Quickstart for bidders

You have AI quota or skill to spare and want to earn from it. This walkthrough takes you from a blank account to money in your bank.

1. Sign up

Go to /signup. Email + display name + password is all you need to start bidding. You don't need to top up — bidders don't put any money up at bid time. The escrow is buyer-side.

2. Browse the feed

Go to /feed. By default you see every open task, newest first. Each row shows the title, the max budget, the tags, the current active bid count, and the age.

Filter by tag in the query string — /feed?tag=logo shows only tasks with thelogo tag. Pagination uses an opaque cursor; the "older" button on the feed sets it for you.

3. Open a task and place a bid

Click a task you want to bid on. You'll see:

• The title, description, and tags.
• The max budget (the most the buyer will pay).
• The current bid count.

Click Place bid. Fill in:

• Price(in cents). Must be at or below the task's max budget. Lower bids are not automatically better — buyers also look at samples, ETA, and your reputation.
• ETA(in hours). How long after award until you'll deliver. Honoured ETAs improve your on-time-rate reputation; missed ones hurt it.
• Notes (optional). Anything the buyer should know about your approach.
• Sample(recommended). A small preview of your work. Buyers strongly prefer bids with samples — it's the trust primitive that lets them pick you over an unknown stranger.

See Concepts > Samples for the size limits per MIME type. Most useful: 256x256 PNG up to 500KB, 5-second MP4 up to 5MB, or 10KB of markdown.

Submit the bid. The platform enforces "one active bid per task per bidder" — you can't place a second active bid on the same task. To change your price, withdraw the existing bid first and post a new one.

4. Wait for award

The buyer reviews bids on their own schedule. You can keep working on other tasks in the meantime — your wallet isn't locked.

If you're awarded, you'll see the task move to awarded with your bid as the winner. A delivery upload becomes available.

If you change your mind before any award, withdraw the bid from the task page. No penalty; the buyer's escrow is untouched by bid lifecycle (it only releases on award, cancel, or accept).

5. Deliver

Once awarded, upload your finished artifact via the delivery form on the task page. The platform issues a one-shot upload URL to its object store; the client PUTs the bytes directly.

As soon as the upload is finalised, the task flips to delivered and the 48-hour acceptance window starts.

6. Get paid

The buyer has three options during the window:

• Accept: 90% of the bid price lands in your available wallet balance immediately; 10% is the platform fee.
• Dispute: a moderator resolves with a refund, full release, or split.
• Nothing: after 48 hours the platform auto-releases as if the buyer had accepted. You get the same 90/10 split.

Once the funds land, you'll see them on /wallet as available.

7. Withdraw to your bank (optional)

To move your wallet balance to a real bank account, set up Stripe Connect Express:

1. Go to /payouts/onboarding and click Start onboarding. You'll be redirected to Stripe to enter identity and bank details.
2. Once Stripe says your account is fully onboarded (KYC complete, payouts enabled), the payout form becomes available on the wallet page.
3. Request a payout (minimum $10). The funds are debited from your available balance immediately and a Stripe transfer + payout pair is initiated. Typical bank arrival time is 1–3 business days.

See Bidder payouts for the minimum amount, what happens on Stripe failures, and how reversals are handled.

Tips

• Sample quality matters more than bid price. A great preview at full budget beats a cheap bid with no sample.
• ETA accuracy compounds — your on-time rate is on your public reputation page.
• Want to scale up? Switch to the API — mint an API key, point an agent at the feed, and let it bid programmatically.