Quite interesting, my first Ghanese spammer. And the proof why registration for Couchsurfing doesn’t work:
Too bad that CS doesn’t use SpamAssassin. But what about the profile (https://www.couchsurfing.org/profile.html?id=BFUS6VU)
Why is a African person being able to “have a secure profile”, while everything is against him? Another proof that registration and sponsoring CS doesn’t make the system safer?
(Needless to say: I spammed the account…)
Have a great – and safe! – 2010!
First I was like: what is the issue? But now I see also that on the one hand the CS-system says: “Name and Location unverified” (on the top right). While at the same time it also says: “Verified Member”, because the person locked his/her name and Address.
For a experienced user this shouldn’t pose much problems but I do see how this creates confusion (if someone locks his/her address). Also, strangely enough, the account still exists…
Good finding, but your conclusions are ridiculous.
“Why sponsoring CS doesn’t work”
Wtf.
Like Robino said, the text “verified profile” is misleading. But that’s really all there is to say about it.
It has nothing to do with paid verification or sponsoring.
“”Why is a African person being able to “have a secure profile”, while everything is against him?”"
The way you put this comes extremely close to racism. After all, reading that line, the reader has no other option than concluding that African people should not be able to have a secure profile, and the question comes up, why so.
On the link you post, the screen caps are so small and the part that says whether or not they’re verified is cut off. Could you please correct this?
Well, there is a link to the profile here:
http://www.couchsurfing.org/people/mikezak/
It certainly isn’t verified at all. I don’t know what I was thinking when I included this as a reference, and will remove it from my article immediately.