Type 1 – Bogus member, bogus profileThe favourite bait for ‘The Hook’; these are fake profiles which are fabricated purely by the online dating site to use for advertising and enticing purposes. And they’re so popular because there are virtually no legal implications for using them! The people featured in the profiles aren’t truly registered members of the site, and the profiles are not written by them. The only real thing about them is the pictures used… generally, of attractive, young busty women in seductive poses.
“But hold on,” you may say, “If the pictures are real, how can the site use them legitimately?” And it’s a good question. But alas, it also has a good answer. There are two ways, that I’m aware of, that permit sites to use photos without recrimination. Firstly, aspiring models may willingly consent to have their photos used for promotional purposes, simply because it ‘gets their face out there’. These are easy to spot, because the photos will have been taken by a professional photographer. Anything that looks like it’s from a photo shoot, the chances are it’s probably fake.
The second way is rather more covert and worrying, and concerns a little-advertised piece of internet law which I learnt about during my studies at law school. It’s called the
public domain liability waiver, and you can find it hidden in the small print of the Terms & Conditions of every single image hosting site on the internet. Rather alarmingly, however, it also appears in the T&C of major social networking sites such as Facebook.
The public domain liability waiver does exactly what it says on the tin. Any image that you post on such sites becomes the property of the “public domain”, and can legitimately be used by ANY third party for ANY purpose. Go on, read that sentence again. You sign your rights to privacy away as soon as you agree to the Terms & Conditions of participating sites. Bet you weren’t aware of that.
What this means, in a roundabout kinda way, is that online dating sites can legitimately steal your Facebook photos and use them in fake profiles. And although I can’t provide concrete proof of it, I strongly suspect that they do.
Type 2 – Bogus member, genuine profileThese are my favourite type, because they’re harmless to all but those who wish to contact them. These are real profiles, created by real people – but not by the person shown in the profile. A classic example is Pepe the Dwarf, my own creation; his profile is real enough, but Pepe is a fictional character created by me.
Other ‘Type 2’ profiles include men masquerading as women, women masquerading as men, older men masquerading as young men, etc. Some are easy to spot, such as Pepe, or women’s profiles that blatantly sound like they are written by blokes – but some can actually be pretty damn tricky to spot. The text in the profile might sound genuine enough… but was it really written by the person in the photo? Sometimes, the only way to find out is to mail them and see.
Type 3 – Genuine member, bogus profileRight, now we’re into the nitty gritty of why online dating sites are such spectacularly difficult minefields to navigate. There are several different types within this category, but I’m going to start with the biggest culprits – the “cam girls”.
As you are probably aware, the internet contains several live webcam streaming sites, on which gyrating young girls take off their clothes in front of their webcam for a global, paying audience. <Ahem> At least, so I’ve been told. The streaming sites make a fortune from their horny paying customers, and the girls get a cut of the takings. It’s a lucrative online business, and reports suggest that the girls can make a fair part-time income from it.
No doubt, the more entrepreneurial cam girls will seek to advertise themselves wherever possible, and where better to post adverts of themselves than on dating sites, where lonely, horny guys will log on every day? In my research this week, I’ve come across a vast number of profiles (
Oi, no pun intended there!) which seem to have been created for the sole purpose of inviting men to view live webcam streaming websites.
How to spot them? Well, easy enough. Is the girl in the profile picture in a state of semi-undress? Does the text mention webcams at all? Because let’s be honest – if you’re a girl signing up for an online dating site for genuine reasons, would the word “webcam” be ANYWEHRE NEAR your profile? I’m guessing no.
‘Type 3’ also includes those annoying profiles which have been created by genuine people who have no intention of actually making use of the site. People who were simply curious about how much interest they’d generate.
However, it also contains the MASSIVE category of people who have registered for the site but cannot use its functionality because they are not a paying member. As I highlighted in my last article, dating sites may have millions of registered members, but only a tiny fraction of them will have access to the core functions of the site, which become available after you have handed over your cash. If you are genuinely looking for love online, I’m sure this would be very frustrating. Worst of all, they’re usually impossible to spot – although partially-complete or vague profiles are probably strong candidates.
K*bots UK, specialist providers of 'fun science' Curriculum Enhancement days for Primary and Secondary schools in Britain.Please find us on [en.wikipedia.org] for more information.Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/31/2010 10:43AM by Locke Cole.