I don't want to sound like I am bashing the original designer of the $200 monkey mascot, but I think the author has some misunderstanding here.
The market value of that was very unlikely $200. Before AI, there were so many people offering similar services on Fiverr. And from my experience they're mostly not scammers (just novices). Of course they might not live in the US, at least not in big cities.
The price range for that was $20~$50.
Edit: the article says 2013. I don't know if Fiverr was popular back then. I'm talking about more like 2019. At that point Fiverr and similar platforms had upended this kind of $200 market.
The market value of that was very unlikely $200. Before AI, there were so many people offering similar services on Fiverr. And from my experience they're mostly not scammers (just novices). Of course they might not live in the US, at least not in big cities.
The price range for that was $20~$50.
Edit: the article says 2013. I don't know if Fiverr was popular back then. I'm talking about more like 2019. At that point Fiverr and similar platforms had upended this kind of $200 market.