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You don't actually need to view the ads, you get rewarded for just browsing and giving back to your favourite content creators. The browser actually blocks ads and trackers unless you state otherwise.

There are people who set up 50-100 cheap smartphones [and a few pcs] via wifi and just let them watch ads-all done within the various companies terms of service- and earn hundreds of dollars a month doing nothing except checking their network every few hours. Some reports thousands a month, but that is unlikely. Not enough to quit the day job over, but still not bad.

I am trying to research it more; might make law school affordable.

is this better than mining coins then? Currently can't get my own mining rig to work so this sounds like a good alternative.

On my machine it took me a few month to mine a buck of monero, but the slow rate could have been because I can't gpu mine. i don't bother mining anymore.
If you have an old pc and want to get started, look into earnhoney. Many people report making a few bucks a day, and I was too and there wasn't any capchas. Where I am am not getting any ads anymore, so i have to use lesser pc based programs that have to be checked every few hours which isn't ideal.

I am getting my first two $20 wifi enabled smartphones on the 15th, and that'll be my first venture into app based passive earning.

If you want to explore it more, try to find on facebook the group thetechslugs
https://www.facebook.com/groups/thetechslugs/?ref=bookmarks

thanks for the insight. Just find it difficult to burn electricity for the sake of a few bucks but that is the reality we are faced with. Even mining coins the proof of work way seems silly but hey it made millionaires. Now that ain't so silly.