New to Couch$urfing and you just signed up? And you clicked on the link that says “Continue”? Great! You are now at the page that we call the We-Trap-You-Page or also “Step 2″. This step is to verify that you really are who you say you are. Sounds good, right?
Now you see information about money and how great verification is, and a form that is for you to fill in. “Can I deal with that later maybe?” is probably what you think. But no! You can’t find the next continue button! Help! Where is the “skip this” button? How do I get out of here? I thought C$ was for free?
And what? Oh you live in Denmark? Bad for you, your suggested minimum donation is set to be $69.71 currently. And don’t you even think of paying less than that “recommended” amount because you won’t get through the form!
Ah, you live just across the border in Germany. That’s cool, you then pay $48.37 dollar less ($21.34). That’s 3 times cheaper for 5 kilometer! Hey, didn’t Casey just promise the community: “Just because we’re not a non-profit doesn’t mean we’re actually “for” profit”
Anyway. No worries. If you have no money, you can still become a member. As Casey wrote before, “The CouchSurfing features that you use today will continue to be free”. To help you further, you can apply for free verification through a verification scholarship.
But unfortunately the page doesn’t give you much information, and it still tells you that you have to pay (oh did the tech-team again release something without talking with communication dept? Where is Casey when you need him? Oh wait, he’s partying at Burning Man!)
And in despair you go to the address-bar and type: http://couchsurfing.com and pfff, it finally works.
Interesting side note: Burning Man is actually moving from for profit LLC to non profit, and as BM has already spawned 3 501(c)(3) orgs in recent years it will no doubt get the 501(c)(3) status in no time – http://blog.burningman.com/tag/non-profit/
Really good article in the NY Times about Burning Man’s move to non-profit status: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/28/business/growing-pains-for-burning-man-festival.html. The eerie thing is that BM and CS seem to be making the same sort of argument to arrive at completely different ends.
this is just ridiculous!!! what a bunch of liars!
oh stop.. I just checked and you acutally can cancel the verification process by clicking on your name in the left corner…
anyhow, as far as I remember, they said, that there wouldn’t be such a thing like verification for cash..
yeah – and did you notice how all the other links are not there? The name is the only one (on a spot that you as an experienced user knows, but which is hard to recognize for a new user).
it’s true, after finishing the step 1 you are already registered. but it’s sooooooooo misleading! They are really ill-intetioned now!
ohh, I can “Donate using my credit card” !
WOW! in your face from day #1. These guys are retards.
When vc financing runs out, what are they going to do?
It says at Registration Step 1: Before you begin, would you like to get verified? If you’d like to skip this step and continue, scroll to the bottom of the page and select “Continue to My Profile.”
- If you click continue to my profile it redirects you to the credit card payment page which shows 2 options:
Pay now, and send my postcard now
Pay now, and send my postcard later
Casey, no doubt you will make the world a better one!
Verification charges:
$5.09 –Malaysia
$27.53– Japan
$25.00 USA
$9.04 India
$13.82 Mexico
https://www.couchsurfing.org/verification/sliding_scale/
This is fucked up indeed. I tried it myself because I could not believe they would ever do such a thing.
I was wrong
Oh yes you can skip this ‘donate to become a member scam page’. But it is a hidden link! WTF
This is just plain evil.
I’ve been saying all the time that these people were definitely not non-profit even when they led people to believe otherwise. They don’t even care about security, like the Leeds case showed.
Oh yeah!
Switzerland’s verification is cheaper than Macedonia-FYROM, Yemen, North Korea, Guinea, Palestinian Territory…
Beside the awful scam-related aspects I have to admit they are graciously sinking with improved accountancy skills…
This will probably get deleted soon so someone grab it.
http://s3.amazonaws.com/images.couchsurfing.us/LIXBP0P/12102451_l_19f607ec620c0fdcbeb1d2b16926efeb.jpg
Is this new sign-up procedure really that different from all those scammy acai pill /teeth whitening ‘free trial’ scams where the fact that you are going to be charged $80 bucks a month for an ongoing auto shipment is hidden in the fine print or made as hard as possible to notice? Of course the verification is a one off fee and CS is not an acai pill scammer but the way they make it look as though verification is not optional is deceptive in the same way. Deception is deception after all.
I wonder what the FTC would have to say about the new CS sign up procedure – a site which says membership is free but uses this misleading sign up process?? http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/index.shtml
Everyone who has paid for verification should keep an eye on their credit card statements. I think CS will go for recurring billing.
Click on your new “pioneer” icon and see if it says “recurring”.
here you go, outside the cashsurfing world:
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/840/cashsurfing.jpg/
yes, we cash!
Thanks CashCow!
here you go another one
http://en.picjoke.net/process.php?clipart_id=511&date=2011-09-02&picname=11-en-5b6b91f96a8c3357c5f160f3e52fbbfd–1314987025-2036427506–4291197ab9485cfb87e8b904bd2fce0f.jpg–.jpg
http://www5.picturepush.com/photo/a/6456448/1024/Anonymous/CaseyFenton-mugshot.jpg
http://stock4.pho.to/data10/7/5/1/7517413f-5a44-bbc4-9dc1-d4e487ea4354.jpg
lol
http://www2.picturepush.com/photo/a/6456655/1024/Anonymous/Riches.jpg
http://www2.picturepush.com/photo/a/6456670/img/Anonymous/BusinessToday-Casey-Fenton.jpg
Does anyone know how to unlink FB and CS? My friend was logged into FB when I was logged into CS on the same computer. When it asked me to link the to websites I selected yes but now my CS is posting to his FB. Help!
@robel your friend need to go to his facebook applications page and then remove the app from there
Wow… I don’t remember if I used my bank account or a separate CC when I donated back in 2009. I guess I am going to have to go to the bank and say my account has been compromised and get it changed before traveling! Who knows what fall-out will happen if they had some method of keeping our CC #’s…
Plus, if Anonymous ever gets an inkling to simultaneously attack sites linked to FB, CS is going to get reamed…