r/WeirdSideHustles • u/KazuKazu_hyperbowl • 1d ago

Sharing My Sidehustle I make money checking if forgotten vending machines are actually abandoned

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I honestly didn't know this was a thing until a few months ago. From what I know, there are a lot of vending machines that are just sitting around in old laundromats, apartment buildings, repair shops, and other places where nobody really pays attention to them anymore.

What I do is basically check if those machines are still being maintained or not. Someone sends me a list of locations and I go there, take pictures, see if anything changed, check if the machine is still plugged in, and report back what I found.

Some people might think it sounds boring, but it is actually interesting because you find some weird stuff. One machine I checked was behind an old car wash and it looked like nobody touched it for years. There were weeds around it and the drinks inside looked really old. I honestly could not tell if it was still active or if everyone just forgot it was there.

From what I know, the owners need the information because sometimes it is hard to know if a machine is still being serviced or completely abandoned. My part is just collecting the information and sending it over.

Last weekend I checked 17 machines and made about $146. I never thought driving around looking at vending machines would make me money, but somehow it does. :PP

It is definitely one of the weirdest side hustles I have ever heard of, and now it is one of the ways I make extra cash.

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u/geneticdrifter 14h ago

Keep pointing them out so us lames can learn.

2

u/Traditional_Figure_1 12h ago

i feel so lame thinking this was pretty cool lol

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u/LostAbbott 12h ago

Problem is that the AI posts keep getting better and or changing.  If you know what to looks for you can sometimes watch them change from the last week of a month to the first week.  Sometimes I can see it, other times It takes me a good week or two to start spotting them again.  It is a horrible game of wack a mole...

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u/geneticdrifter 12h ago edited 11h ago

I notice Astro turf fairly often but I guess those might be bots. Is there a subreddit where the bots get together and share tips? Is that claudebot? /s

In all honesty, is there community of people who point things like this out?

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u/Blazured 12h ago

Download ChatGPT and start using it. You need experience with the way AI talks.

And if you don't have experience with how they talk then you're just going to keep being fooled by AI.

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u/geneticdrifter 11h ago

So use heroin to figure out how to beat heroin. I got it.

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u/Blazured 11h ago

Heroin is addictive. AI's aren't.

You currently don't have the ability to spot AI writing because you have no experience with it. This makes you easy to fool. But you can quickly change that if you just put in a tiny bit of effort.