Fair membership costs? - Paying members & Free non-payin

24 Feb 2011

To the people who feel cheated a little by having to pay when there are free members getting the same as they do...
If you went to a club ( I will take a single female as an example) it's highly likely you would be entitled to free entry...
A single guy would be charged anything from £30 to around £50 ( in there parts at least) ..
Now you will have access to exactly the same facilities as he does yet you will get them for free...
Would you turn round and say "Hang on......I'll pay half whatever his entry fee is as I don't think it's fair he pays and I don't" ?
I've never yet seen a single female make that offer.....
I know it's a bit of an out of kilter example but it is an example of someone paying for something that someone else gets for free.....

24 Feb 2011

Call it what you like, a moan, a rant, a whinge, unfair or tough; The fact of the matter is, whether you dissect parts or not, members are not being made aware to make their so called informed "choice" prior paying up.
The percentage whether active and logging in or not are still taking up server storage room and still have the option to have full site access at their wish, be it in one year or 5 years so the ratio still stands.
I will say yet again, with fees now lowered I am one that will stay, regardless of full free access members, but I will not stop what some call "moaning & whinging" nor will I just "shut up & put up or leave" without raising the questions.
If I think something is wrong, be it a rise in fees, not sharing new costs equally or members not being aware of something that I think they should be, then I am afraid that I will have something to say, call it what you will.
Paying members should be aware and informed. wink

Quote by Aurora_female
From what I have read my understanding is as follows;
Paying members make up 72% of the site, free full access members are 28%.
Paying members will always pay for any and every improvement while the free full access members still pay nothing towards anything.
Paying members will not get any service over and above the free full access members, regardless of paying.
Paying members will not be informed of full free access members prior to joining until they either find a debate in the forum or another member informs them.
Paying members once they know about full free access members can then make the informed choice, after payment, that they can renew and still pay all the costs, or go elsewhere, but if you are unhappy on discovering, the terms and conditions do state "no refunds" given.
Paying members that raise the pay/free member subject will always be told by many "Don't pay then and go elsewhere, you have choice".
Now, thats commitment ;) xxxxxxx

24 Feb 2011

Quote by Aurora_female
No disrespect to anyone Freckle, but if one of the owners says what I have quoted, then I tend to believe that and he did say "Free for life", if he means for basic free members with no site access then I will retract that but that is not mine nor some others' understanding. Maybe st3v3 will confirm either way, whether the
"free for life, around 345,000" is full access free members or not.

I'm not saying that St3v3 lied. I believe him; I was here at the time when there was only that number of members. The point being made, is that many of those accounts were inactive even then. As has already been said, at that time you had to have different accounts for ads, chat and forum. I suspect that a bigger proportion is now inactive. As Dawnie has said, things like Masked Balls affect the numbers - I have at least three accounts created for that purpose, which are now inactive. So - should I have to pay for those 'free for life' accounts too - just because you think everyone should pay for any changes?

24 Feb 2011

Quote by Aurora_female
Call it what you like, a moan, a rant, a whinge, unfair or tough; The fact of the matter is, whether you dissect parts or not, members are not being made aware to make their so called informed "choice" prior paying up.

And that is a whole different debate from the one you started, about fairness of price increases.

24 Feb 2011

Quote by Freckledbird
Call it what you like, a moan, a rant, a whinge, unfair or tough; The fact of the matter is, whether you dissect parts or not, members are not being made aware to make their so called informed "choice" prior paying up.

And that is a whole different debate from the one you started, about fairness of price increases.
No I think it is all relative, many stated within the debate "you have choice" or words to that effect, including yourself Freckle, to which you are quite correct but "informed" it is not. But yes the thread has shifted and changed throughout, hence it is a debate and many people have different opinions hence it will shift & expand. wink

24 Feb 2011

Quote by Dawnie
How many members (paying or free) are actually active? If we say that accessing the site for any reason is being 'active', how many do it on a reasonably regular basis - say once a month or more. Is it possible (the info is there so we could be told) that a higher proportion of free members are irregular or even lapsed users than paying ones?
I would be very interested to see usage figures published. No names needed - just broad figures.
Without that info - these arguments are bit moot.

I Agree.
So maybe SH would care to answer this question
1) How many paying members are active?
2) How many non-paying members are active?
Just wondering really, what does 'active' mean?
Those that log on every six months, six weeks, six days or six times a day?
And, to be fair, who are we to be judging what anyone else considers as active when its personal to them?
By "ACTIVE" I was using the definition as given by foxylady - hence why i quoted foxylady.

24 Feb 2011

I see a few people have added their own analogies to the discussion, so here's mine:
I joined my mobile phone provider (3) a number of years ago. At the time they were running a promotion and I signed on for a £9/month contract. After a year I went back to them to see about getting a new handset, and they happily upgraded me, and added some extra minutes to my free allowance - still all for £9. This year I did the same thing, and they added more minutes, texts, and internet usage - still for £9.
However, my daughter wanted to sign up for the same deal but couldn't. She has to pay more than me for the same allowances because she's a new customer. Should she have been informed about all the people like me that she's subsidising? I know they wouldn't have volunteered that information, and would not have provided it even if she asked.
The bottom line is that she has the choice of any number of providers so she didn't have to take up their offer.

24 Feb 2011

Quote by Steve
To the people who feel cheated a little by having to pay when there are free members getting the same as they do...
If you went to a club ( I will take a single female as an example) it's highly likely you would be entitled to free entry...
A single guy would be charged anything from £30 to around £50 ( in there parts at least) ..
Now you will have access to exactly the same facilities as he does yet you will get them for free...
Would you turn round and say "Hang on......I'll pay half whatever his entry fee is as I don't think it's fair he pays and I don't" ?
I've never yet seen a single female make that offer.....
I know it's a bit of an out of kilter example but it is an example of someone paying for something that someone else gets for free.....

Well said.

24 Feb 2011

Quote by Aurora_female
If you look back to St3v3 post on page 3 you will see this;

How many existing members are free members?
If you mean free for life, around 345,000
I think that pretty much confirms its.

What st3v3 does not confirm, is how many of those numbers are real. The site claims approx members, yet the forum stats show that the record amount of members online is 336. Looking at the homepage now, the site claims there is 655 members in chat.
For obvious commercial reasons, the site needs to show that it is popular and busy, but the members stats shows how many accounts have been created, it does not show how many are spammers that have been deleted (deleting the account does not affect the system recognising that the account has been created) it does not show members who have been banned, or who have asked for their account to be deleted.
The numbers that st3v3 has quoted, are taken from site/system records, they do not reflect true site activity, so therefore the quote of 345,000 is (IMO) a far from accurate reflection of site traffic which takes advantage of free membership.

24 Feb 2011

Quote by Cubes
I see a few people have added their own analogies to the discussion, so here's mine:
I joined my mobile phone provider (3) a number of years ago. At the time they were running a promotion and I signed on for a £9/month contract. After a year I went back to them to see about getting a new handset, and they happily upgraded me, and added some extra minutes to my free allowance - still all for £9. This year I did the same thing, and they added more minutes, texts, and internet usage - still for £9.
However, my daughter wanted to sign up for the same deal but couldn't. She has to pay more than me for the same allowances because she's a new customer. Should she have been informed about all the people like me that she's subsidising? I know they wouldn't have volunteered that information, and would not have provided it even if she asked.
The bottom line is that she has the choice of any number of providers so she didn't have to take up their offer.

Knowing a little bit of the mobile phone industry, I'm afraid your analogy is floawed and here's why:
1) Your mobile phone (at the time, lets assume the Nokia 7700 "Matrix Phone" with no-colour screen and chunky as hell) would have had a fixed manufacture/license/distribution cost to it based on technology at the time. Your daughter's phone (with movement in technology, lets assume an iPhone4, or mine, the HTC Desire with all the touch screen rasmatazz) will cost a heckuvalot more to manufacture.. blah blah.
2) The cost of the handset is roughly split over the length of whatever contract:
In your case, I'm guessing 12 months at the time (£9 x12 = £108 sound about right?)
your daughter's, most contracts about 24 months these days (typical £30 x 24 months) = £720 (yes - them handsets will cost closer to that figure than £110 if you wanted to buy it outright!
3) Even if your phone/call/text/package usage is similar, the networks can usually subsidise the cost price of this so even if both of you don't make a single call, you're still paying for the phone through rental alone.
4) Your phones are sold on a "per unit" basis and hence all the facilities you pay for are attributed to "that unit" as opposed to a "percentage share of the business you're buying into" hence your daughter is not subsiding anyone else's use - just hers.
5) Whatever you both, or any other user, pays for their phone (or how) does not necessarily all pay for "systems, maintenance, server, staff,..." otherwise your daughter should, by percentage of how much she pays, argue that she contributes more to the mobile business than you do, entitling her to more service/facility access (mathematically, 6 times more than you do) and hence the network would be losing money through you (hence why some networks try to get customers on their older tariffs to switch to a more updated tariff.
A different analogy and maybe, but not the mobile phone user's I'm afraid.

24 Feb 2011

Quote by Aurora_female
Call it what you like, a moan, a rant, a whinge, unfair or tough; The fact of the matter is, whether you dissect parts or not, members are not being made aware to make their so called informed "choice" prior paying up.

So using this principle, I should contact my local council and demand to know the personal circumstances of the 'freeloaders' who choose not to / can't afford to pay their council tax, before I decide whether to pay mine in full. Somehow I don't think that would be an option.
I'm a licensed radio amateur and as such am a member of the national radio society. olduns who have fifty consecutive years membership don't pay any annual subscriptions. Now the fees I pay for membership to this society is on par with the annual charges to this web site. Was I informed about the wrinklies getting something for nothing before I joined - NO. Does it interfere with my enjoyment of the membership benefits - NO. Am I jealous that I have to pay and somebody doesn't - NO.
There are so many examples of every day life that I could give of 'unfair' systems.

24 Feb 2011

Quote by Ian
Call it what you like, a moan, a rant, a whinge, unfair or tough; The fact of the matter is, whether you dissect parts or not, members are not being made aware to make their so called informed "choice" prior paying up.

So using this principle, I should contact my local council and demand to know the personal circumstances of the 'freeloaders' who choose not to / can't afford to pay their council tax, before I decide whether to pay mine in full. Somehow I don't think that would be an option.
I'm a licensed radio amateur and as such am a member of the national radio society. olduns who have fifty consecutive years membership don't pay any annual subscriptions. Now the fees I pay for membership to this society is on par with the annual charges to this web site. Was I informed about the wrinklies getting something for nothing before I joined - NO. Does it interfere with my enjoyment of the membership benefits - NO. Am I jealous that I have to pay and somebody doesn't - NO.
There are so many examples of every day life that I could give of 'unfair' systems.
dawnie says you don't pay for your radio thingy... bolt

24 Feb 2011

Quote by Ahabs
** Loads of stuff I didn't know **

Okay I'll give up on that one! :giveup: ;-)
Now, about my car insurance payments.....
:giggle: bolt

24 Feb 2011

Quote by essex34m

If you look back to St3v3 post on page 3 you will see this;

How many existing members are free members?
If you mean free for life, around 345,000
I think that pretty much confirms its.

What st3v3 does not confirm, is how many of those numbers are real. The site claims approx members, yet the forum stats show that the record amount of members online is 336. Looking at the homepage now, the site claims there is 655 members in chat.
For obvious commercial reasons, the site needs to show that it is popular and busy, but the members stats shows how many accounts have been created, it does not show how many are spammers that have been deleted (deleting the account does not affect the system recognising that the account has been created) it does not show members who have been banned, or who have asked for their account to be deleted.
The numbers that st3v3 has quoted, are taken from site/system records, they do not reflect true site activity, so therefore the quote of 345,000 is (IMO) a far from accurate reflection of site traffic which takes advantage of free membership.
The above does make sense Essex but I cannot see the site quoting a "free for life" membership number if half of them are deleted or banned, it would be better to admit to having less surely and show that free was only 5% or whatever?
Some have said; five or even ten of those accounts could be owned by one person also, it is still server room and it is still their to be activated whenever that user likes "for life" with full site access so to me they still come in to the figures regardless.
At the end of the day "free" members are here and will stay, fair or not, that is clearly understood.
But, I think members should be told prior to joining a paying site that not everyone pays so that they do not have that "cheated" feeling.
I have seen members in this thread dating back to 2006, they had no idea about "free for life" members. Many will not know and many do not read the forums to find out.
The thread started slightly different and has evolved to information too which I think members do have a right to know, it would be two lines in the t&c?

24 Feb 2011

There has been references to many business' be it a bank and mortgage percentages (I have not yet heard of a bank giving FREE mortgages, a supermarket (FREE Food?), a phone company (still £9 tho cubes ;) )
Ian, as for council tax dodgers, thats up to the government to sort out. If that person is out of work or on lower income I have no problem paying my taxes to support, any one of us could be in that position at any given time.

24 Feb 2011

Quote by Aurora_female
There has been references to many business' be it a bank and mortgage percentages (I have not yet heard of a bank giving FREE mortgages, a supermarket (FREE Food?), a phone company (still £9 tho cubes ;) )
Ian, as for council tax dodgers, thats up to the government to sort out. If that person is out of work or on lower income I have no problem paying my taxes to support, any one of us could be in that position at any given time.

well if its the free bit that is gripeing you, may i suggest sh charge us £50 for the year and then rufund it to us instantly... no-one can complain that we are free then as we will have paid lmao

24 Feb 2011

Quote by Ian
Call it what you like, a moan, a rant, a whinge, unfair or tough; The fact of the matter is, whether you dissect parts or not, members are not being made aware to make their so called informed "choice" prior paying up.

So using this principle, I should contact my local council and demand to know the personal circumstances of the 'freeloaders' who choose not to / can't afford to pay their council tax, before I decide whether to pay mine in full. Somehow I don't think that would be an option.
I'm a licensed radio amateur and as such am a member of the national radio society. olduns who have fifty consecutive years membership don't pay any annual subscriptions. Now the fees I pay for membership to this society is on par with the annual charges to this web site. Was I informed about the wrinklies getting something for nothing before I joined - NO. Does it interfere with my enjoyment of the membership benefits - NO. Am I jealous that I have to pay and somebody doesn't - NO.
There are so many examples of every day life that I could give of 'unfair' systems.
Where in the previous postings has anyone 'demanded to know the personal circumstances' of any site member ???
Comparing someone saying it would be nice to be advised or informed free non paying full access members exist on the site, before they make decision to join or not, to someone demanding personal information is an incorrect comparison in my mind.
On not being bothered that other members of the 'national radio society' dont pay subscriptions well thats your perogative, if your happy and ok with that great. No doubt there will be members of the 'national radio society' with a differing & opposite perogative to your goodself and not so happy the other members dont pay. Very similar to here in fact, some ok with it and and some not so ok.
Happy radio'ing ;-)

24 Feb 2011

Rantings of a dying site. Fact is, none of the new Members would be moaning if they thought the site offered value for money. Take note - many active Swingers willingly pay to join "swinging sites" where "adult" sites don't appear to offer them the same value in terms of what they are actually looking for. What is Swinging Heaven these days - an adult site or a swinging site?

25 Feb 2011

Quote by Ahabs
I see a few people have added their own analogies to the discussion, so here's mine:
I joined my mobile phone provider (3) a number of years ago. At the time they were running a promotion and I signed on for a £9/month contract. After a year I went back to them to see about getting a new handset, and they happily upgraded me, and added some extra minutes to my free allowance - still all for £9. This year I did the same thing, and they added more minutes, texts, and internet usage - still for £9.
However, my daughter wanted to sign up for the same deal but couldn't. She has to pay more than me for the same allowances because she's a new customer. Should she have been informed about all the people like me that she's subsidising? I know they wouldn't have volunteered that information, and would not have provided it even if she asked.
The bottom line is that she has the choice of any number of providers so she didn't have to take up their offer.

Knowing a little bit of the mobile phone industry, I'm afraid your analogy is floawed and here's why:
1) Your mobile phone (at the time, lets assume the Nokia 7700 "Matrix Phone" with no-colour screen and chunky as hell) would have had a fixed manufacture/license/distribution cost to it based on technology at the time. Your daughter's phone (with movement in technology, lets assume an iPhone4, or mine, the HTC Desire with all the touch screen rasmatazz) will cost a heckuvalot more to manufacture.. blah blah.
2) The cost of the handset is roughly split over the length of whatever contract:
In your case, I'm guessing 12 months at the time (£9 x12 = £108 sound about right?)
your daughter's, most contracts about 24 months these days (typical £30 x 24 months) = £720 (yes - them handsets will cost closer to that figure than £110 if you wanted to buy it outright!
3) Even if your phone/call/text/package usage is similar, the networks can usually subsidise the cost price of this so even if both of you don't make a single call, you're still paying for the phone through rental alone.
4) Your phones are sold on a "per unit" basis and hence all the facilities you pay for are attributed to "that unit" as opposed to a "percentage share of the business you're buying into" hence your daughter is not subsiding anyone else's use - just hers.
5) Whatever you both, or any other user, pays for their phone (or how) does not necessarily all pay for "systems, maintenance, server, staff,..." otherwise your daughter should, by percentage of how much she pays, argue that she contributes more to the mobile business than you do, entitling her to more service/facility access (mathematically, 6 times more than you do) and hence the network would be losing money through you (hence why some networks try to get customers on their older tariffs to switch to a more updated tariff.
A different analogy and maybe, but not the mobile phone user's I'm afraid.
That does not always work out though. My mobile phone deal I will call a deal as its not a contract. I pay a month 300 mins 300 texts but was never tied to a contract and its also sim only so buy my own phone. This deal is no longer open to new customers as I tried to get Mrs Tweeky on it and the minimum monthly is now a month though I am still paying

25 Feb 2011

Quote by tweeky
... Mobile phone blah blah.

That does not always work out though. My mobile phone deal I will call a deal as its not a contract. I pay a month 300 mins 300 texts but was never tied to a contract and its also sim only so buy my own phone. This deal is no longer open to new customers as I tried to get Mrs Tweeky on it and the minimum monthly is now a month though I am still paying
The Sim-only deals are relatively new, and a "mid-way" modification of the Pay-As-You-Go purchase. With PAYG you get no handset and you don't rent the line, hence you get no real talktime package, however with most networks if you do not use the line(ie make any calls) for a period of time (typically 3-6 months) the number gets disconnected.
Imagine a rent-per-day/night housing scheme that you had your name down for, but you failed to show up (for reasons unknown) for a minimum of 3 months - the managers would be inclined to think you were sorted elsewhere and give your booking to someone else. This would probably be the best way to describe what happens with PAYG.
With Sim-only deals you "book the number" on a month-by-month basis, and for that priviledge get a small deal on your calls (and in most cases, texts messages). That is all - its still closer to a PAYG package than a full contract.

25 Feb 2011

The factor in the above posts about mobile phone contracts is that no matter how you look at it everyone is paying. Hence it's not a case of one customer paying for everything whilst the next paying for nothin.
So the common denominator is that both customers pay. There is a price or service differential but something far less than a 100% difference so not really a direct comparison with the origins of this post.
Well thats how i see it......but wont be losign sleep lol

25 Feb 2011

anyway, the point is that if people are fully informed; and subsequently make a decision to join, we can assume they are okay with it?

25 Feb 2011

Quote by duncanlondon
anyway, the point is that if people are fully informed; and subsequently make a decision to join, we can assume they are okay with it?

Duncan, if you refer to ST3v3 (admins) reply to.....

Quote by Somm
In the pages of the post statements have been made that people joined knowing that free full access members exist. As a result the post was considered moaning or complaining by a few hence i asked my quite simple question.
If if people are not advised or aware before or as they join/make payment then how can it be said they are fully aware of the free full access members. If they we're they could then make a decison on fairness and decide to join or not, correct ??

....ST3v3 replies as follows

Quote by st3v3
Its a fair question Somm and welcome to the forum
The answer is that they're not

So....to date, at this present time....fully informed to subsequently make a decision to join.....is not the case.
If informed formally and still join and then complain....well, thats up to them....not much assistance beyond informing can be given haha.
But regardless the the 'non paying' full access members are as such and the current site owners have promised to maintain them alongside 'paying' full access members.
That has to be respected but for sure it doesnt mean the paying aint going to have an opinion or are wrong in voicing it. Healthy logical (or illogical) uncensored varied debate can only be good for the site ???
:smoke:
lol

25 Feb 2011

Oh look over there, a dead horse that hasn't been flogged enough....

25 Feb 2011

Quote by Too Hot
Rantings of a dying site. Fact is, none of the new Members would be moaning if they thought the site offered value for money. Take note - many active Swingers willingly pay to join "swinging sites" where "adult" sites don't appear to offer them the same value in terms of what they are actually looking for. What is Swinging Heaven these days - an adult site or a swinging site?

Interesting point, We came here as experimenting swingers, new to the scene and looking to learn, then meet. This was achieved, and very happy about it we are. However, we rarely meet any one new from this site these days. When we are looking to meet new friends we advertise on this site and on a free one, on the free site we get about five replies to every one we get here, most times these days we meet people from the free site. However we have grown to like this site for other reasons, one of which is this forum, and the people who post here, even if we rarely agree with them. wink

The free site does have some extra features for a cost, we don't feel we need these features.

26 Feb 2011

Only a small thought....most of us have experianced a time waster or two on this site. I wonder how many of these time wasters are paying every year.
Before you have a go at me, I know there are a fair number of non-paying members who are serious, non-timewasting members.

26 Feb 2011

Quote by swcpl2005
Oh look over there, a dead horse that hasn't been flogged enough....

:laughabove::laughabove::laughabove:
At the end of the day, nothing is going to change!! An agreement was made many years ago stating that existing members would remain free ... end of!!
No point going round and round in circles with this (in my humble opinion) so lets just get back to the shagging!!
People still do use this site to find a shag right?? :twisted:
*Runs away to add "Wont meet freeloaders" to her profile*
bolt

26 Feb 2011

Quote by Funlovers2009
*Runs away to add "Wont meet freeloaders" to her profile*

Lets not be shy about it!:laughabove::rascal: rotflmao

26 Feb 2011

Quote by domino_2
Only a small thought....most of us have experianced a time waster or two on this site. I wonder how many of these time wasters are paying every year.
Before you have a go at me, I know there are a fair number of non-paying members who are serious, non-timewasting members.

If your sexual kick is wanking while arranging meets that you have no intention of keeping then isn't a lot to pay, and I doubt that that amount of money would deter anyone from joining a site where they can get their sexual kick.
I would suggest that the percentage of keyboard-wankers has actually increased since the takeover because before that there weren't cams and videos to wank over and the picture ads were hard work to browse. As an aside the takeover has done nothing for us - the forums were better before and the Mirc chatroom allowed people to chat rather than flash or watch - but that's progress.

28 Feb 2011

Quote by Somm
The factor in the above posts about mobile phone contracts is that no matter how you look at it everyone is paying. Hence it's not a case of one customer paying for everything whilst the next paying for nothin.
So the common denominator is that both customers pay. There is a price or service differential but something far less than a 100% difference so not really a direct comparison with the origins of this post.
Well thats how i see it......but wont be losign sleep

The point is people are always on varying deals. As I have stated in a post before I play on on line game servers that I pay for and others like beta testers or people who got on before the charges dont. In reverse I play on some games for free when others pay. Swings and roundabouts.