How I Got Over $11,000 in Free Bitcoin

This story is about how I managed to get free Bitcoin online, and while I can’t claim there was no effort involved, I can say it didn’t cost me any money.

A lot of people in the cryptospace are looking to increase their Bitcoin holdings. The proliferation of scams that seem to offer quick and guaranteed profits from minimal investments are a testament to this. Individuals have messaged me on social media offering ways to make easy money fast. I’ve also seen dozens of posts from people promising amazing returns in exchange for sending them small investments. While these are scams (real investment opportunities never guarantee profits and no one is just giving crypto away for free), they continue to exist for a reason. People are looking for ways to get Bitcoin with little to no effort or upfront costs.

Over the past two years, I have managed to get over $11,000 in free bitcoin and tokens. How did I do it? Several different ways.

Bitcoin Faucets

My first free Bitcoin came from faucets. I got a tiny amount, approximately 0.001 BTC (for a discussion of how faucets work see this article). However, I really can’t recommend faucets as a way of getting free Bitcoin since the amounts they give out are so small. However, they are a fun way to learn about crypto and test out sending and receiving from a wallet for the first time. Indeed, my first Bitcoin transactions were faucets payouts. Yet, I didn’t keep doing them for very long. I quickly moved on to more lucrative activities.

Surveys and Odd Jobs Online

I got more Bitcoin from doing surveys and small jobs online. There was, of course, some effort involved. The small jobs were time consuming and boring. They consisted of things like checking the URLs of businesses and making sure information was correct on directory websites. After doing these jobs for a few weeks, I quickly focussed my energy on the surveys, which are less boring and slightly more profitable.

Of course, surveys are also time consuming. They can take anywhere from 4–20 minutes to complete. Sometimes it is hard to find ones you qualify for. In addition, each survey pays out a different amount of BTC depending on the pool of respondents being targeted. For example, a survey about chocolate or beer is pretty open, usually wanting males or females of a certain age who consumed beer or chocolate in the past year. These surveys typically pay only around 25–150 bits each. Other surveys are more specialized, wanting participants who suffer from a particular health condition or who have a specific type of job (e.g. manager with decision-making authority over IT purchases). These more targeted surveys can pay anywhere from 500–15000 bits.

Naturally, surveys want respondents to be honest but I admit to answering questions in ways to make sure I qualified for the most surveys possible. After trying a few of them, it is easy to pick up on tricks for answering questions in a way that makes you seem eligible, no matter what demographic they are looking for. I worked on surveys this way for a couple months and although the earnings were modest, they were real and totalled about 0.015 BTC.

Crypto Airdrops

Most of the free Bitcoin I got came from airdrops. An airdrop is typically part of a marketing campaign for crypto and blockchain startups. A company will give out small amounts of free coin or tokens in exchange for following their social media accounts. Airdrops generate buzz for an ICO (for a detailed discussion of airdrops see this article). I participated in hundreds and hundreds of airdrops and received hundreds of different tokens. The majority of them will be worthless, either because the project fails or the amount given out is so small it is not worth the gas to send them to an exchange.

However, I’ve been lucky to participate in a few airdrops that turned out to be profitable. For example, in one drop I got over 2200 Oyster Pearl tokens, which reached a high of over $7,000. When that happened I sold about half of the tokens for BTC. More recently, I got an airdrop of HYDRO, which was worth approximately $3,000 when I sold half of what I was holding. I’ve also received multiple drops of tokens that ended up being worth a few hundred dollars. Other drops maxed out at between $10–150. I slowly got more BTC by selling these tokens at the right time. So far, I have made approximately $6,500 in total from airdrops.

To profit from airdrops, it is important to be patient and take advantage when there is an increase in value. It also takes some time to learn about the different (and sometimes obscure) exchanges where they can be sold.

Bounty Campaigns

While looking for the airdrops, I kept seeing references to bounty campaigns. Eventually, I looked into what exactly these were. It turns out they are also part of marketing campaigns. Airdrops are one of the first phases of a startup’s marketing plan. Bounties are another way of generating buzz and interest in a project. Essentially, a bounty campaign involves doing tasks in exchange for tokens. The amount of tokens given out for bounty tasks is usually higher than airdrops. However, bounties are more time consuming and can be a challenge to find. I think the best way to find good ones is to use one of several bounty aggregating platforms. These platforms organize campaigns and keep track of social media activity. They also distribute the tokens.

Social Media and Content Creation Bounties

The easiest bounties involve simply liking, retweeting, and sharing content from a project’s social media accounts. However, these also pay the least. The more profitable bounties are “content creation” campaigns, which involve writing articles or creating Youtube videos about a project and posting them online. The content bounties pay the best (often several hundred dollars for a high quality piece) but they are also the most time-consuming. Moreover, they are only feasible for those who have a good knowledge about blockchain technology and strong writing skills.

I first started with social media bounties and earned thousands of tokens this way. However, I soon moved on to writing articles. At that point, I was deep in the cryptospace and had enough knowledge to understand and assess the concept behind many startups. I also had a general interest in writing. I created articles on dozens of different blockchain projects and received 100s of thousands of tokens in exchange. Not all of these tokens became valuable but some did. I would put my earnings from bounties at approximately $5,000.

Nothing is Really Free

As you can see, there are ways of getting free Bitcoin online. However, it should also be clear from my story that nothing is really “free”. Getting Bitcoin from faucets, surveys, selling airdrop and bounty tokens, all take a good chunk of time. The most profitable bounties also require a good amount of knowledge of cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology. So, while I never paid any money to get this Bitcoin, I did put in a lot of time and effort.

Full article on Hacker Noon: https://hackernoon.com/how-i-got-over-11-000-in-free-bitcoin-af21a734f45d

"When I first became interested in Bitcoin I spent a lot of time on faucet sites. If you aren’t familiar with faucets, they are websites that give out tiny amounts of free Bitcoin and altcoins. In other words, they ‘drip’ small amounts of crypto. You claim free coins by clicking a button and completing a captcha. The coins slowly build up in your account until you hit the minimum withdrawal limit (.0001 to .001 BTC depending on the site). At that point, you withdraw your accumulated earnings to a personal wallet. Some faucets allow you to claim every 15 minutes, others every hour, and some only once a day. How often you can make claims is related to the amount of the payout. The more often you can claim, the less Bitcoin you receive each time."

Full article: https://www.blockdelta.io/faucets-offer-free-bitcoin/

New article on protecting yourself from common bitcoin investment scams:

"Those who have spent a lot of time in the Bitcoin community are aware of how many different scams are out there and how frequently you run into them. The focus of this dispatch are two types of scams I have seen repeatedly online: fake faucet wallets and fake online mining pools. The goal of this story to describe my own experiences with these types of sites and help others avoid falling victim."

Full article: https://www.blockdelta.io/keeping-your-coins-safe/

This article (by the same author) mentions Datum too but also highlights some of the challenges blockchain presents to solving digital privacy issues: https://medium.com/swlh/immutability-is-a-double-edged-sword-how-blockchain-solves-some-privacy-problems-while-creating-ab5fb6336935

I like this piece because the author isn't wearing rose-colored glasses when assessing the potential for blockchain technology to help secure our digital privacy:

"Often when we hear the phrase “data privacy” what is being referred to are the rules set by centralized platforms that determine who has permission to access data and who gets informed when it happens. Yet, this is only the surface of the problem. The deepest threat to our online privacy lies in the nature of the internet itself. The network operates like a massive copy-and-paste machine — copying information from one computer and pasting it to another. For example, when we share vital information like our name, date of birth, address, and social security number, that personal information is passed onto third-parties that require it. This means not only do we have to repeatedly fill out forms every time we interact with a new organization or business, but those entities also make copies and store our information in centralized databases that are easy targets for hackers."

Read the full article on The Start Up: https://medium.com/swlh/immutability-is-a-double-edged-sword-how-blockchain-solves-some-privacy-problems-while-creating-ab5fb6336935

Yes, lots of promise for a project like DeNet I think.

Sorry about that. There are some screenshots that are referenced in the text so cutting and pasting wouldn't work so well... I can delete the post. Don't want to be in violation of the rules.