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The current entry totally looks like an advertisement, or typed up by someone at Badoo. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.45.90.16 ( talk) 02:14, 25 November 2007 (UTC)
As Agoust 10, Badoo is still unavailable from South Korean IP's. It looks like is having a php problem. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.98.120.147 ( talk) 04:33, 10 August 2008 (UTC)
The reference No. 4 is a dead link. The Yahoo article has expired. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.160.172.189 ( talk) 19:30, 8 December 2008 (UTC)
I suggest that the recipients of the spam mentioned here are victims of the Koobface worm which affects most social networking sites including Facebook, and MySpace. Lumos3 ( talk) 16:08, 31 August 2009 (UTC)
I give up. For the benefit of your own edification, please be advised that Badoo's "user recruitig" operates exactly as the one for Tagged (Tagged is even higher on the Alexa lists but has no other notability than its spam, phishing and dishonesty...) You can compare this page: http://eu1.badoo.com/import/ to the complaints against Tagged, for example: http://www.consumerfraudreporting.org/phishing/taggeddotcom.jpg I hope sooner or later enough people complain about Badoo, so that you can stop ignoring their voices in your superficial Googling of notable sources. Until then, this article is neither useful nor truthful. We made a site that has absolute no notability other than its traffic (how manty porn sites do you find notable because of their traffic?) worthy of an article?! Instead of saying that it spams and harvests emails or not saying anything at all, we now lead people to believe that the site is quite safe... Oh well. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.62.38.20 ( talk) 01:53, 2 September 2009 (UTC)
actually, mates, there is a reliable description of the "40 million and counting" user signup process and proof of the fact that they send unsolicited bulk mail. the badoo import contacts page, quoted above, says that it will import contacts from msn, yahoo, aol, gmail "and 43 other webmail services." their privacy policy page, already referenced in the main article, says "...an email invitation will be sent on their behalf, to the email addresses of the contacts that have been uploaded and then selected to be invited." 76.166.179.20 ( talk) 07:12, 2 September 2009 (UTC)
Registrant:
PS: Why not just publish this talk as the page?
Mplungjan ( talk) 06:14, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
Can anyone provide a notable source that describes Badoo's spamming activities, until one is found they are all just individual POVs and are likely to be deleted. Lumos3 ( talk) 22:03, 28 August 2009 (UTC)
It seems from all the edit wars so far that Lumos3 ( talk) is the main biased party aiming to legitimize this entity. Why? May be he should gracefully recuse himself from further editing this one article. Just a suggestion. Not only on the spam issue. Look at the recent "Cyprus based" vs "London based." question. We had the wrong "London based" (which sounds more reassuring for the thousnds getting the scam emails who look at Wikipedia to see whether this is a legitimate enterprise or whether the privacy laws they expect apply to them), while the company is really based in Cyprus?!? Nobody bothered to look, but we leaving no stone unturned to prove or disprove if they spam or lie in the spam messages (for which I have about 10 proofs in my mailbox). The company location, for some reason, may be part of Badoo's deception strategy, because the Cyprus based company definitely wants to create an impression that they are based in the UK, for example by writing things like "...sensitive personal data, may be accessed from countries outside the UK. Please note that countries outside Europe may have lower standards of data protection than the UK." And why did Lumos3 ( talk) add the London offices in the infobox after finding out that he can't revert the Cyprus edit ad this is not a London based company? Why don't we add them all: Chile, Russia, Mexico, Brasil and other locations where they have offices? I think the corporate HQ is enough for the infobox, no? Wikipedia should not be used to make Badoo more legitimate!!! After all "It is a privae club with 45 million carefully selected members..." (ha, ha... we have to give it to them for the humor!) why should it need more legitimacy. Thanks for litening, Yours, multiple-time carefully selected nominee and, without my permission, multiple time member of the Badoo private club. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.166.179.20 ( talk) 18:26, 29 August 2009 (UTC)
I have no connection with Badoo and am not a member. All my edits are based on verifiable sources. Someone saying they recieved an email saying x is not a reliable source for an edit to an article. Both the Daily Telegraph and Guardian articles say it is British/ London based. The company does have registered offices in Cyprus and is open about this - the citations for this are from its own pages. Lumos3 ( talk) 22:14, 30 August 2009 (UTC)
Ok, by far the most common complaint on the Internet about Badoo are spam, deceitful way of recruiting users and disregard for privacy. From blogs in prestigious sites like LaStampa and blogs by unknown bloggers to the majority of comments on security forums:
http://www.lastampa.it/cmstp/rubriche/stampa.asp?ID_blog=141&ID_articolo=85 http://www.mywot.com/en/scorecard/badoo.com http://raoulteeuwen.blogspot.com/2009/06/badoo-sucks-evil-spam.html http://badooit.blogspot.com/2008/11/spam-badoo.html http://www.bloggercorner.com/2009/07/07/794/ http://www.mondoinformatico.info/elenco-dei-socialnetwork-e-dei-loro-servizi_post-6617.html etc. etc.
How many more do you need? Why can't these be synthesized and refrenced? To let the "... but McAfee didn't think so" (BTW, see user comments to that same reference) be left as the misleading conclusion of the spam issue in this article will be a travesty and a triumph of demagogy over reality. 76.166.179.20 ( talk) 03:46, 31 August 2009 (UTC)
Blogs are not considered reliable sources on Wikipedia. If this is an issue then it must have been covered in the media somewhere. My searches have found nothing. All we have at the moment is gossip. Lumos3 ( talk) 09:21, 31 August 2009 (UTC)
Users should only be warned if reliable sources can be found, and it looking at the current blogs it doesn't seen any have been found.-- Otterathome ( talk) 12:00, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
I have received such a phony email as well, and wondering what it was as I suspected something fishy, I went to wikipedia to see what it said about it. The article confirmed my doubts. Therefore it is a useful article. -- Anon ( talk) 06:58, 24 August 2009 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.200.170.249 ( talk) This user is NOT User:Anon
I totally agree with this comment. This article is also referenced from other pages as 'proof' that Badoo is a spam site. Rob —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.84.164.204 ( talk) 08:08, 26 August 2009 (UTC)
I agree that this page should not be deleted. It was the best source of information on Badoo that I found quickly and easily in a google search. Thank you to all that have contributed to it - Amelia 70.135.164.109 ( talk) 06:38, 6 January 2011 (UTC)
I come to Wikipedia to learn facts. I am usually rewarded with good and truthful content. Thank you for not deleting this article. I am now headed to the Wikipedia article about Jesus Christ.
I suspect the numbers on Badoo are pure hype! I apear to be a member even tho' I've never signed up or responded to any mail.... I'm sure it's pure cut and past info from numerous failed dating and networking sites! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.98.96.26 ( talk) 04:35, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
Same thing happened to me. Badoo accessed my contact list and emailed everyone on my behalf,Badoo is a total scam stay away from it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.10.145.59 ( talk) 01:00, 12 January 2011 (UTC)
I reverted this edit for several reasons:
Adrian J. Hunter( talk• contribs) 12:28, 10 February 2011 (UTC)
I am a public relations consultant working for Badoo. I would like to update the current page to include more detailed information about the company. I am keen to ensure that we abide by Wikipedia's rules, and only wish to update the page with factual information. My proposed update for the Badoo page is below - I would welcome feedback from the community before I make the update. If nobody objects, I would like to make this update on 30th August 2010.
Proposed update: Badoo is a social networking website, launched in 2006, which currently claims over 70 million registered users. Although available in most of the world, the site is particularly popular in France, Spain and Italy, as well as Latin America. (Source: Google Trends for Websites) Alexa.com ranks Badoo as the 52nd most popular site in France and the 150th globally.
Rather than enabling users to manage their existing social circles in an online environment, as with other social networks, the primary purpose of Badoo is to enable users to meet new people who they are not already socially connected to. According to the Crunchbase profile on Badoo, it “focuses on the forgotten area between social networks and dating websites, where people just want to socialize with new people and have fun.”
The site allows users to create profiles, send each other messages, and rate each other’s profile pictures at no cost, but charges fees for features which are designed to make the user’s profile more visible to other users, thereby increasing the opportunities to attract attention.
Charging for these enhanced visibility features is the site’s primary business model. Depending on their country, users can make payments by premium rate mobile SMS, PayPal, or credit card.
Badoo includes a geographic proximity feature, which identifies users’ locations based on analysis of their network connection. This lets users know if there are people near to their current location who may wish to meet.
The site also offers a mobile application, which also allows users to connect with others based on their location.
History The site was founded in 2006 in London. In January 2008, the Russian investment firm Finam paid $30m USD for a 10% stake in Badoo. Badoo first launched in Spain and is now one of the leading socializing sites in France, Italy, Spain and Latin America with over 70 million users worldwide
Badoo was founded by Andrey Andreev, an internet entrepreneur has had a successful career creating, running and successfully exiting online business ventures across Europe over the last decade. He created Begun (www.begun.ru) - Russia’s first contextual advertising services agency in 2002, and in 2004, founded Mamba (www.mamba.ru) - Russia’s biggest socializing platform. The companies Andrey was involved in, always attracted interest from many VCs and PE firms.
Open Source Contributions Badoo has release several pieces of software under an open source licence, including various improvements to the PHP scripting language, the Pinba real time statistics server, and the Blitz template engine. (Source: http://dev.badoo.com/)
In the Media Badoo was profiled in the Guardian’s PDA blog ( http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/pda/2008/mar/05/elevatorpitchwhybadoowants) in 2008. In January 2010 TechCrunch published an article ( http://eu.techcrunch.com/2010/01/05/social-network-badoo-is-banned-in-iran/) claiming that the service had been banned in Iran.
Criticism In a Cambridge University graduate student report, it was given the lowest score for privacy among 45 social networking sites examined.
92.238.40.49 ( talk) 13:54, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
I would like to add the following to the In the Media section for Badoo -
Financial Times - ‘Social dating’ takes Badoo ever higher" ( http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/fbd275c0-519a-11e0-888e-00144feab49a.html#axzz1HRVGKE9Y)
Business Insider - "The biggest StartUp you have never heard of is about to hit 108 million members" ( http://www.businessinsider.com/badoo-2011-2)
The Huffington Post - "Badoo Global Study ranked Athens as the most flirtatious city in the world." ( http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/01/worlds-most-flirtatious-c_n_829673.html#s247367&title=Athens__1)
The Independent Newspaper - "Facebook's biggest risers: 'Avatar' tops charts, Badoo second, 'Man v. Food' debuts" ( http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/facebooks-biggest-risers-avatar-tops-charts-badoo-second-man-v-food-debuts-2240288.html)
Seeking Alpha - "Have Quepasa Bears Run Out of Ammunition?" ( http://seekingalpha.com/article/257744-have-quepasa-bears-run-out-of-ammunition)
AllFacebook - "Badoo Retains Title Of Fastest Growing Facebook App" ( http://www.allfacebook.com/badoo-retains-title-of-fastest-growing-facebook-app-2011-03) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lloydgprice ( talk • contribs) 11:28, 24 March 2011 (UTC)
The current info contradicts itself. Luis Dantas ( talk) 21:54, 29 May 2009 (UTC) Badoo was started in November 2006 - http://corp.badoo.com/faq — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lloydgprice ( talk • contribs) 11:17, 24 March 2011 (UTC) Badoo encourages scammers and fakes because when they join they get more emails to spam its a win win situation and if like me you open your mouth you get banned. This is how I know its not a real site a real one is looking to remove the scammers and grow their site with proven real people. Protect your contacts and yourself dont join Badoo !!!! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.206.94.156 ( talk) 17:04, 12 July 2011 (UTC)
This is now a site within the top 100 on Alexa and has featured in a report on Yahoo finance. I believe it now has sufficient notablity to be an article. Lumos3 13:51, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
This site is now well outside the 'top 100' sites on alexa, is a well known scam/phishing site with a poor reputation. It should no longer be classed as a social networking site within wikipedia but an example of a data mining company. http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/badoo.com http://www.mywot.com/en/scorecard/badoo.com#top — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.220.141.90 ( talk) 08:56, 6 August 2011 (UTC)
According to Alexa.com, the Web Information Company, Badoo.com is a Top 50 website in 16 countries worldwide, can anyone report any bigger websites designed for meeting new people ?
Democratic Republic of Congo - 5th Cameroon - 6th Cote d'Ivoire - 10th Colombia - 27th Dominican Republic - 27th Argentina - 33rd Spain - 36th Algeria - 36th Ecuador - 36th Venezuela - 38th Czech Republic - 40th Portugal - 42nd Brazil - 44th Italy - 46th Chile - 47th France - 48th
Source : http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/badoo.com# — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lloydgprice ( talk • contribs) 16:24, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
Facebook -- Canhazanonymous ( talk) 10:21, 6 August 2011 (UTC)
The following links have been brought to my attention, and could likely be used to improve this article and Andrey Andreev.
-- Jimbo Wales ( talk) 10:59, 3 October 2011 (UTC)
"In November 2010, Forbes reported a rumour that the site may float in 2011"
Really? Wow. I've never seen a website float before. WTF — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.201.173.124 ( talk) 04:15, 4 October 2011 (UTC)
I see there is modification wars going around whether or not the "invitation" messages are spam. My personal experience couldn't be more telling; I got one of these "messages" telling me I've got a friend message at Badoo. Trying to see it I was forced to register. After registering there was NO messages!! This is total scam, don't give ANY of your personal info to this site..... -- 81.197.76.159 ( talk) 01:22, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
Badoo is advertising heavily in NYC on the subway system. Advertising sometimes takes up all of the ad space in an train car. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.80.233.29 ( talk) 00:01, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
Reading through these comments, the one thing that clearly comes through is that there's a flaw in wikipedia policy on citing sources. To any user who has fallen victim to Badoo's spam (and who is sufficiently computer literate to distinguish it from the third-party spam that was being mentioned) this is fact, not conjecture. If a journalist from the Guardian or the Telegraph - who generally have no qualifications in the fields they write about - were to describe this in a published article, it would become no more or less true. Wikipedia provides a service to its users (including journalists!) - it supplies information. A key piece of information that any visitor to this page would want to have is that Badoo sends unsolicited e-mails. But for whatever reason we are unable to supply this imformation, simply waiting for some journalist to say it first so we can hide behind them as a source - which they may never bother doing because no newspaper editor may consider Badoo spam a subject worth writing about. The result is that the only important information can be obtained by reading the talk page, not the article itself, which is a sad state of affairs. The only solution I can offer is to nominate this article for deletion, on the grounds that we can't write it properly until mainstream media do so first, which seems to be the unfortunate reality. Palefire ( talk) 10:45, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
I note the comments above regarding Wikipedia's rules for 'reliable sources', but unfortunately, many of those 'reliable sources' are now based on Wikipedia entries. It is the classic chicken and egg situation - Wikipedia cannot trust itself until someone else has published its information. Another potential point of failure in Wikipedia, is that the onus is placed on people to 'disprove' a claim made in an article after it is posted, rather than for the author to prove it before publication. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.248.94.160 ( talk) 01:56, 25 November 2012 (UTC)
I have made several edits to the article regarding the security and privacy of Badoo.com. All have been reverted without checking if they were valid, which is easily done for a public website.
I have no intention of starting an edit war, regarding the Badoo entry. I simply want facts to be displayed on Wikipedia; and as it is obvious on the Talk page for the article, there are serious concerns, which are easily verifiable with a basic knowledge of computers.
With reference to reversions by Sciencewatcher:
The article references the commercial website itself - i.e. Badoo.com, which apparently is treated by yourself as a 'trusted resource'. However, you personally take the approach that the same website cannot be used as a reference for criticism, only positive references are allowed. I suggest you are not in a neutral position on this matter, and lack the basic technical knowledge to verify the amendments to the article that you revert.
Sciencewatcher, and a user with an IP address located in Russia, have also continually failed to address several important questions which were raised in the Talk page, including one in which reference number 20 clearly points to a spam website including pornography (I note that the Russuan contributer has now changed the article and it is in fact reference number 19 which points to a spam site), and another where Sciencewatcher stated that you had 'tested the website', obviously without you having registered to verify correctly the statements that were made in the edit you reverted.
There is an 'OfficialBadoo' video on YouTube that uses a Gmail account to register and explore the site:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ECcBV25wQE
I followed the same basic process, and the results can be seen here, signing in with a Gmail account, and the video includes the cookie details of the user preferences, including personal details, that you keep reverting:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_5LDvQ0A0E
To Sciencewatcher: Thank you for your warnings, regarding Wikipedia regulations, but perhaps you might like to look to yourself (and your own Talk page), before continually reverting factually correct amendments to an article that are displayed on Wikipedia. Wikipedia is not a website that should be used by companies to gain credibility by posting their own articles.
I feel strongly about this; if editors of articles are not sufficiently knowledgeable, or able, to verify an articles amendments, they should refrain for editing and reverting, and certainly refrain from warning users who are capable of the simple task of checking the veracity of an article, not to do so. As mentioned on my edit to Sciencewatchers Talk page: I will post this in its entirety on the Talk page for the Badoo.com article.
In summary, please watch this simple verification of the amendments regarding lack of privacy cookies on Badoo - you can either try it yourself, or simply find an area where you the capability to give an informed opinion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Perambulator3 ( talk • contribs) 21:14, 7 December 2012 (UTC)
While checking the article, I noticed that several of the positive comments are referenced from Badoo itself.
A *warning* - reference number 20, as of the date of this posting, links to http://allsiteslike.com/badoo - which in turn redirects to a spam site that can also include pornography. The original citation is "According to their website FAQ, Badoo claims to employ over 200 people internationally".
As can be seen from the article history, I have added some comments in two areas regarding the sites security and privacy. I note that some feel this needs to be verified by a third party, but the most obvious way to verify a public website, is to simply look for yourselves - I do not ask a stranger who has a financial interest to read a web page to me, I read the web page itself. Disclosure: I am a Badoo.com paid member, and a software developer for 22 years; I have no affiliation with Badoo.com or any other social website. In order to observe the web site tracking cookies, I used Firefox, and the Firebug plugin - both open source tools - and all the personal information that is stored in the cookie from Badoo.com is in plain text, with no attempt at encryption.
When security loopholes are fixed, I have updated the article to reflect this. Privacy is a major concern for any company collecting personal details, sexual orientation, and payment information.
If there has to be an article about this company, it cannot be simply a promotional article; it must be factually correct.
I apologise in advance if my English is incorrect; it is not my first language. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Perambulator3 ( talk • contribs) 17:07, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
That would be OR. I think you really need to start reading wikipedia policies. -- sciencewatcher ( talk) 23:37, 7 December 2012 (UTC)
The article currently states, "Badoo has been accused of increasing its membership through unsolicited emails but McAfee did not find evidence for this." This is misleading. The unsolicited emails that are referred to in the various blogs etc. judged above to be non-notable are sent to addresses in the address books of Badoo members. In other words, a person with no affiliation to Badoo may receive an unsolicited email if someone who has that person's email address in their address book joins Badoo. See our article on contact scraping. The current wording falsely implies that McAfee investigated this practice. My understanding is that all that McAfee would have done is signed up to Badoo using a purpose-made email address and waited to see how many emails that address received. So this test does not contradict the claims of unsolicited emailing.
For now I'm just removing the whole sentence. If someone finds a reliable source describing Badoo's emailing practices they should add it. Adrian J. Hunter( talk• contribs) 12:52, 22 September 2009 (UTC)
Let me try to clarify. There are two questions here:
(1) Does Badoo send unsolicited emails about Badoo to people who have never signed up to Badoo, by retrieving those people's email addresses from the address books of people who have signed up?
(2) Does signing up to Badoo cause the person who signed up to receive spam from third parties?
The debate on this page is about question (1). Various sources claim yes, but as yet, none has been judged sufficiently reliable for inclusion in Wikipedia.
McAfee routinely checks whether signing up to a particular website with a throw-away email address causes that same email address to receive spam. This pertains to question (2). McAfee is a reliable source and I trust their conclusion that the answer to question (2) is no. But to my knowledge, they have not investigated question (1). The sentence I removed from the article implied that McAfee had investigated question (1).
Adrian J. Hunter( talk• contribs) 04:36, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
I'm not sure what you mean. (2) is not worth mentioning in the article as the fact they don't cause you to receive third-party spam is unremarkable. (1) would certainly be worth mentioning if we can find a reliable source... but the consensus seems to be that we haven't found one yet. Adrian J. Hunter( talk• contribs) 13:20, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
Why not create a large group of purpose made throw away emails? You make test1@fake.com, then add test emails 2-10 as contacts. Sign up to Badoo using test1@fake, and see if the other emails receive any unsolicited emails? You could do this for clusters of emails, including various levels of use of the site, and have a control group where none of them sign up. Then, you can find whether there is a statistically significant number of emails received by the emails that *didn't* sign up. 205.208.124.128 ( talk) 20:03, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
This website is very notable. It sends out spam, its a scam. How come there is no mention of the endless spam! -- Cat chi? 03:15, 13 January 2011 (UTC)
I too have received spam from this site claiming that I have a message from someone I've never heard of, only to ask me for personal information when I try to view it. 90.30.150.32 ( talk) 15:30, 24 December 2011 (UTC)
Don't you also receive SPAM from facebook? I do. 178.197.234.3 ( talk) 00:26, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Just got a mail from badoo, "someone has left a message for you", of course you can only view the message if you register. and it really was someone who does know me very very well, how else would he have known i will register as "sdfghdfjdfjh" and use this name in the message to me? 87.154.178.162 ( talk) 22:07, 3 September 2012 (UTC)
Yes, me too. Definitely a scammy spam service. Fuckers. Time to do some editing of this article... -- sciencewatcher ( talk) 14:19, 17 October 2012 (UTC)
Don't edit out of anger. Synergee ( talk) 08:10, 26 November 2012 (UTC)
First facebook does the same. Secondly this article isn't neutral. I can only read American hate towards a successful russian company. Too bad for Facebook. 178.197.234.3 ( talk) 00:21, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
217.33.234.250 ( talk) 14:30, 25 October 2009 (UTC) Badoo i find is well known to the ghanan/Nigerian Scamming fraternaty, they freiquently steal photos from any site they can get onto, showing someone in one or two poses, then they create a profile on badoo, saying they are british/american, either high powered business men or service men. they then start chatting to any woman who comes accross as wanting company. they then move the person onto msn/yahoo straight away, bombard them with messages and nudges just so that the female chatter is concentrating on them totally. after a brief period of chatting the scammer then tells the female that they are divorced/widdowed and have a child, the scammer suddenly has to go overseas to work, and they have run out of money to pay the nanny. they then start badgering the female to send money via a money order to pay for the nanny or a flight home. the owners of badoo do little to stop this, the scam profiles are easy to find, just keep an eye out on the education listing, they normally put a british and or american collage then post either ghanan or nigerian place too. other dating/networking sites, have filters in place to stop the scammers getting through, but it seems that badoo do little to stop the scams
Hi, I joined badoo as I wanted to make friends, but I was scammed by a guy called Luigi Del Torrino, who apparently was in the army, retired then went home to Austin, Texas then was visiting me in Cape Town, all the while playing me like a fiddle. The conversations 3 months later eventually revealed his true nature when he asked me for money, I have just found out that I was not the only one he was so in love with as I received a message on my face book page from another woman asking me the exact same questions that I was battling to answer myself, this man is very good, even has a full on american accent, I was lucky all I lost was my heart and that can be fixed, thank goodness I have good friends who advised me every step of the way and made sure that I parted with no cash. This has put me off social dating sites completely and after allot of soul searching and self discrimination I can now close this very stressful and heart wrenching chapter. — Preceding
unsigned comment added by
197.172.37.10 (
talk)
07:54, 19 May 2013 (UTC)
In my survey and test of over 100 profiles, OVER 90% of the profiles are FAKE, scammers.
Hi All, I think the Badoo page is off to a great start. I do think there's room for a few of updates, further information to add, better structure etc to make it comparable to some of the longer pages about other similar companies. I've read some of the past talk pages and seen some discussion there - i'm not planning on removing anything (maybe updating r.e. new numbers etc) just adding and maybe re-ordering to make the page more comprehensive. I'll share edits as i write them - hopefully nothing too controversial but I think edits would fall under the 'major-edits' categories.
— Lucspook ( talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. The preceding unsigned comment was added at 12:16, 12 June 2013 (UTC) (UTC).
Hi all, I think the Badoo page has had a great start. Not to diminish the work already done in any way, I think it can be built upon to be a bit more robust and consistent with other wikipedia pages about other similar services.
I saw some of the discussions on the talk pages and have done quite some digging and research and have taken the opportunity to update the page. I have really tried to take some of the sensitivities discussed into account so I hope people feel this is a fair representation - it has all been done in good faith and I look forward to feedback and edit suggestions. I've been working it in my sandbox for a while now but I think it's ready to share!
— Lucspook ( talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. The preceding unsigned comment was added at 12:16, 12 June 2013 (UTC) (UTC).
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Badoo is an online social networking service whose mission is to provide the world’s easiest, fastest and most fun way for people to meet each other locally and globally. Badoo is not only the largest, but also the fastest growing social network for meeting new people globally [5]. The social discovery, dating-oriented social network, was founded in Spain in November 2006 by Andrey Andreev and a small group of international programmers and tech entrepreneurs. Badoo was originally a basic photo sharing website but evolved into a social networking and dating website in 2008. As Badoo is a meeting place for adults, nobody under the age of 18 is eligible to sign up for the service [6]. Users must register before using Badoo [7] . They can then create an account and instantly upload photos, videos and chat to other users. Additionally, Badoo offers a premium service where users can pay to customise and increase viewings of their profile as well as play games [7] . Just one year after it’s launch Badoo had 12 million members [8] and as of 2013 had over 183 million members worldwide [9] with more than 125,000 new users joining everyday and over 35 million active users per month, uploading over 3 million photos daily [10] . In 2008 Finam Capital injected $30m into Badoo and the company now has an annual run rate of $150 million, from around 1 million paying users every month [11] . Badoo has an office in London, UK [5]. Jimmy Wales, Co-Founder of Wikipedia, nominated Badoo CEO and Founder Andreev as one of ‘50 People Who Will Change The World 2012,’ in Wired Magazine’s Smart List 2012. Wales said he was “intrigued by Badoo's growth to over 120 million users in an under-the-radar way,” and that Andreev seemed “a smart, serious, interesting tech geek on a mission to create something that people like” [12] . In June 2013 Alexa.com rated Badoo's global ranking as 129 [13]. Notes
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Lucspook ( talk) 19:24, 24 July 2013 (UTC) — Lucspook ( talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
Hi Lucspook.
Even though you modified text all over the article, let's look only at the first three paragraphs for now. Let's look at how they looked before you made your changes, and how they looked after you made them.
Before-and-after comparison
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Here are the first three paragraphs as they were before you tried rewriting the article.
Next, let's look at the first three paragraphs as they were after your most recent edits.
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Adrian, and others, looked at the changes you wanted to make. He wrote above: "This draft reads like a press release, with a tone completely inappropriate for an encyclopedia. All mention of controversy has been stripped from the lead, contrary to MOS:LEAD." Neither your changes, nor the new lead you wrote, were ever acceptable.
You tried to push your unacceptable changes into the article multiple times. Sometime after each attempt, a different Wikipedian reverted your changes: Adrian, [5] SFK2, [6] and myself. [7]
On Wikipedia, it's all about consensus. If you want to make controversial changes to an article, you must establish consensus on the article's talk page. Please see WP:CON. From the fact that three users reverted your changes, it's clear that the consensus is that your changes are not acceptable here. If you repeatedly try to push your changes through without consensus, you will eventually simply be blocked from editing Wikipedia. Instead, you may speak here, explain why you think your changes are good, and try to convince us to come to a consensus that your changes are good. But, without consensus here, Wikipedia guidelines make it clear that you must not attempt to push your changes into the article again.
If you decide to seek consensus here for your proposed changes, it might be simpler if you break up the changes into many small chunks and that you discuss each chunk separately. Try to propose the least controversial chunk first, then wait and see if we agree.
Cheers, — Unforgettableid ( talk) 04:29, 12 September 2013 (UTC)
I propose a new section on growth. I believe it to be neutral, well sourced and cited:
Following Badoo’s launch, it’s strongest markets were Southern Europe and Latin America. Its popularity grew rapidly and in 2012 it was achieving 60% growth and adding more than 125,000 new users year on year, according to Techcrunch [13] .
Badoo was officially launched in the USA on 23rd March 2012 with a campaign led by Nick Cannon, an American actor, comedian, rapper, TV and radio personailty. The launch was a three day project involving four fashion photograpers taking new online profile pictures for 1,000 New Yorkers. The 24 best pictures were chosen through a Facebook ‘likes’ campaign and used on billboards and taxi advertising to promote Badoo’s launch [14] .
Since November 2011 mobile usage has increased by 100% [15]. Badoo’s Facebook page, as of June 2013, has over 8.7 million likes [16] .
Lucspook ( talk) 11:08, 18 September 2013 (UTC)
I propose a factual section on Badoo's apps below. The text is neutral and well sourced.
Badoo Apps Badoo is present on almost every mobile platform. The first App to be released by Badoo was for the iPhone 3 in December 2010 [17] . This was followed by the Android App in February 2011 [18] , Blackberry App in December 2011, Windows in August 2012 [19] and HTML 5 in 2013 along with the new iPad app [20] . The iPad app has been well received and currently has a user rating of 4.5 out of 5 in the iTunes store. In 2013 Badoo’s android app was featured as one of PC Magazine's ‘100 best Android Apps of 2013’ [21] . Badoo has just released a Firefox version of Badoo, which is present on the Firefox marketplace.
In 2011 Badoo’s Facebook app broke into the ‘Top 3 Facebook Apps in the World,’according to appdata.com [22] .
As of June 2013 the Badoo app has been rated: – Google Play – average of 4.5 out of 5 with (over 500,000) 490,297 reviews and over 350K 5 star reviews [23] . – Blackberry app store – 4 out of 5 [24] . – Androidpit - 4.5 out of 5 with (over 500,000) 489,359 reviews [25] . – iTunes App Store – 4.5 out of 5 from 468 (404) reviewers [26] .
Lucspook (
talk)
11:11, 18 September 2013 (UTC)
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![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 |
The current entry totally looks like an advertisement, or typed up by someone at Badoo. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.45.90.16 ( talk) 02:14, 25 November 2007 (UTC)
As Agoust 10, Badoo is still unavailable from South Korean IP's. It looks like is having a php problem. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.98.120.147 ( talk) 04:33, 10 August 2008 (UTC)
The reference No. 4 is a dead link. The Yahoo article has expired. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.160.172.189 ( talk) 19:30, 8 December 2008 (UTC)
I suggest that the recipients of the spam mentioned here are victims of the Koobface worm which affects most social networking sites including Facebook, and MySpace. Lumos3 ( talk) 16:08, 31 August 2009 (UTC)
I give up. For the benefit of your own edification, please be advised that Badoo's "user recruitig" operates exactly as the one for Tagged (Tagged is even higher on the Alexa lists but has no other notability than its spam, phishing and dishonesty...) You can compare this page: http://eu1.badoo.com/import/ to the complaints against Tagged, for example: http://www.consumerfraudreporting.org/phishing/taggeddotcom.jpg I hope sooner or later enough people complain about Badoo, so that you can stop ignoring their voices in your superficial Googling of notable sources. Until then, this article is neither useful nor truthful. We made a site that has absolute no notability other than its traffic (how manty porn sites do you find notable because of their traffic?) worthy of an article?! Instead of saying that it spams and harvests emails or not saying anything at all, we now lead people to believe that the site is quite safe... Oh well. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.62.38.20 ( talk) 01:53, 2 September 2009 (UTC)
actually, mates, there is a reliable description of the "40 million and counting" user signup process and proof of the fact that they send unsolicited bulk mail. the badoo import contacts page, quoted above, says that it will import contacts from msn, yahoo, aol, gmail "and 43 other webmail services." their privacy policy page, already referenced in the main article, says "...an email invitation will be sent on their behalf, to the email addresses of the contacts that have been uploaded and then selected to be invited." 76.166.179.20 ( talk) 07:12, 2 September 2009 (UTC)
Registrant:
PS: Why not just publish this talk as the page?
Mplungjan ( talk) 06:14, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
Can anyone provide a notable source that describes Badoo's spamming activities, until one is found they are all just individual POVs and are likely to be deleted. Lumos3 ( talk) 22:03, 28 August 2009 (UTC)
It seems from all the edit wars so far that Lumos3 ( talk) is the main biased party aiming to legitimize this entity. Why? May be he should gracefully recuse himself from further editing this one article. Just a suggestion. Not only on the spam issue. Look at the recent "Cyprus based" vs "London based." question. We had the wrong "London based" (which sounds more reassuring for the thousnds getting the scam emails who look at Wikipedia to see whether this is a legitimate enterprise or whether the privacy laws they expect apply to them), while the company is really based in Cyprus?!? Nobody bothered to look, but we leaving no stone unturned to prove or disprove if they spam or lie in the spam messages (for which I have about 10 proofs in my mailbox). The company location, for some reason, may be part of Badoo's deception strategy, because the Cyprus based company definitely wants to create an impression that they are based in the UK, for example by writing things like "...sensitive personal data, may be accessed from countries outside the UK. Please note that countries outside Europe may have lower standards of data protection than the UK." And why did Lumos3 ( talk) add the London offices in the infobox after finding out that he can't revert the Cyprus edit ad this is not a London based company? Why don't we add them all: Chile, Russia, Mexico, Brasil and other locations where they have offices? I think the corporate HQ is enough for the infobox, no? Wikipedia should not be used to make Badoo more legitimate!!! After all "It is a privae club with 45 million carefully selected members..." (ha, ha... we have to give it to them for the humor!) why should it need more legitimacy. Thanks for litening, Yours, multiple-time carefully selected nominee and, without my permission, multiple time member of the Badoo private club. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.166.179.20 ( talk) 18:26, 29 August 2009 (UTC)
I have no connection with Badoo and am not a member. All my edits are based on verifiable sources. Someone saying they recieved an email saying x is not a reliable source for an edit to an article. Both the Daily Telegraph and Guardian articles say it is British/ London based. The company does have registered offices in Cyprus and is open about this - the citations for this are from its own pages. Lumos3 ( talk) 22:14, 30 August 2009 (UTC)
Ok, by far the most common complaint on the Internet about Badoo are spam, deceitful way of recruiting users and disregard for privacy. From blogs in prestigious sites like LaStampa and blogs by unknown bloggers to the majority of comments on security forums:
http://www.lastampa.it/cmstp/rubriche/stampa.asp?ID_blog=141&ID_articolo=85 http://www.mywot.com/en/scorecard/badoo.com http://raoulteeuwen.blogspot.com/2009/06/badoo-sucks-evil-spam.html http://badooit.blogspot.com/2008/11/spam-badoo.html http://www.bloggercorner.com/2009/07/07/794/ http://www.mondoinformatico.info/elenco-dei-socialnetwork-e-dei-loro-servizi_post-6617.html etc. etc.
How many more do you need? Why can't these be synthesized and refrenced? To let the "... but McAfee didn't think so" (BTW, see user comments to that same reference) be left as the misleading conclusion of the spam issue in this article will be a travesty and a triumph of demagogy over reality. 76.166.179.20 ( talk) 03:46, 31 August 2009 (UTC)
Blogs are not considered reliable sources on Wikipedia. If this is an issue then it must have been covered in the media somewhere. My searches have found nothing. All we have at the moment is gossip. Lumos3 ( talk) 09:21, 31 August 2009 (UTC)
Users should only be warned if reliable sources can be found, and it looking at the current blogs it doesn't seen any have been found.-- Otterathome ( talk) 12:00, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
I have received such a phony email as well, and wondering what it was as I suspected something fishy, I went to wikipedia to see what it said about it. The article confirmed my doubts. Therefore it is a useful article. -- Anon ( talk) 06:58, 24 August 2009 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.200.170.249 ( talk) This user is NOT User:Anon
I totally agree with this comment. This article is also referenced from other pages as 'proof' that Badoo is a spam site. Rob —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.84.164.204 ( talk) 08:08, 26 August 2009 (UTC)
I agree that this page should not be deleted. It was the best source of information on Badoo that I found quickly and easily in a google search. Thank you to all that have contributed to it - Amelia 70.135.164.109 ( talk) 06:38, 6 January 2011 (UTC)
I come to Wikipedia to learn facts. I am usually rewarded with good and truthful content. Thank you for not deleting this article. I am now headed to the Wikipedia article about Jesus Christ.
I suspect the numbers on Badoo are pure hype! I apear to be a member even tho' I've never signed up or responded to any mail.... I'm sure it's pure cut and past info from numerous failed dating and networking sites! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.98.96.26 ( talk) 04:35, 26 February 2009 (UTC)
Same thing happened to me. Badoo accessed my contact list and emailed everyone on my behalf,Badoo is a total scam stay away from it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.10.145.59 ( talk) 01:00, 12 January 2011 (UTC)
I reverted this edit for several reasons:
Adrian J. Hunter( talk• contribs) 12:28, 10 February 2011 (UTC)
I am a public relations consultant working for Badoo. I would like to update the current page to include more detailed information about the company. I am keen to ensure that we abide by Wikipedia's rules, and only wish to update the page with factual information. My proposed update for the Badoo page is below - I would welcome feedback from the community before I make the update. If nobody objects, I would like to make this update on 30th August 2010.
Proposed update: Badoo is a social networking website, launched in 2006, which currently claims over 70 million registered users. Although available in most of the world, the site is particularly popular in France, Spain and Italy, as well as Latin America. (Source: Google Trends for Websites) Alexa.com ranks Badoo as the 52nd most popular site in France and the 150th globally.
Rather than enabling users to manage their existing social circles in an online environment, as with other social networks, the primary purpose of Badoo is to enable users to meet new people who they are not already socially connected to. According to the Crunchbase profile on Badoo, it “focuses on the forgotten area between social networks and dating websites, where people just want to socialize with new people and have fun.”
The site allows users to create profiles, send each other messages, and rate each other’s profile pictures at no cost, but charges fees for features which are designed to make the user’s profile more visible to other users, thereby increasing the opportunities to attract attention.
Charging for these enhanced visibility features is the site’s primary business model. Depending on their country, users can make payments by premium rate mobile SMS, PayPal, or credit card.
Badoo includes a geographic proximity feature, which identifies users’ locations based on analysis of their network connection. This lets users know if there are people near to their current location who may wish to meet.
The site also offers a mobile application, which also allows users to connect with others based on their location.
History The site was founded in 2006 in London. In January 2008, the Russian investment firm Finam paid $30m USD for a 10% stake in Badoo. Badoo first launched in Spain and is now one of the leading socializing sites in France, Italy, Spain and Latin America with over 70 million users worldwide
Badoo was founded by Andrey Andreev, an internet entrepreneur has had a successful career creating, running and successfully exiting online business ventures across Europe over the last decade. He created Begun (www.begun.ru) - Russia’s first contextual advertising services agency in 2002, and in 2004, founded Mamba (www.mamba.ru) - Russia’s biggest socializing platform. The companies Andrey was involved in, always attracted interest from many VCs and PE firms.
Open Source Contributions Badoo has release several pieces of software under an open source licence, including various improvements to the PHP scripting language, the Pinba real time statistics server, and the Blitz template engine. (Source: http://dev.badoo.com/)
In the Media Badoo was profiled in the Guardian’s PDA blog ( http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/pda/2008/mar/05/elevatorpitchwhybadoowants) in 2008. In January 2010 TechCrunch published an article ( http://eu.techcrunch.com/2010/01/05/social-network-badoo-is-banned-in-iran/) claiming that the service had been banned in Iran.
Criticism In a Cambridge University graduate student report, it was given the lowest score for privacy among 45 social networking sites examined.
92.238.40.49 ( talk) 13:54, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
I would like to add the following to the In the Media section for Badoo -
Financial Times - ‘Social dating’ takes Badoo ever higher" ( http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/fbd275c0-519a-11e0-888e-00144feab49a.html#axzz1HRVGKE9Y)
Business Insider - "The biggest StartUp you have never heard of is about to hit 108 million members" ( http://www.businessinsider.com/badoo-2011-2)
The Huffington Post - "Badoo Global Study ranked Athens as the most flirtatious city in the world." ( http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/01/worlds-most-flirtatious-c_n_829673.html#s247367&title=Athens__1)
The Independent Newspaper - "Facebook's biggest risers: 'Avatar' tops charts, Badoo second, 'Man v. Food' debuts" ( http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/facebooks-biggest-risers-avatar-tops-charts-badoo-second-man-v-food-debuts-2240288.html)
Seeking Alpha - "Have Quepasa Bears Run Out of Ammunition?" ( http://seekingalpha.com/article/257744-have-quepasa-bears-run-out-of-ammunition)
AllFacebook - "Badoo Retains Title Of Fastest Growing Facebook App" ( http://www.allfacebook.com/badoo-retains-title-of-fastest-growing-facebook-app-2011-03) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lloydgprice ( talk • contribs) 11:28, 24 March 2011 (UTC)
The current info contradicts itself. Luis Dantas ( talk) 21:54, 29 May 2009 (UTC) Badoo was started in November 2006 - http://corp.badoo.com/faq — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lloydgprice ( talk • contribs) 11:17, 24 March 2011 (UTC) Badoo encourages scammers and fakes because when they join they get more emails to spam its a win win situation and if like me you open your mouth you get banned. This is how I know its not a real site a real one is looking to remove the scammers and grow their site with proven real people. Protect your contacts and yourself dont join Badoo !!!! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.206.94.156 ( talk) 17:04, 12 July 2011 (UTC)
This is now a site within the top 100 on Alexa and has featured in a report on Yahoo finance. I believe it now has sufficient notablity to be an article. Lumos3 13:51, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
This site is now well outside the 'top 100' sites on alexa, is a well known scam/phishing site with a poor reputation. It should no longer be classed as a social networking site within wikipedia but an example of a data mining company. http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/badoo.com http://www.mywot.com/en/scorecard/badoo.com#top — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.220.141.90 ( talk) 08:56, 6 August 2011 (UTC)
According to Alexa.com, the Web Information Company, Badoo.com is a Top 50 website in 16 countries worldwide, can anyone report any bigger websites designed for meeting new people ?
Democratic Republic of Congo - 5th Cameroon - 6th Cote d'Ivoire - 10th Colombia - 27th Dominican Republic - 27th Argentina - 33rd Spain - 36th Algeria - 36th Ecuador - 36th Venezuela - 38th Czech Republic - 40th Portugal - 42nd Brazil - 44th Italy - 46th Chile - 47th France - 48th
Source : http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/badoo.com# — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lloydgprice ( talk • contribs) 16:24, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
Facebook -- Canhazanonymous ( talk) 10:21, 6 August 2011 (UTC)
The following links have been brought to my attention, and could likely be used to improve this article and Andrey Andreev.
-- Jimbo Wales ( talk) 10:59, 3 October 2011 (UTC)
"In November 2010, Forbes reported a rumour that the site may float in 2011"
Really? Wow. I've never seen a website float before. WTF — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.201.173.124 ( talk) 04:15, 4 October 2011 (UTC)
I see there is modification wars going around whether or not the "invitation" messages are spam. My personal experience couldn't be more telling; I got one of these "messages" telling me I've got a friend message at Badoo. Trying to see it I was forced to register. After registering there was NO messages!! This is total scam, don't give ANY of your personal info to this site..... -- 81.197.76.159 ( talk) 01:22, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
Badoo is advertising heavily in NYC on the subway system. Advertising sometimes takes up all of the ad space in an train car. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.80.233.29 ( talk) 00:01, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
Reading through these comments, the one thing that clearly comes through is that there's a flaw in wikipedia policy on citing sources. To any user who has fallen victim to Badoo's spam (and who is sufficiently computer literate to distinguish it from the third-party spam that was being mentioned) this is fact, not conjecture. If a journalist from the Guardian or the Telegraph - who generally have no qualifications in the fields they write about - were to describe this in a published article, it would become no more or less true. Wikipedia provides a service to its users (including journalists!) - it supplies information. A key piece of information that any visitor to this page would want to have is that Badoo sends unsolicited e-mails. But for whatever reason we are unable to supply this imformation, simply waiting for some journalist to say it first so we can hide behind them as a source - which they may never bother doing because no newspaper editor may consider Badoo spam a subject worth writing about. The result is that the only important information can be obtained by reading the talk page, not the article itself, which is a sad state of affairs. The only solution I can offer is to nominate this article for deletion, on the grounds that we can't write it properly until mainstream media do so first, which seems to be the unfortunate reality. Palefire ( talk) 10:45, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
I note the comments above regarding Wikipedia's rules for 'reliable sources', but unfortunately, many of those 'reliable sources' are now based on Wikipedia entries. It is the classic chicken and egg situation - Wikipedia cannot trust itself until someone else has published its information. Another potential point of failure in Wikipedia, is that the onus is placed on people to 'disprove' a claim made in an article after it is posted, rather than for the author to prove it before publication. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.248.94.160 ( talk) 01:56, 25 November 2012 (UTC)
I have made several edits to the article regarding the security and privacy of Badoo.com. All have been reverted without checking if they were valid, which is easily done for a public website.
I have no intention of starting an edit war, regarding the Badoo entry. I simply want facts to be displayed on Wikipedia; and as it is obvious on the Talk page for the article, there are serious concerns, which are easily verifiable with a basic knowledge of computers.
With reference to reversions by Sciencewatcher:
The article references the commercial website itself - i.e. Badoo.com, which apparently is treated by yourself as a 'trusted resource'. However, you personally take the approach that the same website cannot be used as a reference for criticism, only positive references are allowed. I suggest you are not in a neutral position on this matter, and lack the basic technical knowledge to verify the amendments to the article that you revert.
Sciencewatcher, and a user with an IP address located in Russia, have also continually failed to address several important questions which were raised in the Talk page, including one in which reference number 20 clearly points to a spam website including pornography (I note that the Russuan contributer has now changed the article and it is in fact reference number 19 which points to a spam site), and another where Sciencewatcher stated that you had 'tested the website', obviously without you having registered to verify correctly the statements that were made in the edit you reverted.
There is an 'OfficialBadoo' video on YouTube that uses a Gmail account to register and explore the site:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ECcBV25wQE
I followed the same basic process, and the results can be seen here, signing in with a Gmail account, and the video includes the cookie details of the user preferences, including personal details, that you keep reverting:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_5LDvQ0A0E
To Sciencewatcher: Thank you for your warnings, regarding Wikipedia regulations, but perhaps you might like to look to yourself (and your own Talk page), before continually reverting factually correct amendments to an article that are displayed on Wikipedia. Wikipedia is not a website that should be used by companies to gain credibility by posting their own articles.
I feel strongly about this; if editors of articles are not sufficiently knowledgeable, or able, to verify an articles amendments, they should refrain for editing and reverting, and certainly refrain from warning users who are capable of the simple task of checking the veracity of an article, not to do so. As mentioned on my edit to Sciencewatchers Talk page: I will post this in its entirety on the Talk page for the Badoo.com article.
In summary, please watch this simple verification of the amendments regarding lack of privacy cookies on Badoo - you can either try it yourself, or simply find an area where you the capability to give an informed opinion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Perambulator3 ( talk • contribs) 21:14, 7 December 2012 (UTC)
While checking the article, I noticed that several of the positive comments are referenced from Badoo itself.
A *warning* - reference number 20, as of the date of this posting, links to http://allsiteslike.com/badoo - which in turn redirects to a spam site that can also include pornography. The original citation is "According to their website FAQ, Badoo claims to employ over 200 people internationally".
As can be seen from the article history, I have added some comments in two areas regarding the sites security and privacy. I note that some feel this needs to be verified by a third party, but the most obvious way to verify a public website, is to simply look for yourselves - I do not ask a stranger who has a financial interest to read a web page to me, I read the web page itself. Disclosure: I am a Badoo.com paid member, and a software developer for 22 years; I have no affiliation with Badoo.com or any other social website. In order to observe the web site tracking cookies, I used Firefox, and the Firebug plugin - both open source tools - and all the personal information that is stored in the cookie from Badoo.com is in plain text, with no attempt at encryption.
When security loopholes are fixed, I have updated the article to reflect this. Privacy is a major concern for any company collecting personal details, sexual orientation, and payment information.
If there has to be an article about this company, it cannot be simply a promotional article; it must be factually correct.
I apologise in advance if my English is incorrect; it is not my first language. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Perambulator3 ( talk • contribs) 17:07, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
That would be OR. I think you really need to start reading wikipedia policies. -- sciencewatcher ( talk) 23:37, 7 December 2012 (UTC)
The article currently states, "Badoo has been accused of increasing its membership through unsolicited emails but McAfee did not find evidence for this." This is misleading. The unsolicited emails that are referred to in the various blogs etc. judged above to be non-notable are sent to addresses in the address books of Badoo members. In other words, a person with no affiliation to Badoo may receive an unsolicited email if someone who has that person's email address in their address book joins Badoo. See our article on contact scraping. The current wording falsely implies that McAfee investigated this practice. My understanding is that all that McAfee would have done is signed up to Badoo using a purpose-made email address and waited to see how many emails that address received. So this test does not contradict the claims of unsolicited emailing.
For now I'm just removing the whole sentence. If someone finds a reliable source describing Badoo's emailing practices they should add it. Adrian J. Hunter( talk• contribs) 12:52, 22 September 2009 (UTC)
Let me try to clarify. There are two questions here:
(1) Does Badoo send unsolicited emails about Badoo to people who have never signed up to Badoo, by retrieving those people's email addresses from the address books of people who have signed up?
(2) Does signing up to Badoo cause the person who signed up to receive spam from third parties?
The debate on this page is about question (1). Various sources claim yes, but as yet, none has been judged sufficiently reliable for inclusion in Wikipedia.
McAfee routinely checks whether signing up to a particular website with a throw-away email address causes that same email address to receive spam. This pertains to question (2). McAfee is a reliable source and I trust their conclusion that the answer to question (2) is no. But to my knowledge, they have not investigated question (1). The sentence I removed from the article implied that McAfee had investigated question (1).
Adrian J. Hunter( talk• contribs) 04:36, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
I'm not sure what you mean. (2) is not worth mentioning in the article as the fact they don't cause you to receive third-party spam is unremarkable. (1) would certainly be worth mentioning if we can find a reliable source... but the consensus seems to be that we haven't found one yet. Adrian J. Hunter( talk• contribs) 13:20, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
Why not create a large group of purpose made throw away emails? You make test1@fake.com, then add test emails 2-10 as contacts. Sign up to Badoo using test1@fake, and see if the other emails receive any unsolicited emails? You could do this for clusters of emails, including various levels of use of the site, and have a control group where none of them sign up. Then, you can find whether there is a statistically significant number of emails received by the emails that *didn't* sign up. 205.208.124.128 ( talk) 20:03, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
This website is very notable. It sends out spam, its a scam. How come there is no mention of the endless spam! -- Cat chi? 03:15, 13 January 2011 (UTC)
I too have received spam from this site claiming that I have a message from someone I've never heard of, only to ask me for personal information when I try to view it. 90.30.150.32 ( talk) 15:30, 24 December 2011 (UTC)
Don't you also receive SPAM from facebook? I do. 178.197.234.3 ( talk) 00:26, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Just got a mail from badoo, "someone has left a message for you", of course you can only view the message if you register. and it really was someone who does know me very very well, how else would he have known i will register as "sdfghdfjdfjh" and use this name in the message to me? 87.154.178.162 ( talk) 22:07, 3 September 2012 (UTC)
Yes, me too. Definitely a scammy spam service. Fuckers. Time to do some editing of this article... -- sciencewatcher ( talk) 14:19, 17 October 2012 (UTC)
Don't edit out of anger. Synergee ( talk) 08:10, 26 November 2012 (UTC)
First facebook does the same. Secondly this article isn't neutral. I can only read American hate towards a successful russian company. Too bad for Facebook. 178.197.234.3 ( talk) 00:21, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
217.33.234.250 ( talk) 14:30, 25 October 2009 (UTC) Badoo i find is well known to the ghanan/Nigerian Scamming fraternaty, they freiquently steal photos from any site they can get onto, showing someone in one or two poses, then they create a profile on badoo, saying they are british/american, either high powered business men or service men. they then start chatting to any woman who comes accross as wanting company. they then move the person onto msn/yahoo straight away, bombard them with messages and nudges just so that the female chatter is concentrating on them totally. after a brief period of chatting the scammer then tells the female that they are divorced/widdowed and have a child, the scammer suddenly has to go overseas to work, and they have run out of money to pay the nanny. they then start badgering the female to send money via a money order to pay for the nanny or a flight home. the owners of badoo do little to stop this, the scam profiles are easy to find, just keep an eye out on the education listing, they normally put a british and or american collage then post either ghanan or nigerian place too. other dating/networking sites, have filters in place to stop the scammers getting through, but it seems that badoo do little to stop the scams
Hi, I joined badoo as I wanted to make friends, but I was scammed by a guy called Luigi Del Torrino, who apparently was in the army, retired then went home to Austin, Texas then was visiting me in Cape Town, all the while playing me like a fiddle. The conversations 3 months later eventually revealed his true nature when he asked me for money, I have just found out that I was not the only one he was so in love with as I received a message on my face book page from another woman asking me the exact same questions that I was battling to answer myself, this man is very good, even has a full on american accent, I was lucky all I lost was my heart and that can be fixed, thank goodness I have good friends who advised me every step of the way and made sure that I parted with no cash. This has put me off social dating sites completely and after allot of soul searching and self discrimination I can now close this very stressful and heart wrenching chapter. — Preceding
unsigned comment added by
197.172.37.10 (
talk)
07:54, 19 May 2013 (UTC)
In my survey and test of over 100 profiles, OVER 90% of the profiles are FAKE, scammers.
Hi All, I think the Badoo page is off to a great start. I do think there's room for a few of updates, further information to add, better structure etc to make it comparable to some of the longer pages about other similar companies. I've read some of the past talk pages and seen some discussion there - i'm not planning on removing anything (maybe updating r.e. new numbers etc) just adding and maybe re-ordering to make the page more comprehensive. I'll share edits as i write them - hopefully nothing too controversial but I think edits would fall under the 'major-edits' categories.
— Lucspook ( talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. The preceding unsigned comment was added at 12:16, 12 June 2013 (UTC) (UTC).
Hi all, I think the Badoo page has had a great start. Not to diminish the work already done in any way, I think it can be built upon to be a bit more robust and consistent with other wikipedia pages about other similar services.
I saw some of the discussions on the talk pages and have done quite some digging and research and have taken the opportunity to update the page. I have really tried to take some of the sensitivities discussed into account so I hope people feel this is a fair representation - it has all been done in good faith and I look forward to feedback and edit suggestions. I've been working it in my sandbox for a while now but I think it's ready to share!
— Lucspook ( talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. The preceding unsigned comment was added at 12:16, 12 June 2013 (UTC) (UTC).
Extended content
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Badoo is an online social networking service whose mission is to provide the world’s easiest, fastest and most fun way for people to meet each other locally and globally. Badoo is not only the largest, but also the fastest growing social network for meeting new people globally [5]. The social discovery, dating-oriented social network, was founded in Spain in November 2006 by Andrey Andreev and a small group of international programmers and tech entrepreneurs. Badoo was originally a basic photo sharing website but evolved into a social networking and dating website in 2008. As Badoo is a meeting place for adults, nobody under the age of 18 is eligible to sign up for the service [6]. Users must register before using Badoo [7] . They can then create an account and instantly upload photos, videos and chat to other users. Additionally, Badoo offers a premium service where users can pay to customise and increase viewings of their profile as well as play games [7] . Just one year after it’s launch Badoo had 12 million members [8] and as of 2013 had over 183 million members worldwide [9] with more than 125,000 new users joining everyday and over 35 million active users per month, uploading over 3 million photos daily [10] . In 2008 Finam Capital injected $30m into Badoo and the company now has an annual run rate of $150 million, from around 1 million paying users every month [11] . Badoo has an office in London, UK [5]. Jimmy Wales, Co-Founder of Wikipedia, nominated Badoo CEO and Founder Andreev as one of ‘50 People Who Will Change The World 2012,’ in Wired Magazine’s Smart List 2012. Wales said he was “intrigued by Badoo's growth to over 120 million users in an under-the-radar way,” and that Andreev seemed “a smart, serious, interesting tech geek on a mission to create something that people like” [12] . In June 2013 Alexa.com rated Badoo's global ranking as 129 [13]. Notes
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Lucspook ( talk) 19:24, 24 July 2013 (UTC) — Lucspook ( talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
Hi Lucspook.
Even though you modified text all over the article, let's look only at the first three paragraphs for now. Let's look at how they looked before you made your changes, and how they looked after you made them.
Before-and-after comparison
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Here are the first three paragraphs as they were before you tried rewriting the article.
Next, let's look at the first three paragraphs as they were after your most recent edits.
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Adrian, and others, looked at the changes you wanted to make. He wrote above: "This draft reads like a press release, with a tone completely inappropriate for an encyclopedia. All mention of controversy has been stripped from the lead, contrary to MOS:LEAD." Neither your changes, nor the new lead you wrote, were ever acceptable.
You tried to push your unacceptable changes into the article multiple times. Sometime after each attempt, a different Wikipedian reverted your changes: Adrian, [5] SFK2, [6] and myself. [7]
On Wikipedia, it's all about consensus. If you want to make controversial changes to an article, you must establish consensus on the article's talk page. Please see WP:CON. From the fact that three users reverted your changes, it's clear that the consensus is that your changes are not acceptable here. If you repeatedly try to push your changes through without consensus, you will eventually simply be blocked from editing Wikipedia. Instead, you may speak here, explain why you think your changes are good, and try to convince us to come to a consensus that your changes are good. But, without consensus here, Wikipedia guidelines make it clear that you must not attempt to push your changes into the article again.
If you decide to seek consensus here for your proposed changes, it might be simpler if you break up the changes into many small chunks and that you discuss each chunk separately. Try to propose the least controversial chunk first, then wait and see if we agree.
Cheers, — Unforgettableid ( talk) 04:29, 12 September 2013 (UTC)
I propose a new section on growth. I believe it to be neutral, well sourced and cited:
Following Badoo’s launch, it’s strongest markets were Southern Europe and Latin America. Its popularity grew rapidly and in 2012 it was achieving 60% growth and adding more than 125,000 new users year on year, according to Techcrunch [13] .
Badoo was officially launched in the USA on 23rd March 2012 with a campaign led by Nick Cannon, an American actor, comedian, rapper, TV and radio personailty. The launch was a three day project involving four fashion photograpers taking new online profile pictures for 1,000 New Yorkers. The 24 best pictures were chosen through a Facebook ‘likes’ campaign and used on billboards and taxi advertising to promote Badoo’s launch [14] .
Since November 2011 mobile usage has increased by 100% [15]. Badoo’s Facebook page, as of June 2013, has over 8.7 million likes [16] .
Lucspook ( talk) 11:08, 18 September 2013 (UTC)
I propose a factual section on Badoo's apps below. The text is neutral and well sourced.
Badoo Apps Badoo is present on almost every mobile platform. The first App to be released by Badoo was for the iPhone 3 in December 2010 [17] . This was followed by the Android App in February 2011 [18] , Blackberry App in December 2011, Windows in August 2012 [19] and HTML 5 in 2013 along with the new iPad app [20] . The iPad app has been well received and currently has a user rating of 4.5 out of 5 in the iTunes store. In 2013 Badoo’s android app was featured as one of PC Magazine's ‘100 best Android Apps of 2013’ [21] . Badoo has just released a Firefox version of Badoo, which is present on the Firefox marketplace.
In 2011 Badoo’s Facebook app broke into the ‘Top 3 Facebook Apps in the World,’according to appdata.com [22] .
As of June 2013 the Badoo app has been rated: – Google Play – average of 4.5 out of 5 with (over 500,000) 490,297 reviews and over 350K 5 star reviews [23] . – Blackberry app store – 4 out of 5 [24] . – Androidpit - 4.5 out of 5 with (over 500,000) 489,359 reviews [25] . – iTunes App Store – 4.5 out of 5 from 468 (404) reviewers [26] .
Lucspook (
talk)
11:11, 18 September 2013 (UTC)
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