Suggestions and ways this website can be improved

 What other kind of website of this sort does verification and background checks? 

 That is what the Internet is for, and that is the reason why each person should do their own fact checking and verifying before meeting ANYone online.  Whether that is from here, or any other site, or a dating site, or even sites like Meetup. 

 I'm unsure what makes people think it is the websites job, not the individual person's, responsibility?

its the world we live in. Be safe. Double and triple check. Don't jump into a meeting with someone you  haven't gotten to know first. Hold hands and look both ways. 

If Mark is taking a commission he is part of the process. And I was bringing it up because it is s safety concern as some seem to think that just the women are the ones at risk. But some verification would be good.

greenearth2

Well I don't see clients being able to run background checks on pros because what pro would want to give a client enough information on them to do a background check?   So the only one who could feasibly do it would be Mark...but then that would increase the cost of cuddling services here.   I dunno...so far, I haven't met any cuddlers I was scared of. 
Its usually the other way around...female cuddler pros have way more to fear from all the male clients who can't keep their hands in check than we do from them.   

I was talking about Mark doing it. I have had many jobs that require background checks. Or clearances. Is safety a bad thing?

 For $19 or $29 please feel free to run your own check. I ask for enough information, and have an address (I do not host in my own home because I have children and that is my own personal preference). Voice telephone conversations so you have a phone number to do a reverse check.  If you pay in advance by PayPal you also have that person's name. Each person I have had any real life in-person contact with knows my full name, my real phone number, my Facebook page. I've even made friends with pros here and we are Facebook friends. 

Sounds like you've got some paranoia going on. Feel free at ask questions and get to know a person you meet online before meeting them, but that is YOUR responsibility not Mark's.  Just like it is mine, or anybody else's responsibility. It's the world we live in. Be safe. 

Just a realist. I think there should be at least some safeguards in place. Men as well as women are at risk even if some want to deny that fact.

 Even though this is not a dating site, have you ever been on a dating site? Like OkCupid or match.com, do you expect those websites to do background checks on each person who has a profile there? 

I do expect some sort of checking against sex offender lists and would only meet someone from internet after a phone call and in a very public placr

 Statistically, realistically and In all reality... MOST sex offenders are men. 

Again, this is just all part of online safety whether you are a man or a woman. 

About a decade ago before I had sense. I met a girl online. Bad move she after like 3 dates referred to me as her bf. I was like lady I don't know you at all and she tried pushing limits needless to say I blocked her phone number etc. So I take safety and bounderies seriously

Buck

Other than for my jobs, I have never had a background check.  I have nothing to hide but feel that I probably would have passed on this site if a back ground check were required.  I also see a lot of people hired that sneak through screening but only last a few weeks on the job because their true nature comes out eventually.

I just take precautions from now on with any one I would potentially meet online. Or for that matter meet in person. I work mainly around women. Trust me I have had my share of being sexually harassed by women. So that colors my focus on safety

greenearth2

So when this girl tried pushing limits how did you avoid getting raped etc ??  

I stopped moved away and left. But it was not right what she did. So some people don't understand or respect boundaries. That is sad really. That is why safety is key.

quietman775

I agree that safety is key. My only disagreement is with the idea that it is in any way up to the site to provide it. There's just no way to take the risk out of meeting someone off the 'Net. Last week I was traveling on business. Arranged to meet a cuddle pro from this site in a city I've never visited before. When I Googled her city, the third item in the search results was a news story about a pair of murders that had happened a day or two prior. When I arrived at the address she gave me, the environment was one of serious urban blight. Boarded-up windows. Pavement as pockmarked as the surface of the moon. . Crowded streets and sidewalks. I was glad the appointment wasn't at night. I had to decide whether to park the car and walk back to her place, or do a U-turn and blow off the appointment.  I decided to chance it. I called to let her know I'd arrived and stood on the street outside the address waiting for her to come down.. All the while I was keeping a wary eye on my surroundings. After a long two minutes, she approached me from across the street --- turns out she doesn't give out her real address. She led me back across the street to her place, and that little unexpected twist bumped my internal threat awareness from condition yellow to orange. But you know what? Once inside, she turned out to have a nice comfortable place. She was very personable, and we chatted and laughed for ninety minutes, and both had a great time. I'd see her again if I ever returned to her state. Life is risk. No third party can guarantee your safety nor tell you how much risk you are assuming. So you make the best judgments you can. Sometimes you gotta just go for it. In this case, I'm glad I did.@navyvet76 it must seem like I'm following you around the site to disagree with you today, but I assure you I'm not!  LOL

 I'm grateful for your post @quietman775.  It shows that any scenario can be presented and how different people will choose to see it and act differently according to their own comfort and their past experiences. Given the exact scenario you described, I would have been out of there so fast! 

You stayed and it was a good choice for you. Personally I would have left simply because the address wasn't an exact match and the neighborhood sounded sketchy (and I google maps/zillow search an address before I go). 

Each person has a right to do what makes them feel safe and comfortable, but  I am a very firm believer that is each individual person's responsibility. Even if a background check was provided or a person was "vetted" I would still do my own checking anyway.   

C8H7N3O2

Instead of listings criticisms, I'm just gonna list some ideas for improvement...

-Improve the ability to search for members. By this I mean give us the ability to search by username, keywords (that are used in bios), interests, sexuality, and whether or not they smoke and/or drink.

-Online now icon? Have a small indicator on someone's profile to let other members know when we're online.

-Smoking/Drinking. There are fields for both but how come only the smoking option is displayed on someone's profile?

-More info fields on profile. Can we have some link areas? People can choose to include their social media sites, or what have you. It'd also be quite nice if we had text editor for bios the same way we have for the forum. Bold and italicized text for emphasis is a awesome feature. HTML/bbcode please.

-Forum. Can we have a "reply" feature that lets us reply directly to a specific post? Also can we "quote" bits of other posts that we want to reply to in case it's not an entire post. Can we have the option to have "reply/quote notifications"? I would really love to know when someone has replied to anything I have said without having to check every so often. Does the "@ username" mention feature actually notify you when you have been mentioned? If not it should.

-Make it more gender inclusive. For the "I'm a" and "Cuddles with" fields can there be more gender options for people who don't identify as either man or woman.

-Ethnicity. Can you please correct the "inter-racial" misnomer. Interracial is defined as "existing between or involving different races." For people such as myself who are more than one race, the terms "multiracial" or "mixed race" are more appropriate. Example: I am multiracial because my parents are interracial.

All these features should have the ability to be disabled by those who do not like/want them.

____
A question I have though... when searching in the forum for certain content, how do you get the results to show for a phrase instead of just the first word of whatever phrase that was searched?

I really like the visitors feature so please keep it.

I've gotten a few "offers" for a cuddle session right out of the gate. Always from a no-photo profile, mind you...and that combination is a red flag all by itself.

If someone doesn't have a photo, fine, now I have an email they can send a photo if they don't want to post it on the site...but to just say as your first message, "I'll be in your area on such-and-such a day and would lime to book a 2-3 hour session." REALLY. You don't know me from Adam. Anyway. @FireAndBlue I agree--it's our own responsibility to vet potential clients and they should do the same. Even if this site had background checks, there's no guarantee of anything, so the disclaimer would just be slightly modified.

@C8H7N3O2 There's the spirit! Love all your ideas!

One thing that I can suggest is to utilize your state's judiciary search if it's free to browse like Maryland's is. Obviously, you would need a real first and last name, but it is helpful when screening someone. I have used it before and it has produced some interesting results, on occasion, that were fairly valuable.

Great suggestion, @VIPirate!

Morpheus

I think if you leave someone negative karma, there should be a set amount of time before you can block them. A pro recently left a client negative karma and immediately blocked him not leaving him time to give her negative karma and defend himself. everyone deserves the chance to defend themselves and give their side of the story. I say that once you leave someone negative karma, there should be a 24 hour window before the person that left the negative karma can block the person they left the negative karma for. 

Another option would be that if you leave someone negative karma and then block them, the negative karma should either vanish or it not be visible to anyone else.

its only fair.

Karma can be made up or real. If karma is left by a forum poster or an active member probably more believable but if person is on site and off in a day, maybe not so much. There could be a review process where blocked or not the person receiving karma can respond.

It would be nice as a pro cuddler to have a separate from messaging feature that specifically allows for individuals to request and confirm services. This may help with record keeping as well (for site and/or pro)

snuggle554321

@navyvet76 There already is.  After any karma Post the owner of the profile can make a comment about that karma. 

@Teya  There is the cuddle request forum.  You could try there.  Don't know if that was helpful but at least I tried! LOL  

Apparently there is a way to turn on and off notifications when you are tagged. I've never gotten a notification when I was tagged  so I'm pretty sure mine is off.  At first I wanted it to be turned on but then I changed my mind.  

Something that I would like to see would be a skip feature. It would probably help a lot of people on here who don't like to read a lot of different kinds of drama.  Kind of like what they have on Facebook, you can click on the upper right hand corner of someone's comment and choose show less of that person's comments. You can also choose to follow or Unfollow someone. On Facebook if you block someone or get blocked you effectively disappear to that person and they disappear to you. All history of them/you ever being on the site disappears between both of you. It just makes both people invisible to each other. I really wish we had that on here.  I think that could really help at times. I know some people who are tired of the drama could just block everybody involved with the drama so that they wouldn't have to see it anymore! LOL 

Criticism of this website and ways that it can be improved:  The new rules were posted, and handfuls of people have expressed their criticism (both in public and in private) that these rules are blatantly not being followed,  very specifically two people going off the deep end and in fact things are getting more disrespectful on the forums instead of better. it's like the kids know the parent is out of town so they are throwing a party thinking the new neighbor who just moved in is watching the house but isn't going to tell.

Ways that this site can be improved: @Mark and @docgatorb actually stepping in and enforcing the rules they established and we've been talking about needing to curb certain behaviors for weeks. It's just getting more and more out of hand, I am not the only person who feels like it is way overdue to reign it in. 

 This has gone far beyond everyone's "rights to free speech in a public forum" and has continued to be escalated situations of online bullying. One person's rights to free speech ends when another person's rights to peace and not feeling threatened or harassed has been infringed on. 

 It is very clear there are two clients on this site who are constantly stirring up arguments, gaslighting, baiting, directly picking arguments with specific people who they feel are not "on their side", talking about people's personal business and private email content in public, outright lying, completely ignoring and disregarding any topics about safety concerns, picking imaginary fights,  twisting peoples words around and then arguing about them, pretending they didn't say something or editing their post when plenty of people have taken screenshots anyway,  making threats then acting all sweet and innocent "can't we all just get along" when those people are not doing anything genuine to foster getting along, criticizing professionals real and genuine safety concerns, victim blaming, and continuously making posts about "but but... it's not me! but but... I feel like I'm being attacked" when people are sharing their concerns that have nothing to do with that person, but they continue to insist it's a personal attack and even go so far as to blame others for "making them feel… a certain way" or bringing up their own personal feelings about deceased mothers and how people are "attacking them at this sensitive time on Mother's Day weekend". Maybe have some respect for the women who are here, some of us who are actually mothers.  It's all going so far off track that it's become nonsensical. 

 I have shown a lot of these posts I referenced above to friends and family members that are not a part of this community and they shake their head in total disbelief and even laugh at the absurdity of all the outlandish behavior. Credibility of the concept of professional cuddling, in their opinion, is in the toilet because of these other people's behaviors in public. 

 Please let's remember to act like adults. Everyone needs to follow the rules, and if they don't, there should be action taken. The last 24 hours there has been a tremendous increase in nonsense on the forms instead of a major decrease (THE original point of establishing rules and boundaries). Clearly there are two people in particular who must honestly believe the rules do not apply to them and it's making a hostile environment for other people who are trying to actually share concerns and move forward instead of playing the "not me" game. 

 Sharing a difference of opinion is fine but the rules state that it needs to be done respectfully. The lack of respect has been on a steady decline for a while now but a tremendous decline in the last 24 hours is being witnessed by many who just kind of have their jaw on the floor in disbelief at this point.  

 If this was a playground full of school children we would have two kids in the principals office and most likely been expelled for multiple and ongoing rule infractions, harassment and bullying.  And one or two of their buddies in afterschool detention.  And that was a direct quote from a friend of mine who is a teacher and likened this behavior of two people in particular to her elementary school students.  When other people from the outside are seeing it that way, imagine what new people who are very interested in the concept of platonic cuddling are going to think and feel when they get here and read this sh!t storm of immaturity. 

Just stop. Hit the reset button. Take a deep breath or a day off. Respect that it actually *IS* Mother's Day weekend for some of us and come back with behavior that would actually make your mothers proud. THEN,  after several days or weeks of changed behavior and respect for this community by everyone, maybe those "olive branches" would be taken seriously instead of being seen as poking sticks. 

Morpheus

@Snuggle554321 a cuddler being able to reply to the karma isn't sufficient. The person who was left the negative karma should have every right to post negative karma on the other persons profile. It's only fair.

Morpheus

Fixing the boards is easy, quite simply, be nice. 

One would think... we are waiting. 

Morpheus

Today is a great day for everyone to start 

@FireAndBlue That was a lot of concerns you raised--but you are not wrong! I myself have sent screenshots to the Power that Be that should have gotten a member banned immediately, but alas No.

@docgatorb By the way, now that you're Sheriff, so to speak, may I send You the aforementioned screenshots of a member slandering a pro cuddler to me via messaging and will you take the needed action? The person he referenced blatantly denies doing what she is being accused of, and who knows how many others this member has spread lies about or to how many he has spread the lies? Please be aware that even if a client is a regular on CC, the REAL cost of keeping him on could be an overall decline in business because of this sort of behavior.