There is something very annoying about dating sites: If they eventually succeed in gathering enough participants to become really useful, they start charging money. What happens then is that some decide to pay, and others move to the next site, which is free until it becomes the next one to start charging for its services. And so on.
Aside from the obvious inconvenience, I sincerely think that this is bad education for the masses. For quite some people, a dating site is the first time they seriously use the internet for personal purposes. Internet rookies think that it's legitimate to charge rather high fees for a service, which costs almost nothing to supply (I mean, if we're talking about a very small site with 10,000 participants, wouldn't a shekel per year be enough to cover the bills?).
Which is why I'm thinking about setting up a site of my own. One that will remain free or perish. And if I'm ready to spend the effort it takes to set it up, I'm also ready to spend some shekels to get it hosted, at least for the first year.
But as I know myself and my lifestyle, this will never happen if it's me alone on this. I will gladly handle all the scripting, databasing and other technical goodies (this is the fun part, isn't it?), but I'd love to get some help with all the rest.
Meaning:
* Write the texts ("Hello and welcome to our site...")
* Write prototype HTML with the different pages (tables, forms etc)
* Do nice graphics
* Getting a second opinion ("I would never fill that form!")I had a compact team of myself + two other participants in mind. If you want to volunteer, or know someone who can contribute, please e-mail me privately. And then we'll see if something comes out of this.
And no, I don't think this is off-topic. I think that a free dating site is an excellent place to advocate free software.
Regards, Eli
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