Mark Brooks: I used to work for FriendFinder. There are actually some taboo's that their abuse team grooms the site for, but Alt is indeed the most extreme of their communities. Their 'adult' communities(AdultFriendFinder, Alt, OutPersonals) do a good job of helping people match on their not so mainstream sexual preferences. Sexsearch is a newer entrant that is stealing some of AdultFriendFinder's thunder and is approaching 5 million members. This important segment demands not to be ignored. However, I've yet to see these sites mentioned/recognised in the mainstream press. Everyone likes sex, right? Some people have more specific preferences. Generally these more explicit, sexually oriented sites are regarded as 'casual,' but many couples have married after meeting their match on these sites. They are the antithesis of the more altruistic relationship sites. Except for TRUE which recently launched their 'Sexploration' which is a very nice adaptive 'lite' sexual preferences test. I'm a maverick apparently. 'Are you mild or wild?'
The reason these sites are not mentioned in the mainstream press is because ALT.com is, in my opinion, one of the biggest frauds on the Internet.
I know, from personal experience, that their customer service staff lie to subscribers through their teeth. They are unresponsive to their market. The site is often slow or out and out broken. Their technology is antique, poorly written, poorly designed. They upgraded their chat system to use Flash Communication Server (now Flash Media Server). The resulting bastardization results in frequent break-downs.
Their idea of site improvement is to keep re-painting the corpse every few weeks. It is a poorly run site and not one taken seriously by “real” BDSM and alternative communities.
On June 28, 2007, the entire site was inaccessible (for the second time in as many weeks). They anticipated a return to service by 10pm Pacific. No one could log in. The site continues to suffer from glitches.
In short, it is a complete and utter waste of time, energy and money to its customer base. If you like men who dress up like women or old men dressing up in their wives dirty panties to masturbate online, then this site has merit.
As a 5+ year member, they are an untrustworthy, misleading, lie that should be taken down by the US Federal Trade Commission.
Caveat emptor! You won’t find much to distinguish this site.