Talk:Match.com

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

clean this up

What specifically is not clean?--158.234.250.71 15:03, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

59.162.218.236 13:39, 12 June 2007 (UTC) This article seems pretty sparse, considering its "the worlds largest online dating site". I was wondering if anyone was willing to put in a section dealing with criticisms of the service. For a lot of people, Wikipedia is their first stop when it comes to researching something on the internet, and while I don't know if thats the best policy, its certainly the way things seem to be. Davepetr 02:07, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] Allegations removed

I removed the section below. It's way too POV and the sources are not reliable. It could probably be cleaned up, condensed, and readded in some form consistent with our guidelines and policies but it requires a significant amount of work.

[edit] Deceptive billing and general business practices, serious security breaches, poor customer service

Match.com is notorious for its security breaches and scandalous billing practices. Several different consumer-protection websites have listed hundreds of complaints from former Match.com members. In particular, ConsumerAffairs.com (http://www.consumeraffairs.com/dating_services/match.html ) has an extensive list of unhappy customers who were fraudulently charged fees by Match.com. For example, Match.com has a "California no-refund policy," which allows them to charge a person's account without offering them a refund within a certain period of time. What's worse, Match.com also uses a highly deceptive billing practice of "automatic credit card billing," by which Match.com automatically withdraws funds from the accounts of all members each month unless a member cancels their membership. Current and former match.com members complain that the company often ignores customer's requests to cancel a membership, even the "Free 3-Day Membership," and continues billing the customer indefinitely until the customer cancels the credit card or requests the credit-card company to intervene.[1][2][3][4]

Match.com's latest security breaches involve hackers obtaining a member's login name and password, then using those two important data to access a member's account. Some members have recently reported that these security breaches have resulted in fraudulent emails being sent out to Match.com members, using an unsuspecting member's account. Some emails contained extremely offensive and vulgar language, which was quite damaging to all parties. [5][6][7][8] [9]On many occasions, Match.com has handled consumer complaints by summarily terminating the accounts of those members who have filed complaints with Match.com, and refusing to refund any membership fees.[10][11]

As if these serious problems weren't enough, a former Match.com employee provided this unique insight to the highly deceptive business practices of Match.com, which may turn out to be illegal: "There are over 12 million actual users on MATCH, but you as a subscriber are never going to see more than about 200 of them, even if you actually had 1000's of matches, because of the way their system is coded for hashing thru the potential matches based on your profile info . . . THEY JUST DON'T CARE. I do believe that it's just a matter of time before this corporations bogus practices will be their downfall. They are destined to be the next big corporate scandal headline."[12]

As of 08 September, 2007, repeated attempts to contact Match.com executives to resolve these issues have failed. Interestingly, on 12 June 2007, True.com was sued in Texas, alleging the very same deceptive and, perhaps, illegal billing and business practices that Match.com is currently engaged in.[13]

  1. ^ http://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/0/129/ripoff0129498.htm
  2. ^ http://www.theinternetpatrol.com/matchcom-responds-to-matchcom-lawsuit
  3. ^ http://www.bikermatchmaking.com/Internet_Dating_Stories/Match.com_Consumer_Complaints.htm
  4. ^ http://www.onlinedatingmagazine.com/readerreviews/match/match-com-review-04.html
  5. ^ http://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/0/129/ripoff0129498.htm
  6. ^ http://www.consumeraffairs.com/dating_services/match.html
  7. ^ http://www.theinternetpatrol.com/matchcom-responds-to-matchcom-lawsuit
  8. ^ http://www.bikermatchmaking.com/Internet_Dating_Stories/Match.com_Consumer_Complaints.htm
  9. ^ http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/08/AR2005100800199.html
  10. ^ http://www.bikermatchmaking.com/Internet_Dating_Stories/Match.com_Consumer_Complaints.htm
  11. ^ http://www.complaints.com
  12. ^ http://www.bikermatchmaking.com/Internet_Dating_Stories/Match.com_Consumer_Complaints.htm
  13. ^ http://www.onlinedatingmagazine.com/news2007/lawsuitagainsttrue.html

Is this notable?

In early 2005, the Match.com International division of Match.com invested £3m in a United Kingdom offline marketing campaign.

I have removed the entire "criticism" section. I'm sure that people have criticized the site and these criticisms should be discussed, but this section is written in an overly chatty style that sounds like the complaints of one person who's upset at Match.com. Some POV is not cited (e.g. that "Match.com is notorious for censorship...") Most citations supporting facts appear to link to some blog recounting one person's experience, so they give undue weight to essentially one person's opinion. For example, the citation in the Pictures section ([1]) reads like a rant. The text "There is significant evidence (in the form of complaints)" sounds like an admission that there is no such evidence beyond the allegations themselves. Zashaw (talk) 01:53, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Criticism

[edit] Censorship

Match.com is notorious for censorship of pictures and profile pages. This censorship is defended by Match.com as a method for maintaining a respectable website. In order to become a member of Match.com, you must agree to the Terms of Use. These terms grant Match.com not only the right to display your content, but also to delete and modify this information prior to publishing it. In the event that Match.com modifies your content, they do not require your permission to publish it.

According to the Terms of Use, this censorship is designed to prevent "defamatory, inaccurate, abusive, obscene, profane, offensive, sexually oriented, threatening, harassing, racially offensive, or illegal material"[1]

[edit] Pictures

In addition to censoring images that fall under the above categories as defined by the Terms of Use, Match.com also censors images that are not offensive in any way. Photos where someone's face is mildly unidentifiable are unaccepted by Match.com. Images are as such when someone is wearing sunglasses or a hat.[2]

[edit] Profiles

Profiles, similar to pictures, must be approved by Match.com before they are made public. This approval process can take up to 72 hours. After this process, many words and phases are automatically censored from the profile, despite their context. Because of this, many users' profiles aren't accepted--even after several attempts to correct the issue. This can be frustrating for users who use words like "dirty" in reference to martinis[3] or "petite" to simply describe themselves[4].

[edit] Business Ethics

There is significant evidence (in the form of complaints) that Match.com "baits" expiring customers into re-purchasing their subscription by sending the customer messages from fake, attractive users.[5][6]