MTurk Wake Up Call

Overview
mTurk Wake Up Call is not a stand alone mobile app, it is simply a recipe on a very powerful platform called IFTTT. IFTTT stands for If This Then That, and that is exactly the control you get over both web and now phone based activities. Before the recent launch of their apps, IFTTT would allow you to do one function on the premise that something else has happened, for example, let's say that I want to share a Facebook status automatically on Twitter each time I post. That's a very very simple example and the world is really the limit when it comes to using IFTTT. IFTTT now has both Android and iOS apps that give you that same power, but now with just about every function of your phone.

This isn't a sales pitch for IFTTT, however, so let's get to the meat of how we are going to use this amazing app as our very own requester wake up call.

Downloading and Setting Up
To get started you will need to install the app on your phone, you can search for IFTTT in your respected app store or follow the links below:


 * IFTTT for Android


 * IFTTT for iOS

Once you have the app installed you will need to create an IFTTT account, which is not against mTurk Wiki's TOS.. ha ha?

Once you have everything installed and your account created, you just need to either add your own recipes or use recipes that have been created and shared by other IFTTT users.

Using Recipes
Using premade recipes is very simple. You just browse for recipes in the app or on the website and then just click "Use Recipe".

For a Turker, the biggest problem about making money is being online and ready to work when requesters post. We have tons of tools for knowing when work is available, but sometimes the dreaded sleep bug will prevent us from being ready when the time is right. I've tried everything from waking up to an alarm every hour to hitting snooze for as long as four hours at a time. That's just no way to live. How nice would it be if you had a friend that was always available and would call you when work was available? That is exactly what you have with mTurk Wake Up Call. Below is a very simple IFTTT recipe that monitors your Gmail account and when you receive an email from Turk Alert it will call your phone and, hopefully, wake you up.

To use mTurk Wake Up Call you can enter that in the recipe search field or simply click this link: mTurk Wake Up Call

How It Works
Very, Very simple. IFTTT monitors your Gmail account and when you receive an email from Turk Alert about work available it will call your phone and let you know. This call will, hopefully, wake you up and get you working!

Requirements
mTurk Wake Up Call has a few requirements, but they are easy to accomodate.


 * You must use Turk Alert and have that account setup using a Gmail address.

Okay, well, just one requirement. mTurk Wake Up Call uses the Gmail function on IFTTT, but there are probably other ways around it if you wanted to tinker with your own recipe.

The only draw back to using mTurk Wake Up Call is you may have requesters that you follow via Turk Alert that would not normally warrant a wake up call in the middle of the night or whenever you sleep. You can avoid this by creating a second Turk Alert account with another Gmail account and have just those top priority requesters being followed.

Also, this is not strictly a mobile phone recipe. If you still have a landline this will work just the same using the IFTTT website.

I would love to hear how you smart people put IFTTT to use with mTurk. Share your ideas and recipes in this forum thread!