Local app OddJobb launches to help users get more free time.

• Author: Biton, Adva
• Position: Around Utah

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Salt Lake City--When Ryan Husk was a child, his mother was much fonder of spending time with her children than doing housework. If it was a nice day, Husk said, his mother would forgo the household chores in favor of spending the day at the zoo with her children. The result? The zoo is still Husk's favorite place to be. And the housework often remained undone.

Now Husk wants to make it possible for people to do both: enjoy their free time and get the pesky items on their to-do lists done. He had the idea to create an open mobile marketplace where people could put up their odd jobs and pay others to do them, thus freeing them to go to the zoo, exercise their entrepreneurial talents, build a ship in a bottle, take tennis lessons or do whatever else would please them.

"My mom would totally have used this app If it was out there. I have these great memories because my mom wanted to spend time with her kids and not doing chores," said Husk. "If you can accomplish both things you need to and spend time doing the things you want to, we'd all have a happier life. That's been my dream from the get-go."

The way ODDJOBB works is simple. iPhone users can download the app for free, create a profile, and put up jobs they need done at the price point they're willing to pay. Other people who have the time and inclination to, say, walk a dog, bake a cake or weed a yard, can peruse the open jobs and claim one. When both parties agree that a job has been fulfilled, the doer Is paid. Both parties then rate one another on a five-star scale depending on how good their experience was, and then both are free to post or claim other jobs.

Husk said the feedback from the app's beta test was employed to create as streamlined of an experience as possible. There's no anonymity--everyone who uses the app has a rating (which is mandatory after each job...