have random screenshots of your freelancers computer screen taken, to make sure they’re working while on the clock.
Maven Research : “Everyone is an expert in something”. This is what Maven Research’s website states, and it offers a marketplace to find an expert, or to sell your expertise. Rates can be quite steep, but then again you get what you pay for.
Gerson Lehrman Group : This offers the same services as Maven Research, but possibly “FAR more expensive” than Maven (full disclosure: This was communicated to us by Maven. Although a perusal of the prices on their site seems to sustain this).
Zintro.com : This seems to offer the same services as the two above. It is set up to help investors, consultants, lawyers, and operating managers find the best experts for consults ranging from half an hour to multiple months.
Designs:
99designs.com: State what you need and what you’re offering for it, and wait for the designs to come rolling in. You pay only for the design you choose.
Logotournament.com: This is exactly what it sounds like. A more specialized version of 99designs.com.
Fiverr : Do you need a new logo? A jingle? Someone to shout your company name in the local mall? Find out what else people are willing to do for $5 at Fiverr.
Education
Rate My Professors : An guide to the pros and cons of professors, written and evaluated by other students. Know what to expect, or just vent about what you went through.
Gas/Petrol
Gasbuddy : The best known and, generally speaking, most reliable of gas price listings. Searchable by state and zip code. The only caveat is that prices are usually posted by the gas stations themselves, so some prices are “membership prices” and the like. Especially helpful is the map, easily navigable and showing the location of gas stations with their relative prices.
Travel
Airline Vouchers : Some tips on getting airline vouchers during travel.
Air Fare Watchdog : A user generated site for cheap airline flights. Reviewed by the website and constantly up to date. Also features Jetblue and Southwest, unlike other flight aggregating sites. Highly Recommended.
Tripadvisor.com : Benefit from the wisdom of crowds by accessing this site to get information on any lodging you may be considering. With more than 15 million reviews, this is the definitive source for information, after which you can go to any travel site to make your booking.
Wikitravel : Fast becoming an indispensable part of travel planning, Wikitravel has information for over 20,000 destinations.
Mizpee : Because when you gotta go you gotta go. Geared towards women, but useful for everyone.
Universal Packing List : The checklist you need no matter where you’re traveling to, although it seems curious that the destination is not one of the factors taken into account. While you can choose average temperatures, international travel and purpose of travel, we would think at least the continent (let alone country) of destination would be an important factor.
Intrade.com : The most popular prediction market in the US. Due to the current laws on using money for betting, intrade allows predictions on everything save sports.
Iowa Electronic Markets : The Iowa Electronic Markets is an academic market examining elections where positions are limited to $500.
Qmarkets : Qmarkets allows websites to create their own prediction markets and provides idea management services for Enterprises.
Crowdcast.com : A provider of social business intelligence (SBI) solutions, Crowdcast offers a prediction market platform as well as other collective intelligence solutions, which aggregate information for decision-making. They seem geared towards Fortune 500 companies and the like.
Betfair.com : A great site for betting on sports, unfortunately Betfair is only available outside the US because, yes, it uses real money.
Lumenogic : The company formerly known as Newsfutures, one of the earliest providers of prediction markets to both the general public and private companies. It is now called Lumenogic.
Hollywood Stock Exchange : A web-based, multiplayer game in which players use simulated money to buy and sell “shares” of actors, directors, upcoming films, and film-related options.
Consensus Point : Used by companies such as Best Buy and Motorola, Consensus points uses “predictive analytics” to predict what companies may need.
Zocalo : An open source tool kit for building your own Prediction markets.
Inkling : Inkling allows you to download software also to set up your own prediction markets. It is also a paid service, so you get detailed information regarding the markets you have set up.
PredictX : PredictX is a non-commercial prediction market for academic research which allows users to trade virtual money on future events.
Smarkets : Another sports-betting website currently not accessible to participants in the US.
Shopping
Coupons & Deals : A collection of sites offering coupons and deals for your next purchase.
Consumerist.com : Where the wisdom of crowds bites back. If you’re not 100% about a store, phone company, cable company, moving company or pretty much anything else, check this site first.
GetInvisibleHand.com : A plug-in that stays invisible all the time, until something you are shopping for is available cheaper elsewhere, when it provides a link to the cheaper version.
Etsy.com : A source for handmade artwork, clothes, accessories and gifts, made by people just like you.
Nextag : : A comparative shopping website, which, unlike others, has thousands of reviews by users on all of their products and is extremely straightforward in its approach and ease of use.
Zilok.com : Don’t actually want to buy anything? Here you can rent whatever you need and rent out whatever you don’t. User-generated.
Iliketotallyloveit : The epitome of social shopping. People post various products they think are good or just interesting, along with price and where it can be bought, and other users rate and comment on them. The most popular products are featured first.
Zeer: Here you can find nutritional facts, reviews, warnings and advice on countless food items, all by users just like you.
E-pinions : User-generated opinions on millions of products out there for sale. Feel free to submit your own as well.
Kid Coupons: A coupon site that donates 50% of profits to charity, so you donate money while you save money.
Money
Bitcoin : Bitcoin, a P2P electronic cash system. Except this system is not affected by the fluctuations of central banks and currencies.
Kiva : For those who don’t know, it is a peer-to-peer lending system which gives micro-financing loans to people in developing countries. We’ve used it several times.
KickStarter : A form of ‘Crowdfunding’ for your projects. Concentrated mainly on artist and creative projects (in other words it will not work to fund your new business idea).
Other
Crowdworks Library : A library of papers dealing with Prediction markets, divided by subject. Get all our prediction markets information right here!
Pixelgirl Presents : Free artwork for your computer or cell phone, all submitted by artists who then have links to their personal sites. A great way to support upcoming artists, and get great artwork for free.
Open Source Food : Anyone can submit recipes and anyone can evaluate them. If you like a certain dish you can also search for other dishes by the same chef.
Yahoo! Answers : While known to many for its memes and hilarious questions, this is also one of the most useful resources for random questions you may have, due to the sheer number of people using it.
Paperback Swap : Exactly what it sounds like. Once you send a book to someone you receive one credit, which you can use to request a book from someone else.
TitleTrader : Works just like Paperback Swap, but in addition to books you can trade CDs and DVDs as well. Points can be earned by swapping, paying, or referring other users.
GetHuman : If you’re tired of calling customer service only to have a recording ask you to press this and that and putting you on hold, just follow these steps to reach a human, for pretty much every company.
How to Clean Anything : From Golf club grips to tree sap, a list of how to clean anything. It isn’t completely exhaustive yet, but it’s growing, and you can submit your own articles and tips via e-mail.
Tomedes : A great way to use crowdsourcing for your translation needs. And with an exorbitant number of languages (they’re pretty much all there, from Abkhazian to Zulu). Get quick quotes directly from their sidebar.
MyGenGo : Another site for crowdsourcing translation services. Starting as low as five cents a word, but for now it features only English, Spanish, Korean, Japanese and Chinese.
Casting Words : For your Transcription needs. All jobs are sent to Amazon Mechanical Turk, where a real person will work on it.
Trada : Outsourcing your Search Marketing needs to independent agents. This is ideal for small businesses who can’t afford the in-house online marketers.
GetSatisfaction : A great way to use crowds for customer service purposes. Are you receiving too many questions regarding your product/service each day? Try letting other customers answer the questions. Of course, be aware that they may not always be fiercely loyal customers, but it still lift a weight off your shoulders.
Fflick : If you have a twitter account you can connect it directly and you’ll already have a Fflick account. This will then analyze what all your friends are saying about movies and rate all the movies based on their recommendations. Think Metacritic powered by all your friends.
Calculators
Ababon’s Is it Worth it Program : A convenient program to determine whether furthering your education will be monetarily worth it.
Mortgage Calculator : This page lets you calculate what your mortgage payments are/ will be.
Driving Cost Calculators : Sites that calculate how much it will cost (in terms of gasoline) to drive from point A to point B.
Credit & Privacy
Credit & Privacy links: where to get your free credit reports without hassle or strings, opt out of ‘pre-approved’ credit card offers and stop unsolicited telemarketing calls.
