RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (Full Version)

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noaxis -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/1/2016 3:13:13 PM)

@ladypact thanks for your detailed reply!

I didn't expect the words "account verification" to have so much energy attached to it, sorry about that :) My simplistic thought at the time was, "hey, maybe we are willing to do something the spammers aren't". But you're right - if we aren't willing to undergo any type of review or verification, I see no choice but to continue allowing rampant spammers and scammers and just keep squashing them every time we find one.

For what it's worth, I have some real-world background trying to manage this problem on a popular web site. At one point, we had 100 new fake accounts *per minute* coming in from a bank of offshore computers. From the administrative side, it's a constant cat and mouse game that consumes resources and is ultimately a losing battle. The only way out of it is some kind of whitelist feature. I'm sure that was fet's motivation for going invite-only while they figure out a better plan. It's just an impossible task to keep deleting accounts endlessly.

Scammers aside, even verification will not help the poor women who are getting barrage of rude/tasteless emails from "legitimate" users. There is no accounting for taste, we all know that ;) I was just having a discussion with someone else and we were talking about how Tinder's 2-way match before messaging system is pretty effective in that regard. For example, what if men could indicate interest, but you had to indicate it back before opening to messaging? I feel like that could really alleviate that problem. From my point of view as the man, I too would *much* rather spend time messaging someone who has at least indicated interest on their part and is active on the site.

The premium thing was just a side idea, and I don't know if women would buy it too. I've talked to a couple women on here who are seriously looking for an LTR and would probably like to be featured, but not if it just invites more tasteless emails. So the open messaging system really does lie at the root of a few different problems.

I do go to the local munches around here and have learned that M/s is a pretty narrow subset of things. Without speaking ill of anyone locally, I can say that even the local MAsT chapter has some...issues. Since I'm most interested in finding other 24x7 lifestyle people, I thought casting a wider net might help. I just really value the day-to-day aspects of the lifestyle and am having trouble finding that locally.

I'll keep looking though, and yes, I definitely am enjoying the day. I hope you do too and thanks again for the great response.




bondageerone -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/2/2016 3:13:39 AM)

I have more than once suggested to C/S they make a small charge, in order to keep the site running smoothly.x



LadyPact -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/3/2016 5:36:36 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: noaxis
@ladypact thanks for your detailed reply!

Your welcome.

quote:

I didn't expect the words "account verification" to have so much energy attached to it, sorry about that :) My simplistic thought at the time was, "hey, maybe we are willing to do something the spammers aren't". But you're right - if we aren't willing to undergo any type of review or verification, I see no choice but to continue allowing rampant spammers and scammers and just keep squashing them every time we find one.

I'd suggest that you keep something in mind. Even if it weren't for the specifics of this site with past issues regarding the privacy policy, you're still dealing with a wide range of people who fall everywhere on the scale on the issue of whether they are 'out' or not. For some, it could literally mean their jobs, their homes, or complicate matters when it comes to custody of their children. You may not be in the position of risking those things, but other people are.

There isn't any kind of site verification that can top my being in my local community, meeting people at events, etc. Unless I hired somebody to play the role of me at parties, I'm pretty sure the walking, talking, breathing me is verified.

quote:

For what it's worth, I have some real-world background trying to manage this problem on a popular web site. At one point, we had 100 new fake accounts *per minute* coming in from a bank of offshore computers. From the administrative side, it's a constant cat and mouse game that consumes resources and is ultimately a losing battle. The only way out of it is some kind of whitelist feature. I'm sure that was fet's motivation for going invite-only while they figure out a better plan. It's just an impossible task to keep deleting accounts endlessly.

I'm not as familiar with the technical side of the issue. I'm actually waiting to see if the recent court decision against Internet Brands, Inc (the parent company of Mode Mayhem) has anything to do with it because if sites *can*be held liable in cases of negligence to warn users in some cases, there is potential to see major changes in some forms of social media.

quote:

Scammers aside, even verification will not help the poor women who are getting barrage of rude/tasteless emails from "legitimate" users. There is no accounting for taste, we all know that ;) I was just having a discussion with someone else and we were talking about how Tinder's 2-way match before messaging system is pretty effective in that regard. For example, what if men could indicate interest, but you had to indicate it back before opening to messaging? I feel like that could really alleviate that problem. From my point of view as the man, I too would *much* rather spend time messaging someone who has at least indicated interest on their part and is active on the site.

As a woman, it's a feature I would like. (If you've been reading the suggestions over on Fet, its something that has had several similar suggestions made since the invite-only announcement was made.) However, I tend to counter such things with the 'is it good for business' side of the idea. It would depend a lot on whether men actually thought women would tag them back.

quote:

The premium thing was just a side idea, and I don't know if women would buy it too. I've talked to a couple women on here who are seriously looking for an LTR and would probably like to be featured, but not if it just invites more tasteless emails. So the open messaging system really does lie at the root of a few different problems.

Agreed. I'm sure your female friends can give you a very good idea of the crap they receive. We have quite a few threads here about the subject.

quote:

I do go to the local munches around here and have learned that M/s is a pretty narrow subset of things. Without speaking ill of anyone locally, I can say that even the local MAsT chapter has some...issues. Since I'm most interested in finding other 24x7 lifestyle people, I thought casting a wider net might help. I just really value the day-to-day aspects of the lifestyle and am having trouble finding that locally.

I'm trying to find the nicest way to put this. I am exceedingly aware of some of your local MAsT chapters... issues. Be exceptionally careful of who you associate with there.

quote:

I'll keep looking though, and yes, I definitely am enjoying the day. I hope you do too and thanks again for the great response.

No problem at all. I have no issue with trying to contribute to the forums.

However, I should tell you that I do not accept blind friend requests. I'm sure you are a nice person and all but my personal policy is to only accept friend requests from those that I've met in person, have spoken to by phone, or some other method of knowing them in some way.





Draciron -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/19/2016 7:42:21 PM)

I've been here for quite a while. The UI hasn't changed much and I think that is because while it's not perfect it works fairly well.

The scammers are actually fairly recent. There's been a few here and there. Generally individuals posting fake profiles and the occasional cam spammer. The recent flood is new, but CS is pretty responsive in removing them.

CS started with a mission to serve the community. Paid extras would destroy the site in my opinion. I've seen several sites go down the drain that way. bondage.com used to be THE site for the lifestyle back in it's day. Then it added premium features beyond access to the porn. When it required membership to just read or send a message the site lost most of it's user base. The D/s community is different than Nilla dating sites. On a Nilla site you meet somebody, then off you go. The people you interacted with at that time go away never to be seen again most likely. The D/s is a lifer thing. Some of the people here today are people I interacted with on FIDO, WWIVNET, VBBNet and a dozen other BDSM discussions back before the Internet was opened up to the Public. Then came Usenet. I actually occasionally run into people I talked to from back then on various lifestyle groups. The nicks tend to change. Same with the old IRC D/s chats that used to exist and so on. You get the idea. The community is eternal and just that, a community. Just because you are new to CS today doesn't mean you won't come back here 5 years from now, 10 years from now.

A large percentage of people here are happily in relationships and not seeking. Premium memberships would eventually destroy that kind of continuity and the platonic communications happening between people. That was is the first casualty when a site goes to paid. It quickly degenerates to only people who are seeking.

D/s relationships often take much longer to develop or find that right person. On a Nilla site you are only looking at rather superficial compatibility. D/s tends to but is not necessarily deeper.

Verification would be nice, and not nice. For me and many others it'd be no issue. However for some if they are revealed to be members of our community their careers could end, they could lose custody of their children, jobs could be lost. If ID's were verified those people would either take a risk that one day those records could be exposed, publicly in some cases, or used against them in some way by hackers, PIs or government officials armed with a warrant. I don't think CS would ever voluntarily give up information about a user unless it was to investigate a serious crime. So any verification system would need to be in a way that did not potentially expose a user to harm and still be effective. Using something like a credit card would not help. Scammers generally have credit card numbers. Maybe not their own. The way one site does it is a voluntary picture. Which is reasonable and unobtrusive.

There are some things that CS should add, like a built in checkllist. That's been suggested many times over the years. It's worked well on other sites. They have the interests section, which is similar, but I think an actual checklist would be more useful.

Overall though CS is a stable and thriving community that has been around for many years. So I'm of the opinion don't fix what aint broke.




Draciron -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/19/2016 7:50:19 PM)

quote:

At one point, we had 100 new fake accounts *per minute* coming in from a bank of offshore computers.


I would think an IP ban on the server would be the best way to handle that, though set it to expire after six months. Most of the time ISPs hosting such either have no idea they are even an ISP, it's drones being used by hackers who sell the bandwidth to scammers, or honestly do not care as long as the subscriber pays their bill. Sometimes you'll get luck and get one that suspends scammer accounts.



Kana -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/20/2016 4:25:44 AM)

Yeah, having been here for a while, having watched the shenanigans and moderator madness, there is absolutely zero chance I would ever, ever give PII to anyone on this site.
Therein lies madness and the path to ruin.
No fucking way.

Nothing personal here, but I'd rather skywrite my bank account data over Lagos than give it to C-space.
Just saying

I'm with Drac here. I remember when bondage.com was the big shit on the block. Then they started charging.
In weeks they lost almost all their user base. Live forums and great discussions dried up overnight.
Matter of fact, that's, IIRC, how I ended up here.
And, again IIRC, I ended up on bondage when alt started charging.

Shit, I've been online for way to fucking long.
For crying out loud, I remember the alt.torture days.

But yeah, returning from tangent. Cspace isn't what CM was, and it certainly lost a ton of cachet and users when it made the shift, but trying to charge would be the deathknell for an already severely wounded site.
Cripes, now that I think on it, I can't recall a site that survived charging...and more than one old site started charging less out of an attempt to make money and far more to protect users and in an attempt to be rid of the fakes.
Its one of these things that's perhaps good in theory but never works in reality



HoneyBears -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/20/2016 4:42:58 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: noaxis

Maybe there is a level of verification that would cut down on spammers without being too intrusive. Phone verification maybe? But honestly, it doesn't matter because nothing will work; if Facebook can't prevent fake accounts, nobody can. Just generally brainstorming about ways to cut down on the spam accounts.

We have not seen much in the way of a foolproof verification system that peeps cannot get around. Just a few quickie, non-comprehensive observations:

~ eHarmony can verify/cross-ref your driver's license-type info to ensure you have listed your correct age, location (address on record), legal gender, the basic stuff.
They cannot verify your nickname, marital status, education level, income, profession or employment status. Unsure about criminal background check, probably not. (You could have signed up from prison.)

~ Zoosk has a photo verification system which is laughable. A friend of ours showed us how the "experts" there check to see whether pics resemble the same person as the one on video. So far so good, but NOT WHETHER THESE PICS ARE CURRENT OR RECENT SHOTS. Many of them looked 10-20 years old!
(Pof doesn't verify, but encourages users to report photos which do not contain a clear headshot or which do not appear to be fairly current.)
(AFF has the same "photo verification" system as peeps often do here, holding up a piece of paper with screen name & date. Ironically, they do not or cannot "verify" genital shots as appearing to belong to the same person. lol [8D])

~ Phone verifications are the same as sending a text code or PIN, which can be done from anybody's phone you happen to have on hand at the time, including burner phones with no verifiable account sign-up data to go by.
~ Similar process with getting Facebook and/or Twitter-verified in terms of account messaging access.

-- Lisa & Cub



DesFIP -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/20/2016 1:02:59 PM)

Like Kana, I came here from bondage.com. They sold the site, the new owners decided to start charging for everything and the site closed inside a couple of years.



ThatDizzyChick -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/20/2016 2:55:59 PM)

1. Verified accounts of some kind: Pretty much don't care one way or another, but I don't use the site (or any site) for hook-ups/dating, I do that in person.

2. Improved UI / reduced features: This site has a really crummy UI, so yeah it really could be improved. And as far as UIs go, I prefer a clean and pared down one.

3. Some type of featured member or premium level: Zero interest at all, I have enough shit to spend money on without having my simple pleasures limited.



longwayhome -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/22/2016 2:37:21 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: littleladybug

Verification is simple. Actually meet the other party in person. Yup, absolute craziness.


Couldn't agree more.

There is no "system" solution for verification as it is only as good as what you verify. Are you verifying someone's picture, driving license, marital status, sexual preferences, preferred dynamic, honesty........? The list goes on, especially when most forms of verification can be faked.

Is the aim to weed out multiple profiles, commercial interests, people looking for dishonest payment (as opposed to honest payment), people who could potentially cheat on their partners, window shoppers or people who have no intention of meeting anyone. I have seen all of these categories of people held up as being "fakes". What is certain is that insisting on a picture, a reference or a unique personal identifier will not address all of these issues.

Unless CS employs a team of verifiers to go out a verify members, I cannot see a fool-proof method. Even if there was a team of verifiers, it would be intrusive and scary. What if you get on the wrong side of the verifiers? And what about confidentiality for people who for work/professional reasons cannot be "out" but who are honest and do not harm or deceive others when they contribute to the site.

The only true verification is getting to know someone in person, and even then people hide things for good or ill. It would be good if people did not have multiple profiles and if known fraudsters were excluded. This however is no easy task.

For my part, I prefer to use the site with caution, aware of the potential pitfalls and willing to take the rough with the smooth. There are some truly uplifting moments, opportunities to learn and chances to encounter fascinating people. There is also unnecessary personal abuse and the possibility of being led astray if you are particularly vulnerable.

Having to ignore the worst excesses of some of the socks, and resisting the temptation to give all your personal information or your life savings to a stranger would seem to be the price of going online.

Sure the UI isn't great and I might long for the days when informedconsent.co.uk was an independent site and not a fetlife group, but I get good things from this site (along with the not so good). On balance I would prefer that CS with all its faults was here and didn't become another internet casualty. Use it or lose it and all that.



Bhruic -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/26/2016 10:18:38 AM)

I personally don't understand the aversion to some form of verification. People reference Ashley Madison... but that was a site dedicated to cheating on your partner. While I like a level of privacy as much as the next person, I don't feel any shame in my sexuality, and I am not drawn to those who do.

It would not be devastating to me for it to be known that I was a member on a kink social network... and I suspect that many people who worry about that fact being revealed worry about it groundlessly. I don't go digging around, trying to find out what my friends and colleagues are in to sexually, and I suspect most people don't... and I suspect most people wouldn't care.

I wonder how much this obsession with anonymity is hampering our ability to create the community we really want?



OsideGirl -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/26/2016 10:30:13 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Bhruic

I personally don't understand the aversion to some form of verification.
Since I'm not here to find a partner, I see no point in putting my personal information out into the strata for verification. I personally don't care if someone thinks I'm fake or real or in between.

quote:

It would not be devastating to me for it to be known that I was a member on a kink social network
I know people that lost their jobs for having a profile on a kink site. Hell, one lost his job for having a profile on AOL that mentioned kink in a vanilla manner. In some cases it took years to be able to get another job because of the fields they worked in.

quote:

I don't go digging around, trying to find out what my friends and colleagues are in to sexually
Honestly, I'm more worried about some of the people on this website outting me.

quote:

and I suspect most people wouldn't care.
You'd be surprised how much people would care...especially if those who are outted have kids (I'm sure the PTA would love it), work with kids, have high profile jobs in their community or work with charity or religious groups.

quote:

I wonder how much this obsession with anonymity is hampering our ability to create the community we really want?
I don't think so, because while it might stop the FinDommes, it's not going to stop the users, abusers, cheaters, wannabes or the clueless.



AtUrCervix -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/26/2016 3:16:40 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: noaxis

If this topic comes up all the time, PLEASE ignore me! I'm very new to CS.

I'm curious to hear from other CS users, what are the top features/changes you want to see? I've been here less than a week so I can't speak with much authority but here's what I've noticed that would improve the site substantially:

* Verified accounts of some kind - About 90% of the slave profiles appear to be scammers. The most obvious signs are single pictures, no bios, phone numbers and email addresses published, and horrible grammar/punctuation. But, I do think it detracts from the community. Just to see what would happen, I followed one conversation through to texting until "she" finally sent Moneygram instructions :) I can't believe it ever works, but maybe it does... Anyway - major, major scammer problem on here in my limited experience.

* Improved UI / reduced features - To my eye, it would help to pair down the UI quite a bit. Make it easier to browse/search, track who you've already seen, easier picture uploading, etc.

* Some type of featured member or premium level for those of us who are extra serious about being seen

Ok well I'd love to hear back from anyone.

-noaxis


Great question!!!!

The TOP feature(s) that I want to use are....(and I wish they would put these in to basic functions):

1) How to connect to Pamela Anderson.

2) How to get Pamela Anderson's personal cell number.

3) How to get Pamela Anderson's home address.

4) The TOP FIVE responses that got Pamela Anderson to call me, and then.....arrive at my home address.



debydeb -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/28/2016 10:37:19 AM)

i think they need to redo the whole site..... there are alot of wanna be's in here...find someway to decipher them out



LadyPact -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/28/2016 11:07:03 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Bhruic

I personally don't understand the aversion to some form of verification. People reference Ashley Madison... but that was a site dedicated to cheating on your partner. While I like a level of privacy as much as the next person, I don't feel any shame in my sexuality, and I am not drawn to those who do.

When MP and I were outed, he had SEVENTEEN years invested in that career.

I honestly was devastated. When he came home and said, "well, my boss was called today," I was so lost.

Seventeen years of defending the country was all risked with a single phone call.




quote:

It would not be devastating to me for it to be known that I was a member on a kink social network... and I suspect that many people who worry about that fact being revealed worry about it groundlessly. I don't go digging around, trying to find out what my friends and colleagues are in to sexually, and I suspect most people don't... and I suspect most people wouldn't care.

We will have to disagree...

I've done it. It wasn't groundless. I've had my car sabotaged, our benefits threaten, the loss of our home jeaportized

I wonder how much this obsession with anonymity is hampering our ability to create the community we really want?

I don't know.

What I do know...

Three years (+) is a very long time. It's over a thousand days.

Think of being in some kind of prison for a thousand days...

We can create a community. We have the ability.

We just can't let the consent violaters, stalkers, et all be a part of it.



MSTR4SLV30 -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/28/2016 11:53:49 AM)

IMO I think the site is doing just fine, yes we have scammers here , and yes we have all of the above mention profiles too, but what we don't have is an age verification process that keeps the youths out of the site,this is an adult website and it should be our prerogative to keep them out when we have such an open door policy in effect, for example i was contacted by a member on the main site last week who's profile read 28 your vibrant and ready to serve, she liked my initial profile and said she wanted to get to know me. Me being a Dom i said ok, turned out she was 14 and i sent her on her merry way.

I came back and filed a complaint with the website that they need to step up their age verification principles, look i can only speak of my personal accounts, on this matter, yes it has its faults, but realistically speaking each one of us has a job to do here, its our site, as a community, but ultimately it is only an outlet to find others in our lifestyle of kink to do the research and to do the math and to figure out who is real and who is fake, i don't see that as a problem for me, if you want to add in the net-nanny issues other sites have this site will falter and loose a lot of good people. but by the same token it will cut down on the sites revenues taken in and this hobby of the owner will become a profession by his standards and he may not want that for himself or herself or for the community in general.

it is easier to gripe about what is wrong then it is to acknowledge what is right, this site has been in service for a long time , and the members that do come here usually stay, and if they do leave they tend to come back later on, why because even with its hiccups this site works and so does the community, the scammers usually don't stay long when they are made known to the rest, if you are concerned with meeting someone and they are going to ask for a webcam or a credit card then you should start your conversations with that and get it out there sooner then later or waiting for them to ask you to join them elsewhere, they are easy to spot, some of the good ones not so easy but you will pick up on them easy enough if you learn to put more effort into your questions



mstrj69 -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/28/2016 12:32:38 PM)

I used to have a job that I worried about. Then I joined Facebook and realized as long as I used my Facebook photo, I could say it was stolen. I then decided that if anyone asked I could say "no that is not me and what were you doing on a site like that?"

I do agree the only real verification is when you meet in person. Only then can you tell if their comments are real.



mistermaid -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/29/2016 6:33:20 AM)

I think a good start would be moving all the Pro Dom'mes, sub's, yes there are a few, on to a seperate page where anyone looking for Pro services could find them and they wouldn't clutter up the people using the site for what It's meant. It would have no effect on the boards etc, but would at least make life easier for everyone.



LadyPact -> RE: Thoughts on a new site/app? (8/29/2016 10:36:56 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: OsideGirl

quote:

ORIGINAL: Bhruic

I personally don't understand the aversion to some form of verification.
Since I'm not here to find a partner, I see no point in putting my personal information out into the strata for verification. I personally don't care if someone thinks I'm fake or real or in between.

quote:

It would not be devastating to me for it to be known that I was a member on a kink social network
I know people that lost their jobs for having a profile on a kink site. Hell, one lost his job for having a profile on AOL that mentioned kink in a vanilla manner. In some cases it took years to be able to get another job because of the fields they worked in.

quote:

I don't go digging around, trying to find out what my friends and colleagues are in to sexually
Honestly, I'm more worried about some of the people on this website outting me.

quote:

and I suspect most people wouldn't care.
You'd be surprised how much people would care...especially if those who are outted have kids (I'm sure the PTA would love it), work with kids, have high profile jobs in their community or work with charity or religious groups.

quote:

I wonder how much this obsession with anonymity is hampering our ability to create the community we really want?
I don't think so, because while it might stop the FinDommes, it's not going to stop the users, abusers, cheaters, wannabes or the clueless.


I can't emphasize enough how right I think you are, Oside. Just in my observation, kinky people out kinky people far more often than the vanilla folks do.



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