POF - How not to do it

POF, Plenty of Fish that is, have always been a little bit odd in the world of online dating.  Run by a German, they seem to have always had a very heavy-handed approach to censorship of activity.

They claim to be a site that promotes relationships, but their concept of a relationship is restricted to say the least.


The latest edict from their owner states that they will automatically prevent people from contacting others who are more than 14 years different to them in age.  What a load of nonsense.  There are lots of young ladies who prefer the company of older men, as they offer experience, understanding and above all a comfortable lifestyle.  Younger women crave this and identify with older men much more frequently than those their own age.  POF think that there is no logical reason why a 50 year old man would need to contact an 18 year old girl.

Many users of POF, past and present, and I include myself in this, have suddenly found that their profile has been deleted.  No explanation, no means of saying goodbye to contacts you're in conversation with, nothing.  Bang, your gone.  POF are the Cillit of the the dating world.  What is more worrying is that no one can actually get in contact with them to ask why.  Did you do something wrong, violate a site rule, or were you an innocent victim as so many seem to be.  Often it is the recipient of a solicitous email that gets booted off the site.  Questions remain on what happens to your personal data.  Is it being stored somewhere, what about your photographs ?  Who has them, are they accessible ?

Users also report that applications to join often appear to work and then within minutes if not hours, their profile is deleted.  No warning, and no explanation.  A mystery to us all.

It's all very confusing, and considering that Germany has liberal attitudes when it comes to love, sex and nudity, then it is all the more odd.

The bottom line: avoid POF.  It won't help you and you will become frustrated.

The solution: join a site that doesn't enforce draconian rules: Flirting For Fun

Online dating sites

Where to start ?  The first dating sites were no more than bulletin boards or forums on which hopeful singles put a small ad'...the equivalent of the newspaper friends wanted columns.

These evolved into large friend finder type sites, some of which have lost their way and whilst others continue to evolve and change as the online marketplace matures.

Nowadays though, you will find a site or design for a lot of specialist requirements as actual sites themselves.  Don't be fooled though!!  Invariably, these sites are just subsets of much larger sites, filtered to offer only those of a particular trait or fetish.

There are so many to choose from, however you can do no worse than try some of these:

Flirt-Site

FlirtinUK

Gay-Chat

FlirtinForFun