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Wow, I'm genuinely surprised that the site was real. I thought it was a scam based on the "these hot horny girls in your area" ads.

by junto 11y ago

reustle 11y ago
So it turns out those ads were true, but they were also married?
- IgorPartola 11y ago
  Take a look at AshleyMadison.com. Their whole business is helping married people have affairs. I saw them on a daytime talk show when they first came out (years ago). The thing I loved most about their story is that the name of the site was derived by taking the two most popular baby names from that year and combining them.
  - giltleaf 11y ago
    That's hilarious. This year's would be EmmaOlivia.
Uberphallus 11y ago
I'd say it's both real and a scam.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
needusername 11y ago
The site is real and it is a "scam". You just had to look at the chargeback rates they were getting and how often they were changing acquirers because they were getting kicked because of their chargeback rates.
- Scoundreller 11y ago
  What were the chargeback rates like? How often were they changing acquirers?
  - needusername 11y ago
    I don't have exact numbers but they were infamous in the industry. I know of two scams they were running. Firstly a lot of the profiles are fake or professional. Secondly they ignored when you cancelled your monthly subscription and kept charging you anyway in the hope that you either wouldn't notice or wouldn't bother filing a cb. Everybody knew what was happening but was looking away as long as the money was good, even MasterCard. Internally the code names we used for them was "online gaming" or "innovative business models". Whenever an executive used these words you knew he meant them. There are acquirers that specialize in merchants with high cb rates. But they go kicked even from there (after MasterCard intervened). I have no idea where they are now.
sputknick 11y ago
It actually didn't start out as a site for people looking for sex. It was started by a guy (Andrew Conru) who was looking for people to go fishing with, he lamented how hard it is for adults to find friends. Soon after he started the site, people started posting sex pictures, and it pretty quickly became the focus of the site.
- IgorPartola 11y ago
  That is both sad and very interesting. I have a similar problem with finding people to go running with me around where I live. Meetup groups around here are spread over a 50 mile radius or so, so that's no help. Perhaps I can try the opposite approach and post "hey, looking for a running buddy" on Match.com, OkCupid, AFF, etc.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
  - DanBC 11y ago
    There is a niche in the market. Some people have tried to fill that niche, and they've posted their sites to HN. The main problems seem to be: 1) The sites only work once you have enough users to make them work, but you can't get more users until the site works. 2) People use them for sex, which is off-putting to large numbers of users. OKC should probably set up some kind of meet-friends-in-groups thing.
    - IgorPartola 11y ago
      I wonder if something like this can be piggy backed off Facebook would work. You kill many birds with that stone: you can use the degrees of separation to verify people ("Oh, that's Joe's friend"), you already have an audience, and people are less likely to flood it with casual sex proposals.
      - phkahler 11y ago
        Facebook would be great but they're so full of garbage that few meaningful messages get through. I once sent out a query for people interested in a software project and tagged every friend I had who knows something about code (30-40). It didn't even show up in all their feeds. But hey, share a cat video hosted on a big commercial site and everyone gets that...

Wow, I'm genuinely surprised that the site was real. I thought it was a scam based on the "these hot horny girls in your area" ads.

by junto 11y ago

Wow, I'm genuinely surprised that the site was real. I thought it was a scam based on the "these hot horny girls in your area" ads.

reustle 11y ago

So it turns out those ads were true, but they were also married?

IgorPartola 11y ago
Take a look at AshleyMadison.com. Their whole business is helping married people have affairs. I saw them on a daytime talk show when they first came out (years ago). The thing I loved most about their story is that the name of the site was derived by taking the two most popular baby names from that year and combining them.
- giltleaf 11y ago
  That's hilarious. This year's would be EmmaOlivia.

Uberphallus 11y ago

I'd say it's both real and a scam.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

needusername 11y ago

The site is real and it is a "scam". You just had to look at the chargeback rates they were getting and how often they were changing acquirers because they were getting kicked because of their chargeback rates.

Scoundreller 11y ago
What were the chargeback rates like? How often were they changing acquirers?
- needusername 11y ago
  I don't have exact numbers but they were infamous in the industry. I know of two scams they were running. Firstly a lot of the profiles are fake or professional. Secondly they ignored when you cancelled your monthly subscription and kept charging you anyway in the hope that you either wouldn't notice or wouldn't bother filing a cb. Everybody knew what was happening but was looking away as long as the money was good, even MasterCard. Internally the code names we used for them was "online gaming" or "innovative business models". Whenever an executive used these words you knew he meant them. There are acquirers that specialize in merchants with high cb rates. But they go kicked even from there (after MasterCard intervened). I have no idea where they are now.

sputknick 11y ago

It actually didn't start out as a site for people looking for sex. It was started by a guy (Andrew Conru) who was looking for people to go fishing with, he lamented how hard it is for adults to find friends. Soon after he started the site, people started posting sex pictures, and it pretty quickly became the focus of the site.

IgorPartola 11y ago
That is both sad and very interesting. I have a similar problem with finding people to go running with me around where I live. Meetup groups around here are spread over a 50 mile radius or so, so that's no help. Perhaps I can try the opposite approach and post "hey, looking for a running buddy" on Match.com, OkCupid, AFF, etc.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- DanBC 11y ago
  There is a niche in the market. Some people have tried to fill that niche, and they've posted their sites to HN. The main problems seem to be: 1) The sites only work once you have enough users to make them work, but you can't get more users until the site works. 2) People use them for sex, which is off-putting to large numbers of users. OKC should probably set up some kind of meet-friends-in-groups thing.
  - IgorPartola 11y ago
    I wonder if something like this can be piggy backed off Facebook would work. You kill many birds with that stone: you can use the degrees of separation to verify people ("Oh, that's Joe's friend"), you already have an audience, and people are less likely to flood it with casual sex proposals.
    - phkahler 11y ago
      Facebook would be great but they're so full of garbage that few meaningful messages get through. I once sent out a query for people interested in a software project and tagged every friend I had who knows something about code (30-40). It didn't even show up in all their feeds. But hey, share a cat video hosted on a big commercial site and everyone gets that...