I’ve seen every get-rich-quick con under the sun. The good, the bad, and the lucrative—straight from a grizzled vet who’s still standing.

I’ve been grinding out a living online since 1996, back when the internet sounded like a fax machine having a seizure and “broadband” was a pipe dream. That’s 29 years of dodging digital snake oil, raising six kids in a West Virginia holler, and keeping my marriage to my childhood sweetheart, Lisa, alive through it all. I’ve built websites when they were just text and blinking GIFs, slung copy for shady mail-order joints, and branded businesses that didn’t deserve it—all while figuring out what actually pays the bills. Here’s the unvarnished truth about scams, schemes, and the rare wins that kept me in the game. Buckle up.

The Scams: A Rogues’ Gallery of BS

The internet’s a cesspool of hucksters, and I’ve waded through it all. In ‘97, I got suckered into a “data entry” gig—$500 upfront for a “training kit” that turned out to be a floppy disk with a PDF titled “How to Scam Suckers Like You.” Lesson learned: if it smells like a pyramid, it’s a pyramid. Then there were the “millionaire mentors” promising private jets for $29.95 a month—spoiler, the only one flying was the guy cashing my check. Multilevel marketing? Tried it in ‘99. Sold $40 worth of overpriced vitamins and ended up with a garage full of aloe vera gel Lisa still glares at me about. The latest? Crypto pump-and-dumps and NFT rug pulls. Same grift, shinier packaging. Rule one: if they’re yelling about “financial freedom” while flashing a rented Lambo, run.

The Schemes: Half-Baked Hustles I Survived

Not every bad idea was a scam—some were just dumb enough to work for a minute. In 2001, I built affiliate sites for diet pills that promised to melt fat like butter on a skillet. Sketchy? Hell yes. But those $2 commissions added up to a new roof when kid #3 arrived. I’ve ghostwritten eBooks for “gurus” who couldn’t spell “success,” designed logos for startups that folded faster than a lawn chair, and once ran a coupon blog that made me $300 before the server crashed and I said “screw it.” These weren’t scams—they were schemes, shaky little hustles that paid the electric bill until the next gig. The trick? Know when to jump ship before the whole thing sinks.

The Wins: Where the Real Money Hides

Here’s the good stuff—the hustles that actually stuck. Web design kicked it off in ‘96. I taught myself HTML on a Pentium 75, banging out sites for local mechanics and diners. Clunky, ugly, but they paid. Graphics came next—Photoshop 4.0 and a pirated copy of Illustrator got me through lean years. Writing and copywriting? That’s where the gold was. I’ve penned sales pages that moved everything from fishing lures to $5,000 coaching programs—words pay when you make ‘em punch. Branding and image consulting grew out of that; turns out, people will shell out big to look legit. Offline marketing—flyers, radio spots—kept me fed when the dot-com bubble popped. Online? SEO, social ads, email funnels. Diversify or die, folks—I’ve got more revenue streams than a West Virginia creek bed.

The Near Misses: Dodging Disaster

I’ve had my share of “almost got me” moments. In 2005, a “business partner” pitched a dropshipping empire—$10K in, and he vanished with the inventory. Lisa still calls it my “midlife crisis tax.” Phishing emails? Nearly handed over my PayPal to a “client” in 2010 before the coffee kicked in and I smelled the rat. And don’t get me started on the “exclusive investment opportunity” in 2018 that turned out to be a Ponzi scheme with better fonts. Experience is a brutal teacher—keeps you sharp, though. Now I triple-check every link, contract, and sob story. Trust’s a luxury I can’t afford.

The Kids and the Chaos: Hustling Through It All

Six kids don’t care about your deadlines or your latest “sure thing.” They’ll interrupt a client call to announce the cat puked on the router or demand you fix a bike tire while you’re mid-paragraph on a $1,000 sales letter. Lisa and I tag-teamed it—her wrangling tantrums, me wrestling dial-up in the early days. The hustle had to fit the life. I’d code at midnight, sketch logos during naptime, and brainstorm taglines while stirring mac and cheese. Flexibility was the win—still is. Now the older ones help with Photoshop grunt work, and the youngest thinks “SEO” is a secret code. They’re my why, even when they’re my headache.

The Toolkit: What’s Kept Me Standing

No fancy degrees here—just grit and a battered laptop. Early on, it was Notepad and a prayer. Today, it’s WordPress, Canva, a decent mic for voiceovers, and enough caffeine to power a small nation. Internet’s non-negotiable—50 Mbps or bust. I’ve got backups for my backups: external drives, a second router, even a generator after a storm took out power mid-deadline in ‘09. Skills? I’ve stacked ‘em like firewood—web design, graphics, writing, marketing. If it’s online and it pays, I’ve probably done it. The real tool, though? A nose for BS. Sniff out the scams, ride the schemes, and chase the wins.

The Takeaway: Wisdom From the Trenches

Twenty-nine years online, and I’m still here—tired, salty, but standing. The internet’s a casino: bright lights, big promises, and a house that always wins unless you’re smarter than the dealer. Scams will bleed you dry, schemes might buy you time, but the real wins come from work—boring, consistent, unglamorous work. I’ve raised a family, kept a roof over our heads, and built a life with Lisa that’s weathered more storms than a mountain oak. Sweatpants on, skepticism up—that’s how you survive the hustle.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, kid #6 just asked if “NFT” stands for “Nice Freakin’ Taco.” Time to set him straight.