FetLife
 |
|
|---|---|
| Like Facebook, but run by BDSM aficionados like you and me. We think it's so much more fun. You also? | |
| Internet community | |
| languages | English |
| editorial staff | John Baku |
| user | 5,607,222
(As of February 4, 2017) |
| Registration | necessary |
| On-line | January 2008 (currently active) |
| fetlife.com | |
FetLife is the world's largest social network for the BDSM and fetish community and sees itself as the “ Facebook for the kink community”. The site is only accessible to members and can not be indexed by search engines for data protection reasons . Membership is free and can be done under a pseudonym .
history
FetLife was founded in January 2008 by John Baku from Montreal , Quebec . The website was deliberately designed to be an online community rather than a dating website . For example, there is no search function to find users with specific preferences. The social aspect predominates in the community, but the sexual aspect is explicitly included.
On July 7, 2016, FetLife temporarily removed the ability to register new user accounts. The reason was suspected that FetLife was responding to various allegations of doing too little against users accused of rape or sexual abuse . According to Baku, the focus will be on current members rather than on attracting new members. Furthermore, the support team was overwhelmed with the number of inquiries and complaints. In the meantime, registration was reopened, but required an invitation from a paying member. In the meantime, unlimited registration is possible again, but requires confirmation with a mobile phone number.
In early 2017, FetLife deleted large amounts of content, including anything related to alcohol or drug use, racial games, hate speech , profanity ( e.g. incest ), game types that leave permanent injuries and, most importantly, simulated rape or kidnapping . The background to this were complaints from credit card companies to FetLifes Bank. Despite these measures, FetLife can no longer process credit card payments.
On March 14, 2017, FetLife was included in list C of media harmful to minors by the Federal Testing Office for media harmful to minors .
Functions
Users can create a personal profile and specify gender, age, role, sexual orientation and list the fetishes they are interested in. Users can upload pictures and videos, write blog posts and exchange private messages with other members.
The users can create groups in which various topics are discussed. Events can also be set up, for example conventions, workshops, parties and round tables.
European user demographics
The gender distribution is relatively even among European users : Among members with at least five friends , 54% identify as cis- male, 40.5% as cis-female, and the remaining 5.5% are split between other genders . About 45% of users are straight , only 5% describe themselves as exclusively gay or lesbian .
In contrast to traditional social networks like Twitter or Facebook or content- focused sites like Flickr or YouTube , local connections between members are much more important. This is also expressed in the large number of events, meetings and workshops.
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Andrea Zanin: Facebook for the kinky. In: Montreal Mirror. September 2008, archived from the original on June 30, 2012 ; accessed on February 4, 2017 .
- ↑ a b c d e f Damien Fay, Hamed Haddadi, Michael C. Seto, Han Wang, Christoph Kling: An Exploration of Fetish Social Networks and Communities . In: Adam Wierzbicki, Ulrik Brandes, Frank Schweitzer, Dino Pedreschi (Eds.): Advances in Network Science (= Lecture Notes in Computer Science . No. 9564 ). Springer Science + Business Media , 2016, ISBN 978-3-319-28361-6 , ISSN 1611-3349 , p. 195-204 , doi : 10.1007 / 978-3-319-28361-6_17 .
- ↑ Kari Paul: BDSM Community Reacts After Kink Website FetLife Goes Invite Only. In: Broadly . August 18, 2016, accessed February 12, 2017 .
- ↑ Sirin Kale: Kinky Social Network Fetlife Deletes Thousands Of Fetishes to Stay Online. In: Broadly . January 25, 2017, accessed February 12, 2017 .
- ↑ Marco Tralles | qb-it.de: »SM-Nachrichten - schlagzeilen.com. Retrieved May 31, 2017 .