Menz Update - Canada Day Happiness

[Marko]

Still a few days early, but Canada day marks the 1 year anniversary of Menz.Life launching. This began with Altay and I joking around on Perb private messages to start our own Gentlemen's club - and leave these pink ponys to their feminist pastures.  A PHP forum is a 30 year old technology, not hard to setup, and still very useful - I thought to myself. So here we are after 1 year.

Menz has grown fast! Honestly, I am amazed because we do nothing at all to promote it. This month, we broke all-time records again with over 600 visitors in a single day and 5,500 visitors in June. We've gone from just two people a month to nearly six thousand a month—without a single site linking to us. Not one. And we haven't spent even $1 on advertising. We didn't even register with Google until six months ago. How does it keep growing?

Additionally, the traffic is very localized to Vancouver. None of the other forums on Menz—such as Toronto or Calgary—are active. I think this is because the Perb moderators went overboard, acting outside of a moderators usual behavior. Probably Terb and Merb have moderators who are more level-headed. Perb's moderators went trigger-happy, banning hundreds of users—including long-time members—for absurd and trivial reasons. Initially, Perb felt threatened by Menz—they even went as far as banning users who signed up at Menz with the same username! Most users on Menz are former Perb users who migrated over. I think this is a big reason why Menz has grown so quickly— because it’s a migration from an existing platform.

Launching a website and achieving network effects is very challenging, but Menz has done it! There is a lot of potential for growth in the next year. I originally wanted to create an alternative to Leolist and Tryst— the forum was just a quick second thought to get something up. But the forum quickly became the main feature users wanted. There is a significant void in Vancouver because Perb is not what it claims to be. It’s not a review board—as it turns out, it’s an advertising board. Accurate reviews are hard to find on Perb, which is why people are turning here now.

For now, I am okay with Menz existing as an alternative to Perb. However, we do need to find a solution to the moderation. Being a moderator requires immersing myself in the world of escorts every day. There’s no option to take a break—it's hookers 24/7 for an entire year straight. I’d like to be able to take a week or two off from interacting with escorts. Soon I will delegate moderation powers to trusted users. It might not work, but we’ll give it a try. Sorry I haven’t been able to update the site lately—I will do so soon.

I also plan to make the top banner a rotating banner, linking to various sites. However, I’m not sure who we should link to. Any suggestions? I want to keep things as clean and simple as possible. I hate how cluttered and ugly Perb is, and I refuse to link to porn sites.

Please respond on this thread with any suggestions or feedback on how to improve Menz.

[Peyto]

Congrats to Menz life for its 1 yr anniversary. Curious though. Out of all visitors Menz gets. How many of those are bots? Are you able to identify this? I know PERB gets a huge load of bot registries.

[Marko]

Congrats to Menz life for its 1 yr anniversary. Curious though. Out of all visitors Menz gets. How many of those are bots? Are you able to identify this? I know PERB gets a huge load of bot registries.

Most bots will identity themselves as bots. You can see the search engine bots when they search the forum, they will appear as Google, Bing, etc. 

So far we have avoided most malicious bots. Once in a while we will get spammers , but its very rare. 

This is not the first PHP forum I've run. In the past it use to be really, really bad for bot signups. Nowadays its majorly better. I'm not sure why. I guess better detection measures nowadays.

[Peyto]

So the member base shown is more " human " legit. Always curious about that. Perb shows close to 200k members but how many of those are bots and very inactive members.

[Marko]

So the member base shown is more "  human " legit. Always curious about that. Perb shows close to 200k members but how many of those are bots and very inactive members.

Yes defiantly. Those Perb stats are laughable and absurd.  

Anyways I looked it up and we had 46 bots crawl the site in June.

[razzar1234]

If perb continues on its current path, this site will eventually rival or surpass it. People will eventually get tired of the corruption and whiteknighting that goes on all the time.

[OF_Manager]

This might be asking a lot of you, but I wonder if it would be more effective to create a Leolist and Tryst alternative entirely separate from Menz, with no affiliation. Then, once it gains enough traction, you could consider merging the two.

[Marko]

This might be asking a lot of you, but I wonder if it would be more effective to create a Leolist and Tryst alternative entirely separate from Menz, with no affiliation. Then, once it gains enough traction, you could consider merging the two.

It always comes down to time and money. Yes it would be more effective to build a listings section entirely from scratch - rather than what I tried - to modify an existing open source platform (mybb). But ...

If I was to build my own PHP forum from scratch, it would take me years to complete! MyBB was initially developed by a team of programmers over several years. Over the years, hundreds of volunteers and community members have contributed through code and support. There is no way to match that as a single individual.

[MissHunter]

(edit adastr@ - MenZ is a gentlemen club and we dont care what you think. We don't want your opinions. )

[Marko]

(edit adastr@ - MenZ is a gentlemen club and we dont care what you think. We don't want your opinions. )

Hunter I like you. But you refuse to follow the rules here so you are banned for a week.

[Peyto]

When you click who's online It shows "rating thread" What does that indicate?

And a suggestion. Is there a way to disallow guests from viewing the forum and have them sign up a be a legit member?

[lotlizard]

(edit adastr@ - MenZ is a gentlemen club and we dont care what you think. We don't want your opinions. )

Hunter I like you. But you refuse to follow the rules here so you are banned for a week.

I like her too. But sometimes she doesn’t know when to shut the fuck up. Or just doesn’t care lol

[Marko]

Sometimes I get random emails from anonymous SPs - so thought I'd share yesterday's...

I am writing as a concerned observer who has followed the discussions on your forum for some time.

It has become increasingly clear that certain patterns such as multiple usernames, repeated false accusations, and targeted defamation appear to be part of a coordinated effort to discredit several independent providers in the region. To an outside eye, this no longer looks like open community dialogue. It resembles an intentional strategy meant to manipulate and divide.

Where? Who? I will investigate if you point it out. Menz has very small members list. Menz does not have a problem with fake accounts yet. 

I have come to suspect that the administrator of the forum may also be the owner of an escort agency using this space to quietly promote their own interests by undermining others. If this is the case, I gently invite you to reflect.

We talked about turning Menz into an agency in the past.  But that would defeat the purpose of having non-bias review forums. As it stands now there is no affiliation with any agency.

Using a public platform to harm others or control narratives does not lead to anything meaningful. It may bring temporary power or financial gain, but never true peace of mind. There is no real success in destruction.

Menz isn't trying to hurt others - the purpose is to help clients make informed decisions. There is no financial gain, Menz is losing money! As far as power or controlling the narratives, Perb does this - and that's why Menz exist, to counter this.

True happiness comes only from compassion. Hurting others will never heal your own pain and sadness. If you truly wish to feel blissful and at peace, I invite you to change your behavior. The best shortcut to happiness is to be kind to others. You deserve to feel better than this. I invite you to start practicing kindness, for the sake of your own mental health. You might be surprised by how good it feels, and how much lighter it is than holding on to hate for everything and everyone.

A fellow human

Be nice. I agree.

---

When you click who's online It shows "rating thread" What does that indicate?

And a suggestion. Is there a way to disallow guests from viewing the forum and have them sign up a be a legit member?

I'm not exactly sure why it displays as 'rating thread', because guests cant rate threads. I think its just because it loads the 'rating' plugin with every view.

If we make every forum private then search engines can't index the site.

[OF_Manager]

Sometimes I get random emails from anonymous SPs - so thought I'd share yesterday's...

I am writing as a concerned observer who has followed the discussions on your forum for some time.

It has become increasingly clear that certain patterns such as multiple usernames, repeated false accusations, and targeted defamation appear to be part of a coordinated effort to discredit several independent providers in the region. To an outside eye, this no longer looks like open community dialogue. It resembles an intentional strategy meant to manipulate and divide.

Where? Who? I will investigate if you point it out. Menz has very small members list. Menz does not have a problem with fake accounts yet. 

I have come to suspect that the administrator of the forum may also be the owner of an escort agency using this space to quietly promote their own interests by undermining others. If this is the case, I gently invite you to reflect.

We talked about turning Menz into an agency in the past.  But that would defeat the purpose of having non-bias review forums. As it stands now there is no affiliation with any agency.

Using a public platform to harm others or control narratives does not lead to anything meaningful. It may bring temporary power or financial gain, but never true peace of mind. There is no real success in destruction.

Menz isn't trying to hurt others - the purpose is to help clients make informed decisions. There is no financial gain, Menz is losing money! As far as power or controlling the narratives, Perb does this - and that's why Menz exist, to counter this.

True happiness comes only from compassion. Hurting others will never heal your own pain and sadness. If you truly wish to feel blissful and at peace, I invite you to change your behavior. The best shortcut to happiness is to be kind to others. You deserve to feel better than this. I invite you to start practicing kindness, for the sake of your own mental health. You might be surprised by how good it feels, and how much lighter it is than holding on to hate for everything and everyone.

A fellow human

Be nice. I agree.

---

When you click who's online It shows "rating thread" What does that indicate?

And a suggestion. Is there a way to disallow guests from viewing the forum and have them sign up a be a legit member?

I'm not exactly sure why it displays as 'rating thread', because guests cant rate threads. I think its just because it loads the 'rating' plugin with every view.

If we make every forum private then search engines can't index the site.

It's unfortunate how these escorts consistently demonstrate signs of paranoia, delusion, and mental health struggles.

They also love the word "defamation"

[yaletownfuckboi]

When you click who's online It shows "rating thread" What does that indicate?

And a suggestion. Is there a way to disallow guests from viewing the forum and have them sign up a be a legit member?

I think a major advantage Menz has over Perb is that you can view reviews without needing to log in.

I dont sign in every time I look at this site, especially if i'm quickly looking for reviews.

[Marko]

It's unfortunate how these escorts consistently demonstrate signs of paranoia, delusion, and mental health struggles.
They also love the word "defamation"

True, they love the word 'defamation'. I think many escorts have no family, they have no support system, or estranged from family. So a lot adopt a victim-hood mentality where they see themselves as victims and men as preying on the abused.

[Silverfox]

It's unfortunate how these escorts consistently demonstrate signs of paranoia, delusion, and mental health struggles.
They also love the word "defamation"

True, they love the word 'defamation'. I think many escorts have no family, they have no support system, or estranged from family. So a lot adopt a victim-hood mentality where they see themselves as victims and men as preying on the abused.

The thing is, defamation lawsuits are among the most difficult cases to win, and they tend to be some of the most expensive to pursue.

So, when escorts casually throw around that word, it often comes across as an empty threat and makes them seem poorly educated and immature.

[Marko]

Menz has grown fast! 600 visitors in a single day 

We had another influx in traffic the last couple days, yesterday there was 2,083 visitors in a day, more than double the previous record. 

In the last 4 days 4300 hits from Google search. I think because the site is now 1 year old the algorithm doubled its results for Menz. 

If you are a guest, you should sign up,  you are missing out on a lot of members only threads.

[Marko]

Menz has grown fast! 600 visitors in a single day 

We had another influx in traffic the last couple days, yesterday there was 2,083 visitors in a day, more than double the previous record. 

In the last 4 days 4300 hits from Google search. I think because the site is now 1 year old the algorithm doubled its results for Menz. 

If you are a guest, you should sign up,  you are missing out on a lot of members only threads.

Google has tripled the traffic to this site in the last 6 days. Yesterday most online users 252 was broke.

Sorry guys I just find it very fascinating and funny how all the SPs complain about how horrible Menz - how it will never grow - meanwhile.....