HN user
SEEKING WORK - UK West Midlands; remotely worldwide, or onsite in London, Birmingham, Bath, Bristol, Oxford.
Android and iOS developer, experienced (4+ year), with availability starting mid-October. Have worked with a wide range of international clients; specialise in creating native apps for either or both platforms. Full portfolio at http://www.northhillapps.com or LinkedIn http://lnkd.in/bsDVcp3
A colleague of mine has written a book on this subject, sounds like it would be worth a look for you: https://leanpub.com/freelancedeveloperbook
99designs.com was the link, took me a while to remember
My main problem with this proposal, is that WE all know that $500 buys you a rough prototype or a proof-of-concept. But a quick search through Elance or Odesk shows that there are many many potential clients who seriously expect a fully-polished product for that amount. What happens to the poor contractor when the client comes back with a huge changelist, which they're honoured to complete before getting paid?
Having said that, there was a pretty successful version of this idea implemented for designers a while back.