FREE MEMBERS - now completely restricted

"Extort" ? .... a bit much don't you think? They're offering a service, for a fee, no ones forcing you to pay it.

Yes The site is just using that excuse to extort money out of people instead of letting us view for free

Right it is the GOVERNMENT. Somehow it is less like human trafficking if you need to pay for it.
FOSTA is a convenient excuse . It is not the reason.

I see no issue in the way it was before! There are creeps that pay for the site and decent people who just want to test the waters. The 3 messages a day with 24 views was on the money with this website! And more people will join if it goes back to the way things where; but the goverment isnt having it!

tags, your suggestion and my historic stand on this thread may have some common ground here, for very different reasons. I would support a one year free access as it was before the ban. One year is probably long enough for a couple to see if this site has a value to their journey.

I vote and pray to delete all free members after their profile has been online for 1 year anniversary. Majority of them have not filled out their profile,no pictures and no certifications. Enough is enough. Paid or lifetime members shouldn't have to view such fakes and game players.

Newcple I do not know who you were addressing as the only people who are reading or contributing to this thread are paid members.

If you're serious about making meaningful connections and want to view all pics etc..,,,Just pay the membership fee....You get 3 months here for what other sites charge for one month.....Some times you have to pay to play......

Are the posts solicited. Well, yes in the sense that having a physical address means that I solicit about half of the mail I receive at my home, or about two thirds of my telephone calls just because I have a number.

Unsolicited , yes as in read the profile first please, or take the hint when we have declined you twice before. I have no objection to someone reaching out if we have not already said no, and they are not outside our stated parameters. When we get posted by 25 year old smokers who list as not interested in soft swing, then that is unsolicited.

More to the point of this discussion. When we were free members, and just circling the event horizon of the LS ,we did read every post , much of the mail was not what we were looking for, If we had been paying at that time it would have been deemed a waste of money

. Being a free member gave us the time to figure out that some of the problem was our profile, and some of the problem was in our expectations. The remaining problems? Well they were problems for real , but became fewer as we gained experience.

After a good long while, and some legitimate back and forth with real people we took the plunge. We needed to be able to let people see what we looked like and to do that we needed to subscribe. We subscribed for one month and our results got better. I did the math and decided that a lifetime membership made sense. We would not be here at all without the free membership.

Many of the new free members are just making up their minds, and this site was a good place for them to find their sea legs.

For experienced long term swingers the present system works out just fine. What we have discovered though is that, while at one point SLS was our only real point of contact, our network has grown well beyond SLS. Yes, we do meet the occasional couple here, we just did last weekend. For the most part though it it friends of friends and a group that we joined.

Unsolicited email , lol . That's funny , cause how else is a person to contact you on here . I read the profiles . I send emails , many people in the lifestyle are rude and snobs . I reply to every message I get on sls , , whether I am interested or not . And I thank them for being interested and I'm just decent human being , it's thing that is lacking in the world today .

Cannacouple383 , I have never been curious enough to spend money to open unsolicited mail. Just to see what is inside.

Much of the mail here is from folks who do not bother to read our profile. If they had they would know that they were not in the running. This has not changed much when the free members went away. Our membership was purchased largely for more access to the emails and the ability to have more album control. This was only after SLS had proven itself a worthwhile place to be.

I think that this will get people to look , gets them in the door and if they want to be able to respond and connect to the messages they get then they could at the very least cough up the 15 dollars for a one month membership , really I think that's very little to have to spend for a data basis of like minded people that will improve their success in what they are looking for , I have sent emails to some free members in hopes they will spend the 15 dollars to be a member so they could read it and perhaps make a connection , I have no problem with the policy

If they cant read emails or reply to a paid member. Whats the point of having them? Its more people to sort through to find a likely single or couple. Right now I have to look and be sure they are paid and not free since free members cannot reply! Just get rid of the free members so they quit joining..I know it is a ploy to get them in to only find out they cant even read an email. But it makes it harder for the paid members to find someone to connect with.

I think Free members should be allowed to read and reply to emails from paid members..Single guys have a hard enough time in the lifestyle. This just made it much harder. restricting it to reading and replying only will keep the trolls out and give a few more people for us PAID members to select from.

To answer the question posted- no, free members should not be blocked from all communication. As it was prior- limited to 3 a day or something else like that fosters real people using and ultimately joining the site. That's how I started and continue to occasionally use this site based on my finances which fluctuates, so my membership is intermittent.

My issue is the stated excuse. I can't understand where several other adult dating sites I use do not have this same legal issue. It's harder to believe that this is the only site out of many in its class that is adhering to federal law, implying that all the other ones are in violation, for as long as this policy has been enacted. I think its BS, just a ruse to push all members to pay, nothing more or less or anything to do with the law. If I take the time to research the law and question the other sites and find they are indeed operating illegally, then I will correct my opinion.

Thanks for posting, interesting to see all the perspectives

I agree wannabe3878 ....I had a similar suggestion earlier in the thread. The site needs to grow for all of us to benefit. If you think about it on a smaller scale...what if no new users (free members) in your area become paid members then you have no growth and the people are always the same every time you have a look to see who's on. I personally am fortunate enough to travel very often so I get to see and feel out different communities of the site.

The above situation site wide........ Staff begins to get let go and then site support suffers. Who here remembers (uses) MySpace....not exactly the same but people will find somewhere more interesting to spend their time even if they have to spend more money.

We have to remember that yes we got a great (THE BEST) deal but we no longer support the site with new revenue. The people supporting the site are either new lifetime members and the ones that some people think are cheap because they pay for a bit and then become free. Some people just pay when they have time and or are ready to play. Should they become a lifetime member they also no longer add new revenue to the site.

I think the site would be smart to allow free members to receive and respond to messages only. Can only see the initial, shared picture for each profile and read the profile.
I understand that many want to have them charged but I can tell you, it is better for the site (and all of us) to be more welcoming than other sites. This will attract more people to pay so that they can see, interact more and keep the site growing.
As it is now, there is no reason to sign up for the site as there is no way to “prove” the site has real people. Interacting with someone will prove it and provide more of a chance for the “free” people to pay.

The hell with the Free Members. The offer absolutely ZERO to the Paying membership.
They only benefit the website's
Bragging rights,
"We got a Gazzillion Members".
They take up needed space on
OUR WEBSITE.

If free members now have NO ability to send or reply to emails, can not contact another member, and can not read or reply to the forums... why do they exist, other then the site trying to boost the membership. I mean really why... Im confident IF YOU did an analysis the free members cost more then they bring in. Perhaps a short free trial period would interest them more then F.U. ... I have to be honest I was once a free member it was so frustrating. mostly because the site sent me emails tring to get me to pay,,, it definitely was not actual real members contacting me as a free member... because most members I have talked to say if they arn't willing to pay a little money... they are not worth the time anyways. I mean lets look at the hook... free to sign up... yep but if you want to scratch your own butt it will costs you.

He seems nice.

NO, but this is closer to not allowing me to gift something I buy at Sams to a non member. Membership should have its privileges.

If Free members cannot initiate OK, although once a month would give a taste.
If free members can only send two or three a day after a PAID member initiates OK, This would give them a taste.
Blocking them from anything but the default galleries would give them a taste and protect our privacy as we control the defaults.

Blocking them from MAKING Galleries, which is a key privilege makes sense. That is what drew us into a paid membership.

Without anything allowing that we are pretty soon going to be limited to those already on board. Without some interaction we would never have joined up in the first place

I didn't mind the free members. I was free for about 3 months before paying. There were many that I liked catting with, and also met a few.
I don't think they should be blocked.

I thoroughly understand charging free members to initiate communication or post galleries. I can support limiting the manner in which free members can view profiles, perhaps limiting gallery access. They should be able to read and respond to messages they receive to some extent.

1. It give them a glimpse of real value inside and

2 It allows paying members to ability to get some of what they have paid for the ability to communicate as they see fit/

True story:

We joined another social site/club just a little while ago as a free member. Within minutes, we had an email from another member. When clicking upon it to read it, it took us to a pay for use page as a premium member in order to read, interact and peruse other profiles. Damn them too for wanting money to run their website!

Is gubmint cheeze going this route as well, eventually?

~Allen

uphotcouplexxx, completely agree... why are "new members" that are free even appearing on my front page, i cannot contact them, they cannot contact me... whats the point of me even seeing them? show up on the "on line" list also.......