The meat of GPT site work is completing offers. The process is tedious, but effective. Basically, you are providing your information so companies can advertise to you. There is a possibility of spam, but it can be somewhat controlled by your approach. Here are some tips I've picked up from other folks and figured out on my own as well.
1) Get yourself an email address (or several) specifically for this process (or use an old one you don't mind subjecting to the possibility of spam). Many sites use Paypal to send payments. You can easily add a new email address to Paypal, so no need to befoul your main address for the sake of using the right Paypal address. Depending upon the rules of the specific site, you may also want to check out disposable email from sites like Mailinator.com and GuerillaMail.com.
2) Only do free offers. Most sites have a search function so you can narrow down offers to free only. Don't do any trial offers, at least not to start out. Many trial offers, even if they're free, require that you cancel before a specific time. I am horrible at remembering such details, and so I do not do trial offers. I suggest you avoid them as well unless you've read all the fine print and are really confident that you know what you're getting into.
The offers you want typically ask for your email only on the first page, and then your home address on the second, and then a series of pages where you can check off "no" or "skip" (sometimes you have to scroll to see it) until you get to the "Congratulations" page. If you have Roboform, righthand Alt and + selects "no" on a long listing of radial buttons. Occasionally, you are forced to select at least one offer to continue. The safest bet for getting another email-based offer is to look for a small sweepstakes offer (usually $500 of some product). Even assuming you select an offer, you are usually given a choice on the next page as to whether or not you complete it.
Concerning phone numbers, if you put a real home/cell phone number, there is always a chance you will get calls. In most cases, you can politely ask them to remove you from their list. If you don't wish to deal with this, there is another option, depending once again upon the rules of the site you are using. K7 is a site that lets you create a free voicemail number. You can enter this number instead of your home/cell number, and check the messages from the site.
Things to Avoid
A) Any offer that costs money. Be sure to read any disclaimers you see.
B) Any offer that tries to solicit your credit card number, bank account number, or cell phone number. DO NOT let them text anything to you. This can incur a fee onto your bill.
C) Offers for book clubs, financial services, and anything else that implies followup contact or relationship. If you're determined to do such an offer, read all the fine print extra carefully.
D) Any offer or program that attempts to get you to download a toolbar.
I've only downloaded the following two programs for this process, which I know are both alright. In order to make the data entry quicker, I use Roboform (I never save passwords on it, though). A lot of these sites track your submissions via cookies. In order to clear all cookies and other junk after every few offers, CCleaner seems to get rid of stuff my normal browser cache/cookie clearing misses.
3) Don't give false information. Some offers will ask for your street address. If you're not comfortable giving your real street address, don't complete the offer. If you do provide your address, there's a small chance of junk mail. However, if you don't mind the possibility of junk mail, you can probably make a lot more money. I give my home address pretty freely (provided there's not some long disclaimer I have to check off...that's a sign of badness), and I've only gotten three pieces of junk mail since June 1. Both were things I had signed up for -- some info on Snapfish (a photo developing service), a comparative car insurance quote, and a booklet about arthritis medicine for my mom.
Conclusion
This may seem like a lot of information, but most of it is common sense. In general, always err on the side of caution when completing offers.
I will be expanding and perfecting this post in the days to come. If you have any questions, feel free to post 'em here.
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