ADULT FRIENDFINDER'S GROUPLAND
Regarding Adult FriendFinder (AFF), most comment here understandably tends to focus on its blogs. I want to focus on groups on AFF. Just as blogland has noticeably declined on AFF, groupland has also declined. Though I'm sure there are more, I can only think of a few groups that are active on AFF - HNW Bloggers, Club 7 and, to a lesser extent, Live from AFF come to mind.
Over the last couple of years, many groups are now often used as an extension of a member's blog and/or used by members to submit hook-me-up posts. From where I'm standing, there doesn't seem to be a lot of group discussion going on beyond the 'hook-me-up' and 'wanna-fuck-you' lines.
In my opinion, two events caused the decline of groupland. First was the move to the Community side as part of Andrew Conru's plan to create an adult social media site. Many group posts never made the move over making groups somewhat discombobulated - I love that word!
This technical glitch was compounded by a second event when Jon Buckheit got rid of Andrew Conru. The former clearly didn't share the latter's vision of the relatively new Community side. Under Jon Buckheit, the Community side became an alternative to the site's Dating side. Standard members, mainly men, could use groups, as wells as blogs, as a way of directly communicating with members and, in particular, trying to hook up with women on the site.
Were or are you an active member of any groups on AFF? If so, what groups?
I'm active, though far less so now since being reinstated after my ban, on the HNW Bloggers and Club 7 groups.
Soon after joining AFF 16 years ago, I established the COUPLES UK group. The group was set up many years ago for swinging couples in Britain and other countries. The group soon took off and became quite active. As well as the obligatory sticky post on the group's guidelines (ie, its terms of use), there were also sticky posts inviting new members to introduce themselves and sticky posts on swinging meets, sex clubs and sex parties. None of these sticky posts made it over to the Community side. I didn't chase Site Support as the group had become quite inactive since my swinging partner and I had split up.
Also since the group's migration to the Community side, as a moderator I was unable to control who could join the group. Consequently, many single men joined leaving their customary cockshots and hook-me-up posts on the group.
Though the group is barely active despite having about 1,000 members, it's the fifth most popular group on AFF. That says a lot about how much groupland has declined - an inactive group is a popular group on AFF!
Above is a poster for the hilarious (at least by British farcical standards) Carry on Camping film released in 1969. And below is a scene from the film of Hattie Jacques and Kenneth Williams looking shocked at the shenanigans they witnessed on a camping trip. This scene was and is still used as COUPLES UK's signature photo.
I'm actually in ten different groups, but most of them are inactive. There used to be a blogger "symposium" with a different topic for people to write on each week; a couple of the groups are for that. There was a group called BiblioOrgy that held promise (book recommendations and reviews) but it never amounted to anything. :(
ReplyDeleteI never really spent time in the Groups, even before the Community transition.
I fondly remember the virtual symposium. Unfortunately it died a death. I hope it gets reincarnated though it probably needs a new moderator.
DeleteI was in the symposium, Hnw, live from aff, and club seven. I leaned more into blogging than groups, but prior to blogging I was into the chatrooms. But they slowed down so much it wasn’t worth it.
ReplyDeleteThe Virtual Symposium was brilliant. I can't recall the blogger's name who launched it, he just disappeared as bloggers do. But it was a brilliant idea. It allowed bloggers to write about what they want so long as it was connected to a theme which was never difficult to do.
DeleteI remember my first contribution. The theme was bridges which I took it literally and blogged about my favourite bridges. Most interpreted the theme metaphorically and wrote about their transition from one life to another life. I can be too literal sometimes!
I was a big chatroom person too, between 2005 and 2010 or so. I'm thinking the chatrooms died off because so many people access the site on their phone now. It's not really practical to try to follow a chatroom on a phone screen.
DeleteIt really is a shame - our regional chat would sometimes organize meet and greets at a local pub. One time there was even a huge Halloween party at a hotel. It was nice to be able to meet and chat with people in a low-pressure group setting.
I rarely did/do chatrooms on AFF. I joined one chatroom quite recently, well maybe two months ago, and it wasn't a satisfactory experience. Maybe I'm too shy for chatrooms!
Delete@smarty Yeah, that's around the same time I was involved, and our regional chat would also meet a pub once every other month. It used to be one of the best ways to meet people. Chat in the chatroom, talk them into going to the meetup, and if you didn't get along, there was still fun to be had.
DeleteI met all the people originally in my Coffee Break group in the Japan chat room. Those were the good times
DeleteI used to love the Symposium Group also and was too bad it went to the wayside. I had commented on Club 7 a few times and at one time was in HNW. I also used to be part of the Naughty Community Group but had stopped going there about 2 years ago. I miss the Ontario chat room as it was both busy and active. I do not know if it is now with all the changes though.. I Loved watching the Carry On shows and movies. They were hilarious..
ReplyDeleteThe 'Carry On' films were very funny, though I'm not sure how well they've stood the test of time.
DeleteNeither do I as I have not seen them for decades now..
DeleteComedy soon gets dated.
DeleteI'm the owner/moderator of HNW, Live from AFF, Club 7, and Coffee Break. Coffee Break is inactive now but I used to organize group dinners to share a meal and lots of laughs.
ReplyDeleteThese groups are inactive, too, but I'm also in the Virtual Symposium, Bling Enthusiasts, Inner Sanctum, The Campfire, and Blogger Slogger. The Virtual Symposium was run by Pocogato.
Though the virtual symposium was/is run by pocogato, it was humorlife who started the group but unfortunately he just disappeared so pocogato took over the reins.
DeleteRight. I remember him. He was pretty cool.
DeleteHe was but he just disappeared without trace.
DeleteHis profile is still active and he's still gold. It sux that the site removed dates so we can't see when his last login or activity was.
DeleteI had to retrieve your reply from my spam folder!
Deletehumorlife may have left without turning off his auto-renewal. Unless he's active on the Dating side, he certainly was inactive in blogland.
I forgot it was humorlife that started the symposium and thought he left the site altogether..
DeleteIt has been several years since he quit the Symposium group. Doesn't he check his credit card statement?
DeletePresumably not!
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