Terrific Resource for Writers, Readers and Students

Shvoong.com is a terrific resource for students, researchers, or anyone else interested in quick capsule summaries of books, web sites, journals, magazines, movies and newspapers. Advertising themselves as the place for abstracts, they are probably one of the most honest research-oriented web sites around. You'll find no promises of fully detailed analysis of these works, just summaries.

Shvoong.com allows freelance writers to submit a summary of at least 300 words and no more than 900 words. Obviously, you can't expect a lot of detail of Tolstoy's mammoth novel War & Peace, or practically any Stephen King book when in that allotted amount of words. Although anyone can write a summary, that doesn't necessarily mean there's a guaranteed lack of quality. For one thing, each summary is checked for accuracy and to guard against plagiarism. And for another, each abstract can be rated by readers. If several summaries of the same material are submitted, the ones that consistently get bad ratings will be removed.

The abstracts are initially divided into five categories: Books, Humanities, Science, WWW, and Newspapers. To further assist you, these five categories are then broken down into subcategories. For instance, under books you can narrow your search down into genres such as horror, classics, plays, fairy tales, Greek Tragedy, and many more. The Science subcategories include biology, chemistry, physics, statistics, etc. Humanities include such topics as film studies, Jewish studies, linguistics, law, musicology, etc. The WWW section subcategories are more general in nature: blogs, auction sites, search engine, SEO, software, etc. The Newspaper section is broken down by country.

Obviously, the range of quality of the abstracts to be found on Shvoong.com varies greatly, according to the ability of the freelance writers composing them. Some provide amazingly detail considering the limited number of words allowed; others are next to useless. Needless to say, the more popular a work is the better the chance of coming across a really useful abstract. As you might expect, Shakespeare's Hamlet shows up in great numbers on Shvoong.com. You can easily pick and choose in order to find information you may be looking for. On the other hand, the most obscure a work is the more likely there will be only one abstract; or in some cases none at all.

Shvoong.com also presents freelance writers a money-making opportunity. Shvoong.com pays each person who submits abstracts 10% of all gross advertising revenue that the company receives as a result of users clicking advertisements on the pages on which the abstract appears. Before you get excited, however, understand that in order to make any kind of income from this you'll have to provide a substantial amount of content, along with choosing sources that are likely to bring in a high number of searchers. You also must earn 10 bucks before any payout. Freelance writers looking to Shvoong.com to generate a dependable monthly income would have to first produce a stunning amount of abstracts, then make the effort to increase internet traffic to their abstracts.

At times, however, Shvoong.com in the past has offered what they call "abstract days" in which they have paid up $20.00 for every five abstracts you submit within a twenty-four hour period. I personally have made over $200 during these marathons, and that has been without the ability to dedicate all day to them. Unfortunately, as far as I know, Shvoong.com has not offered one of these opportunities since the fall of 2005, but that doesn't mean they've completely discontinued it.

If you possess the ability to translate languages, you can further increase your income. Shvoong.com will pay writers who translate the original language of any whole abstract 5% of the royalties from advertising clicks on which the translated abstract appears. Even if you can't translate yourself, have no fear: the writer of the original content also receives 5% of the gross from the translated page.

You can also earn money through Shvoong.com's affiliate program. This isn't your traditional web-based program, however, it's far more old-school. The affiliate program basically consists of downloading a flyer that you then post wherever you want. Whenever someone uses the unique code on your flyer to open a new account with Shvoong.com, you earn exactly the same commission on the abstracts they write. Although there is no limit on the number of members your flyer can generate, there is a $100 limit on commissions per member.

Speaking of translations, Shvoong.com offers an interesting tool. By clicking on the Translation Tool link, you can paste up to 150 words of text into a box and get an elementary translation of it into from English into 12 different foreign languages, including Simplified and Traditional Chinese, Dutch and Russia. The tool also allows for seven translations from French, 11 translations into English, and 6 translations into French. As an example of the quality of the translation, here is the translation of this sentence into French, Italian and Spanish:

Comme exemple de la qualité de la traduction, voici la traduction de cette phrase dans le Français, l'Italien et l'Espagnol.

Come esempio della qualità della traduzione, qui è la traduzione di questa frase nel francese, nell'italiano e nello Spagnolo.

Como ejemplo de la calidad de la traducción, aquí está la traducción de esta oración en francés, italiano y español.

Sadly, I don't speak any of those languages, much less write in them. So I have no way of knowing whether this translation tool provides a truly useful translation. If anybody wants to leave a comment on the quality of the above translation, it would be much appreciated.

Shvoong.com provides valuable information for those looking for capsule summaries of books, abstracts of journal and newspaper articles, and information on web site contents. It is also another opportunity for freelance writers to make a little extra money.