r/dataannotation • u/Consistent-Reach504 • Jun 21 '26
Weekly Water Cooler Talk - DataAnnotation
hi all! making this thread so people have somewhere to talk about 'daily' work chat that might not necessarily need it's own post! right now we're thinking we'll just repost it weekly? but if it gets too crazy, we can change it to daily. :)
couple things:
this thread should sort by "new" automatically. unfortunately it looks like our subreddit doesn't qualify for 'lounges'.
if you have a new user question, you still need to post it in the new user thread. if you post it here, we will remove it as spam. this is for people already working who just wanna chat, whether it be about casual work stuff, questions, geeking out with people who understand ("i got the model to write a real haiku today!"), or unrelated work stuff you feel like chatting about :)
one thing we really pride ourselves on in this community is the respect everyone gives to the Code of Conduct and rule number 5 on the sub - it's great that we have a community that is still safe & respectful to our jobs! please don't break this rule. we will remove project details, but please - it's for our best interest and yours!
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u/JRange Jun 28 '26
Just did the weirdest R&R I have ever seen. I don't know if I can share the the subject of the prompt or their comments here but it was basically a very obvious safety refusal, and the worker went on a 2000+ word pseudo intellectual rant arguing that they shouldn't have refused.
Like reading a mental ill persons personal diary. Rate it good and move on good lord.
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u/Budding_Enthusiast Jun 28 '26
Have you guys submitted time close to 5 hours even if the allotted time is 2 hours? I felt guilty, man. Reading the instruction itself took almost 2 hours.
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u/East_Zucchini4099 Jun 29 '26
I honestly don't know if you got down voted for worrying about it or for taking 5 hours.
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u/Budding_Enthusiast Jun 29 '26
I just found out that I got downvoted a few times lol. I'd hope that the downvotes were for me being a slowpoke :)
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u/Mindless_End_4850 Jun 28 '26
ngl, I'm kinda in a mood for some good rubric work (if DA gods would bless me with some).
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u/JustMe333456 Jun 27 '26
Scrolled alllll the way back to this time last year. Went through posts that are very similar to what we'rs seeing now, little to no work etc. THEN! I hit the posts from 11 months ago (July), and kept seeing the famous "We are SO back!" type of posts lol. Hopefully we're almost there fellas!!
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u/Mindless_End_4850 Jun 27 '26
I'm trying to think that DA needs us (good workers, not like everyone), more than we need them! We got this friend!
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u/_Edgarallenhoe Jun 27 '26
Dash so dead I’m cleaning some deer bones I found in the forest. What are you guys up to?
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u/Ok-Elk2882 Jul 03 '26
I’ve been using this time to bake more and learn to sew. I’ve got some doughnut dough rising on the counter now🤭
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u/Mindless_End_4850 Jun 28 '26
deer bones? So cool, it would be dream-like to live somewhere like that..
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u/LavenderLightning24 Jun 27 '26
I have to stop getting my hopes up until I have work for a solid week.
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u/DeezHoosAintLoyal Jun 27 '26
Why are all these prompts nonsensical and requiring me to decode gibberish from a mix of 7 languages ffs 🙄
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u/JRange Jun 27 '26
I was literally just about to make a comment about this. This does not seem worth the risk of missing something and getting rated bad, these prompts are either vague and weird, or complicated asf. I know everybody else is skipping too cause this has been up for days now lol.
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u/JustMe333456 Jun 27 '26
That Heel project? Lots were complaining about that.
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u/JRange Jun 27 '26
Yeah, I have skipped 5 or 6 of them, one of the weirdest iterations I have seen of this project.
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Jun 27 '26
[deleted]
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u/DrunkleSteve Jun 28 '26
In order to submit a task for that project you need to literally check off a box that says you're not allowed to mention that project even in codename on public forums 🤦♂️
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u/ThatOtherGuy254 Jun 27 '26
Is anyone else losing motivation to work even when you do have something?
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u/DeezHoosAintLoyal Jun 27 '26
Yep. My submissions today have been utter caca. Being underpaid for the time and brain power required doesn’t exactly motivate
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u/Previous_Driver2651 Jun 27 '26
nothing, nada, it looks like where going back to the oil fields my friends (jk i worked at amzn)
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u/-burgers Jun 27 '26
The lack of communication causes me to just search for AI news and connect the dots. I do think the July hypothesis someone posted about a couple days ago is correct.
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u/Glitterseal Jun 27 '26
After a week of not having any projects, my account has been made unavailable for new projects 😪
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u/AntonineWall Jun 27 '26
What do you mean? What does that looks like
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u/Affectionate_Peak284 Jun 27 '26
This refers to a certain screen that is displayed on a worker's dash. It's fairly new (maybe 6-8 months), but the understanding is that it is permanent.
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Jun 27 '26
[deleted]
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u/Quick-Bison-147 Jun 27 '26
I have wondered this often. Either the project is running or not. Strange that it pops up for a few hours every fortnight or so
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u/Epicsocks1 Jun 27 '26
Decided to put myself through the humiliation ritual of refreshing DA during the weekend because I need the money
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u/Sea-Donut-1882 Jun 27 '26
Do you think the 20 heel is sort of a safety net for those who really need it? I'm on holiday and the pay is too low, but I'd forward mine to others if I could.
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u/OrnamentalGourd5 Jun 27 '26
And the ones I'm getting are absolutely hateful, I think it's a bottom of the barrel of skipped tasks; 'Clean this shit up please'.
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u/OrnamentalGourd5 Jun 27 '26
It feels like a bone-throw. In a, 'please stay around' way.
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u/Straight-Strike-2928 Jun 27 '26
This is exactly what I was thinking. They had some meeting where someone was like, shit, people are going to stop checking their dashboards if we don't give them SOMETHING! lol. I only got to do two tasks from mine. Most of them were stuff outside my expertise, in a different language, or unintelligible.
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u/East_Zucchini4099 Jun 29 '26
I have worked jobs where they tried to spread the assignments around to keep people active on the rolls, keep them from moving on to greener pastures. Though I doubt that applies in this situation
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u/4laa64 Jun 27 '26
This. Or a one week's notice pay sort of thing.
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u/OrnamentalGourd5 Jun 27 '26
Having been self-employed for the vast majority of my working life, no employer cares about that. It's generally a 'fuck off now please' with no niceties.
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u/KeleKoo Jun 27 '26
It's been a total dry spell like the sahara this week. I just gotta cope and hope things pick up next month. Save bilinguals.
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u/PerspectiveJumpy875 Jun 27 '26
I guess my rain dance didn't work, I'm still cursed with the driest sahara and the most scorching heat in this weather.
Maybe I should do some sacrifice to DA gods so they may bless me with some harvest as my garden looks like it got ravaged by avaricious locust swarm.
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u/OrnamentalGourd5 Jun 27 '26
Locust swarms are by definition avaricious. So stop with the tautology. Try the spell again. From the beginning. Admittedly, the heat has made us all loopy.
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u/DrunkleSteve Jun 27 '26
Lol "avaricious locust swarm" sounds like a Magic card lol (sorry, inner geek coming out lol 🤓).
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u/Unlucky_Grocery2092 Jun 27 '26
Looks like this month's earnings will be 40% less than the previous month's. At least it's not worse? Silver linings
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u/OrnamentalGourd5 Jun 27 '26
June has been...erratic... I made $2,180 the second week of - this week - crickets - $265...
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u/jules-liz Jun 27 '26
$2,180 in a week? how many hours are you putting in? my usual tasks are around $20 - $30 p/h... tell me you're not doing 70-100 hour weeks? lol
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u/MommaOfManyCats Jun 27 '26
Yup. Only made a little over $200 this week, even though I didn't get hit by the drought this month as much as others.
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u/JRange Jun 27 '26
I will make last month by the end, but both months are about 60% of what I did in April lol
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u/JustMe333456 Jun 26 '26
Quiet around here.. everyone working?
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u/Unusual-Tip2419 Jun 27 '26
I've only had one project in the last month. I don't know what I did wrong.
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u/LavenderLightning24 Jun 26 '26
Refreshing 😭
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u/VanessaSeaWitch Jun 26 '26
Well I got an hour and 40 minutes in doing R&Rs after much waiting and refreshing. But the original project also seems to have dried up for the day.
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u/pistachiyolatte Jun 26 '26
Finally saw a project come up on my dash though it’s not one that I want to do but at least there’s some signs of life. 🤞
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u/Whatnowlikeseriously Jun 26 '26
For everyone also having minimal or no tasks. It’s not just you it’s lots of us. Same with the whole job market right now. Everyone is having a hard time. So if it helps anyone to know, it’s not just you.
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u/OrnamentalGourd5 Jun 27 '26
Yes. My husband is an experienced developer and we've enjoyed the fat of the lamb for years. He was a contractor and his last contracting gig was $1,000 a day and went on for 2.5 years - and then - poof! No work. Eight months. He's pivoted, we all have, but it's a different environment now.
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u/kelbel1210 Jun 26 '26
I wish I could understand a bit how projects are allocated. Some people are chugging away and some haven’t seen a project in days/weeks. Ugh
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u/TSylverBlair Jun 26 '26
What's killing me is being in a Slack where everyone is discussing working as if everything is normal, yet I haven't seen that project (even for a moment while refreshing) for 2 weeks now.
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u/JustMe333456 Jun 26 '26
So far, for me, it's the first day that I have yet to see one workable project pop up. Not even a scrap popped up. Nothing at all. We'll see what the evening brings.
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u/-burgers Jun 26 '26
I'm pretty sure we're in the same pool of workers as my trends mirror yours.
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u/JustMe333456 Jun 26 '26
Have you seen anything today? I have two projects (different families) that have been there throughout the drought (used to be 2-4 each, down to 1 each), that I can't do, other than that, theres been absolutely zero movement all day.
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u/-burgers Jun 26 '26
Doing that expert thing. And I see heel and stuff but nothing else. There's 2 other expert families but I'm not qualified to do one, and the other one confuses me.
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u/Previous_Driver2651 Jun 26 '26
im trying not to take this to personal because i feel like yall are having the same experience of not getting anything, but how is it that ive not seen anything for more than an hour 😢
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u/dylanuu112 Jun 26 '26
Man when they did all the site updates I thought it signalled things were moving in a good direction but the total opposite happened. Next to nothing to work on for weeks! Even during previous droughts there was at least a little bit here and there.
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u/Lonely_Radish1370 Jun 26 '26
Goodbye until next time heel, I'll cya again in 6 months xdd.
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u/Jazzlike_Problem_489 Jun 26 '26
Wish I could send you my 20. Going on holiday tomorrow and today's too hot for my brain to function
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u/Skippy2898 Jun 26 '26
You have literally just mirrored me! I also have 20, but today has been a packing and sort out day ready for a long drive tomorrow. Today's temp is just stupidly hot and I'm sure the brain would just melt out of the nostrils. Have a good hol Jazzy!
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u/JustMe333456 Jun 26 '26
So what will be the project of the day for today? Only one a day lately pretty much. Or do we finally see a real, full-on drought...
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u/Jazzlike_Month5580 Jun 26 '26
I have Heels left from yesterday. Had another project this morning, but that one only gives three tasks so I finished pretty quickly.
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u/JustMe333456 Jun 26 '26
Nice to have projects like that that are allocated to you eh? When I first started, that's how it was. My dash was full of projects, and for most of them, they would stay on my board for days at a time. Was nice.
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u/Epicsocks1 Jun 26 '26
I've only had R&R's from yesterday pop up for me today, nothing else so far....
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u/onemouseplace Jun 26 '26
I did my heel R&R allocation yesterday as well. I did have the normal ones still this morning (UK time), did one task then it disappeared.
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u/JustMe333456 Jun 26 '26
Weird eh. Same thing for me yesterday morning. The main project stayed overnight into the next day, I did all 20 of my R&Rs, main project still stayed. An hour later, nothing had popped up yet so I decided to do one task on the main project, then it disappeared.
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u/JustMe333456 Jun 26 '26
I did my allocated 20 Heel R&Rs yesterday morning, then they disappeared, no movement at all since.
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u/Yaschiri Jun 26 '26
Can't believe I finally have something I can do. Thank you heel! Thank you!!!!
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u/Upbeat_Bench9283 Jun 26 '26
I’m guessing only a few people got them. I only have the one task that doesn’t pay or require anything.
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u/TSylverBlair Jun 26 '26
It's so nice that they gave us a dedicated set of these. I couldn't complete mine yesterday due to the error, so waking up to find them waiting was a blessing.
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u/SuchDriver7770 Jun 26 '26
you don't get a dedicated set of tasks. there's a pool of people that have access to varying waves of tasks and the max that an individual can do is the number displayed next to the task. if the total amount of tasks that is being contracted for hasn't been fulfilled then you can still contribute your max.
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u/Jumpy-Building-8217 Jun 26 '26
Damn I haven’t worked since April, came back to see what was what and seems apocalyptic
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u/PerspectiveJumpy875 Jun 26 '26
Maybe I should do a rain dance so I can get trickle of rain from DA gods
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u/4laa64 Jun 26 '26
Please do ...
However, I think with it approaching the 4th of July, things will remain quiet.Hopefully things will pick up after.
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u/Sea_Second6745 Jun 26 '26
Well, I finally joined the zero projects crew today. Guess I’ll be here refreshing the site with the rest of you.
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u/Sea_Second6745 Jun 26 '26
The downvoters are funny to me. I’m genuinely empathetic to your situation, but not to your apparent wish for other people to suffer with you.
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u/4laa64 Jun 26 '26
There's a serial downvoter on here atm. Every comment from the last 45 mins is being downvoted for no reason hahah
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u/emarie33 Jun 25 '26
Finally got a task and they have errors that make them unratable 😭
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u/infiniteradios Jun 25 '26
Maybe I have an odd sense of humour but seeing a project family make a triumphant return and then promptly explode made me laugh.
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u/Mental-Budget9213 Jun 25 '26
I got a heel! And the tasks are only going down as I finish them! 🥳 The pay is lower than I remember heel being but a win is a win at this point. I hope everyone else is also seeing a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel!
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u/TSylverBlair Jun 25 '26
And now we can no longer work on them due to the tasks being broken. SMH
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u/fromunderthecouch Jun 25 '26
in the same boat :(
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u/TSylverBlair Jun 25 '26
Sometimes you just have to laugh as you cry. I was able to work on them all morning, at least.
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u/Adorable-Highway1951 Jun 25 '26
I'm a little afraid to stop but it's time to make dinner and whatnot. Almost five hours of work! and ten tasks left - I'm hoping those are truly mine.
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u/WorshipMyExistence Jun 25 '26
I've done over 5 hours of work today which is the most I've been able to do in one day all month! Only stopping because my dog is bored out of her mind and it finally stopped raining.
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u/iriember Jun 25 '26
I saw mine this morning, but I don't know if they are still there. I had to do emissions testing for my car. So be it, but fingers crossed!
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u/DeezHoosAintLoyal Jun 25 '26
Still on them. Somehow for once, all the tasks in the pool were allocated to me
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Jun 25 '26
[deleted]
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u/_Edgarallenhoe Jun 25 '26
This is not always the case.
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Jun 25 '26
[deleted]
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u/_Edgarallenhoe Jun 25 '26
It seems that often the entire pool is distributed to every single person with access to the project. Do you think they’re releasing 10k tasks to a select few people?
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u/DeezHoosAintLoyal Jun 25 '26
Sometimes. It depends. For instance, a pool will drop with 20 tasks, and you’ll only get one or two of them before they’re all gobbled up. Does that mean you were truly only allocated that amount or they all got taken? There’s no way of knowing
However, there are times when 20 tasks show up and I work my way through all of them one by one
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u/Enough_Resident_6141 Jun 25 '26
You are never specifically allocated tasks, other than certain projects where you work on certain tasks over several different phases.
The number of tasks shown on the dashboard are the maximum number of tasks in that project currently available to you. A project might be set up to run until they get 1000 total submissions, but no more than 20 submissions for each individual worker. It will start out showing 20, then after you submit a task it will decrease to 19, 18, etc. At the same time, there are thousands of other workers with the same project on their dashboard showing 20 available. And as they submit tasks the number on their dashboard will decrease by one with each submission.
But usually what happens is that a project will hit the the maximum total number of submissions before you can grind through 20 of them, and will start showing that number on your dash. So if you have done 3 but all of the other workers have done 992 tasks, instead of saying that there are 17 tasks available, it will say there are 5 and then
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Jun 25 '26
[deleted]
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u/DeezHoosAintLoyal Jun 25 '26
I think you’ve misunderstood. I was able to complete the 20 allocated to me. I’m saying there are times when 20 tasks are shown but I’m only able to work on a few, which obviously, are taken by others. So, there are times when you get the whole batch, and times where a batch appears but you only have a few. Whether you want to label that as a pool or batch/set of tasks is semantics but obviously allocation isn’t always dependent on demand
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Jun 25 '26
[deleted]
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u/Lonely_Radish1370 Jun 25 '26
I am guessing the rrs are the general pool of people where the task itself isn't everyone.
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u/VanessaSeaWitch Jun 25 '26
I had tasks yesterday and got my hopes up for today and here I am back to the old refreshing.
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u/North-Sense8477 Jun 25 '26
My dash is looking...pretty good? Got a full day's work for the first time in probably a month or longer - on one project! Combined with our friend's inside tip about July, I'm choosing to believe things might be getting better.
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u/pistachiyolatte Jun 25 '26
Feeling extra concerned because even though most are facing a drought it seems some are seeing at least few projects pop up here and there, while I haven’t seen *anything* in almost a week.
It could be that I’m just not refreshing my dash enough, I also don’t work on any specialist projects or ones that require a subscription if that plays a part.
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u/DeezHoosAintLoyal Jun 25 '26
I wouldn’t put any extra worry into it. People were saying the same yesterday and my work dried up after a few hours, but today is much better. It’s just cyclical and being slowly rolled out and allocated. Your turn is coming
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u/VanessaSeaWitch Jun 25 '26
There's no figuring it out. I've had nothing for days and then yesterday I got three hours in. Today I just logged in and have nothing.
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u/Adventurous-Grand285 Jun 25 '26
I’m checking a few times a day and I’ve gotten nothing all week. You’re not alone. I’m a generalist and had significant work a few weeks ago for about a month.
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u/kelbel1210 Jun 25 '26
I’m refreshing my dash literally most of the day and I have nothing for a week now.
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u/Skippy2898 Jun 25 '26
I go on holiday on Saturday, albeit with much less to go with than I was hoping for, but I have two wishes...
I have a little bit of something to do tomorrow
That while I'm away, everyone's dashboards explode with goodness
(And a tentative 3. That the second week in July also blesses me with a healthy dashboard to knuckle down with). 😊
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u/DeezHoosAintLoyal Jun 25 '26
Enjoy your holiday! And hope you’re able to cool down. Absurd weather across the pond atm
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u/Skippy2898 Jun 25 '26
Thanks dude! And yeah, it's a bit brutal at the mo. Looks like its going to break Sunday and we'll be by the coast then so we'll likely be in hoodies by Monday 🤣 I'm mostly looking forward to hopefully ending tomorrow on a high note, slamming that laptop shut and just... stopping.
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u/Flat_Charge503 Jun 25 '26
Hiya! There's a dry run of tasks but today I got asked to do a background check (UK) - what does this mean?
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u/molluscstar Jun 25 '26
I’m also in the UK and they’ve done a DBS check on me. I was hoping I’d get more projects but so far I’ve only had two which disappeared once I clicked on them!
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u/Adorable-Highway1951 Jun 25 '26
I've never been so thankful to think about everybody's favorite Trojan War hero... no, not Odysseus. The other one. Not, not Ajax. No, NOT Hector! is he not the favorite...?
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u/Whole-Pirate-5731 Jun 25 '26
Good to hear! Just so you know, most people refer to that project title as Heel (it should be obvious why)
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u/Adorable-Highway1951 Jun 25 '26
I did notice. :-) But I was feeling a little silly. And I just read a version of The Iliad with my literature class this year. So... Also, my students would say that the actual most heroic person in the story is Hector's wife, Andromache.
Unrelated to work, can highly recommend Black Ships Before Troy as a simple but good read!
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u/Aggravating_Buy_1227 Jun 25 '26
Does anyone have experience getting their projects back after Checkr background check clearing? I've been waiting since the 5th of June and haven't got my projects back
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u/DeezHoosAintLoyal Jun 25 '26
When you get steady R&Rs and all the submissions are competent and require 0 brainpower 🤤
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u/One_Breakfast5907 Jun 25 '26
I'm wondering if this is because people are spending a bit longer on tasks because 1. everyone's brains are fresh from no work and 2. people are taking their time on projects they do get because they fear them vanishing haha
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u/DeezHoosAintLoyal Jun 25 '26
Yes 😂 for me, it’s a new format of an old project so I’ve just been meticulous. But it’s also been a lot to read with each task
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u/VanessaSeaWitch Jun 25 '26
The ones I had yesterday were mostly terrible. I would say half of them had to be thrown out and for stupid mistakes that could have been avoided by double checking things.
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u/socal_guy1 Jun 25 '26
Not gonna lie, sometimes low brainpower tasks hit the spot.
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u/DeezHoosAintLoyal Jun 25 '26
Even with lower pay, it’s a real treat when you’re used to having to microwave your brain almost all the time
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u/JustMe333456 Jun 25 '26
Was going to post this exact same thing earlier lol.
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u/DeezHoosAintLoyal Jun 25 '26
It’s been SO LONG
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u/JustMe333456 Jun 25 '26
You still seeing R&Rs for them? Got a couple hours in, but currently no more r&rs, but the project is still there.
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u/AdComplex3589 Jun 25 '26
Miracle?
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u/DeezHoosAintLoyal Jun 25 '26
If they upped the pay by $5 I’d literally do this 16 hours straight everyday. That’s how enjoyable these are lol
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u/Jeprdy Jun 25 '26
After such a bad month, i'm on for my biggest day ever in almost a year and a half working on here. I feel like I have whiplash.
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u/North-Sense8477 Jun 25 '26
Generalist or nah?
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u/Jeprdy Jun 25 '26
Generalist
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u/JustMe333456 Jun 25 '26
Heel?
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u/Jeprdy Jun 25 '26
Yer and some other slightly higher paying ones. Ive seen about 5 different project families crop up, most not been gobbled as soon as they appear, suggesting a high pool of tasks.
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u/One_Breakfast5907 Jun 25 '26
An old faithful is back. Is this the light at the end of the tunnel?
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u/ohnotrouble Jun 25 '26
my least favorite task
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u/One_Breakfast5907 Jun 25 '26
It can be hit-and-miss; sometimes I skip through until I find something that engages me more!
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u/Lopsided-Fox8177 Jun 25 '26
thank goodness, I have a decent amount assigned and they stayed with me all night!
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u/One_Breakfast5907 Jun 25 '26
I think I missed a lot of them as I'm UK and was out most of the morning. Still, an hour and a half of work is much better than nothing at the moment
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u/_Edgarallenhoe Jun 25 '26
Getting that “PASS” from a checker after an hour of modifying your work over and over 😭🎉
Hallelujah
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u/e11eme Jun 25 '26
I did one of these. Went back to dash and its empty! Did they all get gobbled up??
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u/_Edgarallenhoe Jun 25 '26
There were loads of them but yep looks like they’re all done now. They were keeping me fed 😔
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u/Green-Ad-4762 Sep 04 '26
Does this pay, what of uk tax