TampaYankee

Several Firefox users have reported problems regarding the inability to login to the forum and post. We also have two Explorer users reporting the same difficulity. The issue stems from our desire to have a single login for access to all free site content and to post access in the forums. DCForum+ is a stand-alone package with its own login procedure that is intended to run independently of any other software. It could be considered a 'separate site'. Our single login design requires that 'we' perform invasive surgery on DCForum+, deactivate or 'go-around' some of its functions without loosing or clobbering other functions. In general, how well or easily this can be done depends on how well the 'nerves' can be seen, traced from their origin and then clipped off or joined to a sympathetic nerve in the site software. In software terms, how well the code is layed out by function and how easily it can be traced and interfaced to external code. After a long bout of initial surgery on the patient, several returns to the 'OR' have been made to perfect the result. To date the result has fallen short of the goal with only partial success, and for some that is intermittent. Our engineers have been pursuing doggedly the problem. From the noises coming out of the shop in the back, it seems that this software is not the most tech-support friendly. I choose to understate the tech support mood. I won't relate the comments, but it suffices to say that the language is fit for neither women nor children, nor men of mild manner. There is no sign of a postive prognosis at this time. Thus hard decisions have to be made. We only have three options it seems: 1. Stay the course. This is unacceptable because it excludes members of the community from active participation in the forum. 2. Run up the white flag of surrender. Fall back to a dual login procedure -- one for the site and one for the forums. Cumbersome, but it preserves the benefits of the DCForum+ software, namely threaded topic messages and an clean well organized easy-to-read layout IMO. 3. Search out new directions. Replace DCForum+ with alternative software that achieves the desired goal of a single login procedure. Earlier forays didn't show a wealth of altenative threaded-forum software packages. Linear forum software makes up the vast majority of what is out there, and some pretty nice stuff is available. However, unless users take adequate care in their posts to identify who they are addressing, linear message board architecture can make it difficult to determine who is responding to whom. It can be likened to reading a transcript of a conversation among multiple parties in a room, a format devoid the benefits of different vocal patterns and tones to distinguish the particpants remarks. Our strong preference is for threaded forum software that associates those having an exchange in the room. However, we have to deal with the terrain as we find it. Access to all members takes priority over the exact layout, and sadly the ease of readability, of the forums. We are evaluating alternatives to DCForum+ -- threaded and linear architectures. Concurrent with this evaluation we continue to pursue a fix to our current single-login process. Hopefully a breakthrough can be made but we are not placing all of the eggs in that basket. Short of that success, which seems unlikely at this point, we are left with Options 2 and 3. It is our impression that most members dislike a dual login procedure. Thus we are leaning to Option 3. Given the availability of alternatives, the probability favors the linear architecture message board. That is not our preference but it is the reality. Please feel free to offer comments and suggestions or recommendations for candidate message board software. We apologize to those who have been locked out and we are taking steps to rectify the situation. Thank you for your patience. The Management

We have determined that AOL is rejecting an inordinate amount of our emails at their gateway. The error message states in essence that at least one URL in our email is objectionable. We have been on the phone with the AOL postmaster. They have reviewed our email and determined that there is nothing that should have activated this filter. They are investigating on their end and are supposed to get back to us. So we wait. We are investigating gay.com and hotmail. A few samples for gay.com indicates that the same gateway filtering may be active. We are enlarging our test sample to obtain definitive results. If any gay.com members are experiencing problems please let us know. We have seen very little hotmail data but they have a reputation for similar filtering. We need more information before we can draw any conclusions for this site. If any hotmail members are experiencing difficulty please contact us. Except for the occasional Bulk Folder exile, Yahoo does not seem to be an issue with respect to gatway filterng, as far as we know. If anyone is having problems other than Bulk exile please let us know. For exiled email please select the email and mark "This Is Not Spam'. And keep an eye on the Bulk folder just the same.

>I don't understand the dual login need... >When registering why not make this a one step process? That is the way it is supposed to work. We have put a lot of effort into integrating the forum software into the site to enable a single login for the site and forum. Unfortunately, dcscripts software has proven a dragon not so easily conquered. While the integrated software works as intended for many, it seems to fail for some. Most of these failures seem to be associated with Firefox, but not all. That 'but not all' makes it even more exasperating. We continue to retrace the spliced nerve endings to find the dangling ganglia. We appreciate everyone's patience and we realize this prolblem cannot be tolerated forever.

Birthing a website is similar to birthing a baby or colt, it seems. While I haven’t had the fortune to give birth to the animate, praise the gods, I am learning about birthing an interactive website. As in natural birth, Labor can be fast or not so fast, excruciatingly painful and frustrating or not so much. This Labor, my first in the online area with remote participants and servers, has impressed me as not of the fast-and-not-so-painful type. We are talking a nine pound baby birthed by a 90 pound mother, I think. We have had our share of startup issues – some biggies and some not so. The biggies: Site Performance: Caused by some unbounded loops in the code. That always makes for a self-absorbed system with no time for external requests, no matter how hot the hunk making the request. We are hopeful that all such pesky bugs have been laid to rest. Unreliable Email Performance: Cause still unknown at present but with the extermination of the loopy bugs, our efforts have been concentrated on this major issue. The site is heavily dependent on email for so many reasons. Until this problem is resolved we recommend the use of maleescortreview@gmail.com for email contact. Firefox Compatibility: We have observed and we have received a number of complaints associated with this browser. Personally, this browser had me locked out of the forums as a poster over a week. We have people working on the compatibility issue. In the interim we recommend use of Explorer. Safari for Mac Users seems problem free as well. The not-so-biggies… there have been some nuisance bugs that have thwarted users and admin alike. For example, the text entry box on the Contact Us page doesn’t suffer special characters well, spaces and periods excluded. The error message fails to shed much light on the nature of the error other than the system is unhappy. We are working on that shortcoming. Other shortcomings in design or implementation have been discovered and fixed or are in the process, or are scheduled on a priority basis. We apologize to all for the inconvenience and frustration. We, as admins, have shared in that frustration as well. Hopefully, we will get the remaining two biggies resolved in the next few days. Until then we will endeavor to use workarounds to add escort profiles and to process reviews. Clearly we are still in Labor but we are breathing well, as per the recommended exercises, and we continue to push. Hopefully it will go very fast after the shoulders emerge completely. Thank you for your patience and understanding. We hope it will be rewarded by an end product of excellent quality. The MER Management

We have decided to forego a politics forum for a few reasons. First other 'politics sites' seem to provide a much richer environment for political discussion. Second, political forums on other escort sites seem to have a record of low participation. Third, politics and religion seem to foster short tempers, rancor, and personal attacks incongruous with the Site Mission and the lighter atmosphere associated with that mission. After all, we are about fun and pleasure. We recognize that current events can affect us in our daily lives and knowledge of those current events are of interest to members. Thus we allow that imformation about current events is properly posted in The Pub for all to see. With a little self discipline, current events and political discussion can be separated much like the front page and op-ed page of a newspaper. So, please post the news here and explore opinion differences on sites that are better attended for political discussion.

Upon a follow-up reading of my post above I wanted to make a clarification to keep the record accruate. I stated that escort profiles would contain one large photo in addition to the other small photos. As presently planned that is incorrect. The guaranteed one large photo will appear in the reviews only. If escorts submit quality photos to us then we feel that the smaller photos should provide a sufficient basis for readers to make contact decisions. I apologize for my unintentional misstatement and for the delay in correcting it. However, as I mentioned elsewhere, I have been effectively locked out of posting due to a Firefox browser issue.

Thanks for the warm wishes from all you guys. Very much appreciated. We still have glitches to work out with what we have so far. After that, we have improvements scheduled for existing capability -- streamlining page navigation to mention one. Improved escort listing capability for another. We hope to make this a welcoming environment for the exchange of information. Clients and escorts are most welcome. We will strive to be even handed to both communities, after all, each community is dependent on the other and benefits the other. In addtion we have more serivces planned for the very near future. Some important ones will be gratis, like chat and IMs. For those that want more there will be that too in the premium service area. Again, thanks for all of your well-wishes. We hope to justify your enthusiasm.

A belated welcome to you, Barry. I am so happy to see such good 'old friends' move to town, even if on a shared-time basis. The opportunity to work with them is icing on the cake. I look forward to the benefit of sage advice from a steady experienced hand. A most warm welcome.

Straycat, Sorry for the glitch. It has effectively locked me out of posting since my Five Questions post. It has been very frustrating for me so I definitely can sympathize with you. BG, thanks for throwing some additional light on this issue. It is likely to benefit many others while we get the bumbs smoothed out around here. Frankly I am exstatic that I am now a recognized poster in the community. LOL. Now I can catch up on my posts. Now if only we can get a few other techical glitches solved... TY

I received an email from a respected online friend posing five questions, some earnest and some as devil’s advocate. He thought that many might be interested in the answers. [em]1) More and more sites: Today, there seem to be more and more of them. I don't know how much time others have, but I have a finite amount of time for this kind of stuff.[/em] Time management is an issue for all of us these days. And there are more and more media and entertainment outlets becoming available daily. There is tremendous competition for our time and attention. It is up to us to select what we tune in to. There will always be demand for another really good read or movie if it is truly that. Else the society has become stagnant. Nothing left to be discovered? No new music to enjoy? No new opinions to read? No new movies to see? No new Andrew Lloyd Weber musical? Too many choices – the curse of the information age. [em]2) Pay site: I notice that, come July, it will be about $10 per month for a reasonable membership. [/em] Umm… just to be precise I believe it is slated at $7.95, but let’s not quibble. [em]At that time, there will be two issues in front of you: (a) Why pay for what I can get for free everyplace else? [/em] Good question. I certainly wouldn’t. I’m not aware that we are charging for “what is free everyplace else”. If so then I expect business will be slow. • We offer free reviews now and after July 1. • We offer free escort profiles to the escorts now and after July 1 • We offer free browsing of escort profiles to all now and after July 1. • We offer free escort contact information from the reviews and profiles for all, now and after July 1. • We offer free read access to the forums, and free post access to virtually all free members now and after July 1. • We soon will offer free chat to members when it comes online and after July 1. Eventually ‘photo enlargement’ and ‘advanced search’ will need a Silver subscription membership. There are other perks too. Without that subscription, each review (with a photo) and each profile will have one larger photo. While not as nice as all enlarged photos, we anticipate that the quality of the smaller photos taken with the larger photo will offer sufficient information to help a member make a decision regarding contact. Gold membership will offer video feeds and adult galleries in addition to other perks, for those that are interested. I am unaware of the availability of this fare for free anywhere else and certainly not everywhere else. [em]( Why expose my personal details to a site that, ultimately, deals with illegal activities. If the site is raided, do I really want to have my personal information available for the authorities?[/em] Good question. We do not participate in any illegal activities and have no intention of doing so. We provide information exchange and for escorts free advertising, just as many other escort related sites. We accept no money for either. Escorting is not an illegal activity in any jurisdiction that I am aware of. The exchange of money for sex is illegal in many jurisdictions, particularly in the States. We certainly do not offer that service nor do we permit advertising the exchange of money for sex. We only permit escort advertising on a rate-time basis. What consenting adults do in privacy is their business and subject to the laws of their community. This site is owned by and operated under the auspices of a foreign corporation. That provides no shield for illegal activity nor should it. However, it does provide that a zealous DOJ or other governmental authority must make a convincing legitimate case to a soverign nation why one of its corporations should be subject to a search and seizure order. [em]3) Site Anonymity: Who's behind the site? HB never revealed his identity to M4M's audience, but he was consistently known as HB and outspoken at times, especially at the beginning. The new site feels to me like it's being run by a person or a group of people who are operating clandestinely. There's no mention of who's involved, who owns it, who started it, who's running it, or anything like that.[/em] HB was as anonymous as anyone I have ever seen online. The fact that one got a feel for him over time doesn't seem to me to preclude the option for others to be afforded the same 'getting-to-be-known' curve. Sites and online reps are made by what they offer and what they do. That his how HB did it and he did it a day at a time. Everyone should have a chance to establish a track record without being judged up front for not starting with an open curriculum vitae. HB would never have passed that test. [em]So why all the anonymity? [/em] I suspect for the same reason that HooBoy chose – Privacy. Over the years I have put a lot out about myself, never suspecting I would find myself in this role. There is a second reason. I wanted a site to attend that I actually enjoyed, where I laughed and shared information with interesting people. I couldn't find that site to meet my needs anywhere else so I thought I'd try to help create one. A bit of a ‘stop complaining and get off you ass and do something about it’ streak when the opportunity presented itself. However, and a BIG HOWEVER… As part of site management I will have to participate in the maintenance of site discipline. I don’t think personality and discipline make comfortable partners. IMO that fact contributed to problems at other sites. IMO HB discovered that too and gave way, choosing to withdraw from MC posting almost entirely for a couple of years. The more popular moderators were the ones who posted infrequently and then little. It seems discipline is best meted out by dispassionate gray authority. It generates less personal resentment. I wanted to participate on a day-to-day basis as a regular member giving opinions and comments that are not intended to be viewed as site policy. Those opinions, in fact, may not be as site policy is consensus based. But that is how everything I post will be interpreted. I'm sure everyone wanted to know who is behind the curtain. Maybe it is best to be out but it is likely to be the end of my post participation, if not now then probably not too far down the road. Those that forget history are condemned to repeat. The lesson wasn’t lost on me but there is demand that suspicions and fears be allayed or confirmed, depending on your view point. [em]If it's being started or run by disgruntled former M4M-er's, why not make that clear?[/em] If that was the case I think it would have been starkly apparent as demonstrated by a few other sites. Disgruntled people rarely hide their ‘disgruntle’. It takes the fun out of the condition it seems. I am not a disgruntled former M4M-er, just a bored disinterested one. Maybe it is my shortcoming as some may see it, but a condition I have to live with nevertheless. [em]4) Why another site? Why do people want another site? Why not simply support M4M? If there are good reasons, then why not state them for all to hear and evaluate. [/em] I don’t feel that I need to publicly justify my effort to make a better mouse trap even if I fail to succeed at it. Are there sacred cows for which no one may comtemplate an alternative? Sites live and die on what they offer their constituents and how well they do it, -- even religions do. This site is not immune to that fact. I also don’t feel that I have to trash another site or its adminstration to start an alternative. I have no desire to do that and I won’t. Over time, M4M drifted away from my needs and interests or I drifted away from what it offered and the environment it was offered in. I made suggestions and comments about site content and operations over the long term. I recognized constraints on the resources and latitude of the operators. I was patient I believe. The music grew fainter with time until eventually it just died. It is neither a catastrophe for M4M nor for me – life goes on. [em]M4M has been a great community resource for years. If a new site wants us to take part in it -- and presumably, then, take a lesser part in M4M -- why should we do that? [/em] It was and still is a great resource IMO. It has a great history that I am proud to have participated in more than a little. It is not for me to tell anyone why they should look beyond their nose or scan a new product on the shelf at the pharmacy or grocery store. However, if they choose not to then they forgo any chance of improvement in their lives and services unless someone lays it in their lap. [em]If the new site is being started by people who are pissed off at Daddy, why not say that? [/em] It didn’t occur to me because I am not pissed off at Daddy -- plain and simple. [em]In other words, other than having a nice design and the same software -- meaning it's easy for M4M-ers to use -- why should people start to support a new site, especially one that is going to become a pay site in six months?[/em] Asked and answered. [em]5) Kill M4M? [/em] I have no goal to kill M4M. It is the 500 pound gorilla. It will live or die on its own. I suspect it will survive in some form after the long legal ordeal concludes – maybe for the better, maybe not. I can’t read the tea leaves on that. What I don’t understand is the demand that I need to justify why I want to put in sweat equity to build and offer a site that I hope is fun interesting and hopefully serves a community interest and yes, provides me some modest supplemental income. Frankly, I was not dependent on this opportunity to supplant my income. I had other options available but they didn’t stir my passion or offer what I felt to be the potential community contributions of this site. If successful it would have required less work and generated more income because I wouldn’t have to share the proceeds. [em]I'm all for competition and hope that it will spur M4M to new things. Is it your intention or the intention of those you are working with to ultimately see M4M go down the drain? [/em] Asked and answered. [em]If yes, what are the reasons we should support that (as opposed to simply supporting the development of a new site).[/em] I thought we were developing a new site. I still think we are. I hope this allays some of the curiosity even if not all of the fear. Your Admins: TampaYankee/Totally Oz

KYTOP, They actually let you in on the aniversary of the BIG WAVE? Your reputation clearly did not precede you!! Just kidding. Looks like you had a great time. I am envious... ;( Thanks for the update. It inspires me to work on a trip. :9