I test side hustles on camera and publish the numbers, good or bad. This page is the scoreboard: every experiment I have written up, what it actually paid, what it took, and whether I would do it again. Each line links to the full write-up.
The scoreboard
| Experiment | What it paid | What it took | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|
| Selling AI-made 3D models on model platforms | Over roughly two years: about €4,500 in MakerWorld gift cards, about €1,000 from Creality Cloud, over $2,000 from Nexprint in one year, a bit over €1,000 from Cults3D and a few hundred from MyMiniFactory. Direct sales are only €20–50 a month. | ChatGPT for image ideas, Hyper3D for the model, then printing, photographing and uploading every one | Still doing it — and most of it is gift cards, not cash |
| Upwork | About $700 in the first half year, more since | Hundreds of proposals and zero hires before it started working | Worth it once I changed what I applied for |
| A Udemy course on AI 3D modelling | $310 in the first six months, around $500 by September 2026 | About four hours to make | Worth it — it answers questions people were already asking me |
| Renting out four things I already own | €30–50 in an average month, best month around €150, worst month €0 | About an hour a month | Worth it — best effort-to-income ratio so far |
| Respondent.io paid research | $95 for one study of about an hour | Checking every few days for about six months to get accepted once | Won’t use it again |
| Seven walking apps | Nothing I could withdraw | 100,000 steps | Not worth it |
| Adsterra ads after AdSense said no | About $2 earned in the first couple of weeks | Claude wrote the ad code, I uploaded one file | Too small to judge yet |
| A leveraged ETF portfolio | Too early — this is an experiment, not income | €100 a month | Ongoing, reported monthly |
What the numbers actually say
The biggest number comes with an asterisk. AI-made 3D models are my largest earner by far, but most of it arrived as MakerWorld gift cards and platform points rather than money in the bank. I use them for printers and filament, and sell the printers locally below store prices. If you cannot use the gift cards, the headline figure is worth a lot less to you. The whole breakdown is in the seven-platform write-up, and the new income series tracks the current numbers episode by episode.
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One email per experiment. Full numbers, no fluff.
Upwork only worked once I stopped competing on skill. I am an electrical engineer and sent hundreds of proposals for 3D modelling, CAD and electrical jobs without a single hire. The hires came from small research jobs where where I live was the actual qualification — checking local websites, local market research, testing local platforms. The lesson I would pass on: search for jobs your situation qualifies you for, not only your CV.
The course was the least work for the money. About four hours to make, and it exists because people kept asking me the same AI 3D modelling questions. Around $500 so far.
The cheapest one to start was the one I already owned. A carpet cleaner, an instant camera, a Bluetooth speaker and a drone, listed on a local rental platform. No new skill and no new money. Some months are dead, because a small town only needs a carpet cleaner so often.
The worst one looked like the easiest
Seven apps — Macadam, Smiles, Sweatcoin, Aruco, Robox Fit, Steppa and StepBet — and 100,000 steps. I did not reach a single withdrawal threshold, so I cannot claim a payout from any of them. StepBet is really a bet with yourself rather than an app paying you. The full walking app test is here.
Respondent sits at the other end of the scale: a real $95 for about an hour, but it took months of checking to get accepted once, and it paid out on a prepaid Visa I had to find a shop to spend. Why I would not do it again.
What I would tell someone starting
Start with what you already own or already know. The rented tools, the course and the local research jobs all came from things I already had before I started.
This page gets updated as new experiments go up. None of these numbers are a promise, and nothing here is financial advice — it is what happened to me, with the tools I had.
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