Talk:Badoo/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

A Rewrite?

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)

South Korea

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)

Dead link

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)

Spam reports and Koobface

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)

Dude, you are trying too hard. You wish. But you are wrong. Not everyone on this discussion page who investigated the spam problem is stupid. This spam is being willingly perpetrated by Badoo, has been going since long before Koobface, comes from Badoo's own mail server farms and network ranges, which are even verified with current spf records for badoo.com (v=spf1 ip4:87.245.192.0/21 ip4:66.175.123.0/24 ip4:194.228.191.0/24 ip4:66.119.86.0/24 -all). Don't blame it on Koobface. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.62.38.20 (talk) 20:57, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

That is still original research unless you have a reliable source. Take your information to a reliable newspaper and have it published. Wikipedia is not the place to post original work. I have nothing against posting the information about Badoo as long as it can be supported by independant coverage from a reliable source.--TParis00ap (talk) 22:13, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Smilarity to Tagged

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)

I was tempted to reply something uncivil but I will just once again point out that user opinions are not fact, they are opinions. Wikipedia is based on reliable sources and not how many people agree that a website spams their inbox.--TParis00ap (talk) 01:58, 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)

If you can use that information to write a sentance or two, feel free. I don't have an account or I might give it a go.--TParis00ap (talk) 09:22, 2 September 2009 (UTC)

thanks, but i think someone more gifted in the art of wikipedia prose should do it. it probably fits with the lowest privacy standards from the guardian the daily telegraph reference. or with the claim that they have 40 mil. users, i don't know... 76.166.179.20 (talk) 18:02, 2 September 2009 (UTC)

DNS lookup

Registrant:

Badoo WorldWide Limited

Blake Building, Suite 306,

Corner of Eyre and

Hutson Street

Belize City, Belize ---

BZ

442070999939

Fax:442070999940

Record last updated 05-19-2009 11:53:54 AM

Record expires on 05-26-2012

Record created on 05-26-2003

dnsstuff

PS: Why not just publish this talk as the page?

Mplungjan (talk) 06:14, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

RfC: Is Badoo is spam site and should that claim belong on Wikipedia

Wikipedia is not a place to slam Badoo. It is an encyclopedia, not a place to warn people of the evils of the world. The biggest policy here is WP:NOTSOAPBOX but these policies also have effect: WP:NOTFREESPEECH and WP:NOT#OR--TParis00ap (talk) 20:36, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

That is correct. This is a unique situation and I see it has been in discussion for 2 years. Fact: Badoo is notable enough to warrant an article. Fact: it is indisputably based on unsolicited emails. The article should reflect the truth in a factual way. That would not be soapbox. On the other hand the very existence of the article may be soapbox because it is written in such a way as to promote the company. If we can not say for sure (because it has not been rigorously tested and we can not quote enough properly documented evidence) that the site relies on unsolicited emails then we should be able to say that it is "alleged". That certainly is a fact. Robotics1 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 19:29, 28 August 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)

You just quietly deleted some verifiable evidence, the exact quote of their spambot campaign "You have a new message on Badoo!..." Also, scroll to the bottom of your own McAfee reference. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.62.38.20 (talk) 01:01, 29 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)

User:Lumos3, any disclosures under WP:CONFLICT?

10 spam emails in your inbox is not a WP:RS as far as WP:Verifiability. The spamming issue needs independant coverage. Not a million "I got spammed" on the talk page.--TParis00ap (talk) 15:21, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

Yes, you are right, but because it is a fact (they do spam, they do harvest email addresses and they do trick naive users into creating accounts and giving their email passwords...), it will be hard to hide behind the "lack of evidence" wall for very long. Some diligent Wikipedian will find or formulate the acceptable evidence for us. I am starting by adding their 'privacy scorecard' according to Cambridge U. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.136.154.30 (talk) 16:49, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

And that is fine if they do, I am not in Europe, have never used the site, and don't care if it spams or not. But without WP:RS it is an unsourced attack. Wikipedia is not the place to warn users. It is a place of fact supported by reliable sources. If a reliable source is found, it should be included. Until then, original research and opinion should not be in the article. Just because "everyone knows it's true" does not mean everyone knows it's true.--TParis00ap (talk) 19:14, 30 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)

Can someone please stop the British/London based madness already? Wikipedia can be more accurate than the Guardian and less easily fooled. They are an offshore company. An IBC. In Cyprus!!! OK? Not in London. Some of their other hosting registrations and netblocks belong to another offshore company in Bermuda. Also easy to look up. Please look at the Wikipedia entries for offshore company and International Business Company (IBC). And why people use these. If, whoever wants to get the benefits and anonymity of operating as an offshore company, they might just have to live with the slight disadvantages of not being able to claim the prestige of their own country! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.136.154.30 (talk) 00:20, 31 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)

I agree with Lumos3, blogs are not reliable sources because they are not editted. Any person can create a blog and type whatever they wish. McAfee is an established company with expertise in security and privacy, it is a much better source with experts with college degrees in computer science versus regular users who just want to connect with high school alumni. Further, it seems Lumos3 has found creditable information disproving Badoo as a spam site. Please read the Koobface article.

Users can be easily fooled. A spoof site can trick users into believing they are on Badoo when they are actually on a fake. They enter their personal information and BAM they get spammed. Further, many virus' could spread spam like the Koobface one. Facebook and MySpace are hit with similar attacks all the time. Infact, myspace as instituted new technology that verifies links before it will let users access them so they can block these spoofs at will. Security experts know how to tell the difference between spoofs, viruses, and legitimate sites. Bloggers do not. 1 million blogs means only that 1 million users have no technical computer background at all but like to blog about their problems. That is an easily believed scenerio.--TParis00ap (talk) 19:16, 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)

Do not delete

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 think I see what you are saying. You are saying in not so many words that truth should prevail. Badoo is a real entity therefore it is valid to have an article about it? But that article has to reflect the truth, that Badoo is pushing itself by less than ethical means. I guess once you have $30m invested there is a lot of pressure to succeed by fair means or foul. Robotics1 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 12:14, 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.

Badoo data mining!

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)

Yes, I totally agree. The data is highly questionable. I only found out about Badoo because of their annoying spam. This article is an obvious advertisement for them, so I've put a cleanup tag at the top, in line with the various criticisms on this talk page. Palefire (talk) 22:54, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes, and this warrants a change of the site's definition from "social networking site" to "scam." Unless we try to define something like "involuntary social networking" as a type of business activity. Most of the "members" are being harvested and signed up automatically and without their consent via links in spam emails, which create usernames and passwords for them. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.62.38.20 (talk) 00:06, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

I have not had any spam (yet), but Bad(oo) is bad - it raided my Address Book and e-mailed all in it. Very embarrassing. BEWARE. DON'T TOUCH IT. Spanishexile :::: —Preceding unsigned comment added by Spanishexile (talk • contribs) 20:06, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

I got such a mail just yesterday. The person who was written in that mail as sender swears, that he did not send a Badoo invitation e mail to me. Maybe some kind of data mining and abuse of data. -88.130.107.203 (talk) 21:27, 19 July 2010 (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)

Edit by Lloydgprice

I reverted this edit for several reasons:

• The new lead sounded promotional in tone.
• There was a citation to CrunchBase which, as a user-editable site, fails Wikipedia's criteria for a reliable source (WP:SPS).
• "The site originated in Russia" was changed to "The site originated in Europe", with no change to the existing citation ([1]), which states that Badoo originated in Russia.

Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} 12:28, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

There was some good info in the Finam Capital source that Lloydgprice provided ([2]), which I've integrated into the History section. Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} 12:42, 10 February 2011 (UTC

I would like to update this page

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)

Thank you for being open about your affiliation, and I appreciate your posting on the talk page before editing. Please read Wikipedia's guideline on conflict of interest if you haven't already, and consider creating an account to facilitate communication.

You should be aware that your activity here is likely to generate increased interest in this article, both from its past contributors and from other Wikipedians. That would likely lead to an expansion of this article, which may include the addition of information that would not be flattering to the company. In particular, the only reason the article does not yet mention Badoo's spamming is that none of the article's (rather few, relatively inexperienced) contributors have yet found a sufficiently reliable source documenting it. This could change.

A few comments about your proposed edit:

• It's difficult to find scholarly information about social networking sites, and the Cambridge University study is particularly valuable as the only scholarly reference this article has. Thus I don't support your shift of that study's result from the top of the article to the bottom, and I don't think many people would. Note also that many contributors oppose criticism sections, prefering both positive and negative views incorporated throughout articles.

• The tone of your proposed edit is promotional, rather than neutral. For example, the opening paragraph places undue emphasis on Badoo's popularity, and there's unwarranted fawning over Andreev ("successful"... "successfully"... "always attracted interest"). You've also removed negative commentary from Top Ten Reviews.

• There's no reason to add "claiming" to what TechCrunch says unless you have reason to doubt their claim. My (limited) experience reading TechCrunch is that they're far more accurate than most mainstream news sources.

• CrunchBase can't be used as a source per policy on self-published sources.

• Details of payment options are not appropriate in an encyclopedia article.

Cheers, Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} 15:44, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Adrian, thanks for taking the time to provide feedback - I will bear all of this in mind when making the update. I would like to stress that it is not our intention to bury or remove negative information, or to include promotional material. I do however feel that there is more to say about the company than is currently published on this page and simply want to bring the content up to date as transparently and openly as possible.

LanceText (talk) 15:37, 31 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)

Started in 2003 or 2006?

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)

Notability

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)

Badoo.com : Market Leader worldwide as a Meeting Network ??

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)

Some relevant links

The following links have been brought to my attention, and could likely be used to improve this article and Andrey Andreev.

1. Telegraph UK
2. Times UK
3. Sunday Times UK
4. Wired UK

--Jimbo Wales (talk) 10:59, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

Floating websites

"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)

Spam 1

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)

Yes, I had a similar thing - although I didn't bother registering, I could tell it was spam.

It's a bit of a difficult situation when it comes to articles like this. Badoo isn't a proper social networking site, it's just a small money-making scam - the claim that it has 22 million users is clearly rubbish. It's possible that a large number of people have been conned into registering, as you were, but I can't believe it's in the millions. So really the only piece of information the reader needs is "This is a scam site - avoid." But you're always going to get a few energetic users like Geeria (who is actually not a registered user, and whose only contribution to wikipedia has been to advertise Badoo) dragging us into a time-wasting edit war.

I suppose we need to ask an administrator to block the page. It's really an abuse of wikipedia to be PR-ing a scam site like this. And the unsigned and non-existent users who revert our edits are unsurprisingly refusing to discuss this on the talk page.

By the way, 81.197.76.159, it would help if you signed your edits too.

Palefire (talk) 20:01, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the answer, I thought that was the case with Geeria, and Badoo indeed.. Just dislike the publicity on my part ;) But if it must be done to kill scams..

Oh, just noticed I dont even have an account, created. I have an older account at WP FI --Tntuof (talk) 23:24, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

I have had the spam experience as well, the spam part is true. Geeria, stop acting like an *-Hole arguing it's not proven and leave it there, it's true, they do exactly that. They trick new subscribees into giving away their login credentials to MSN and whetever else and spamming their entire cointact lists.

Kleena (talk)

Wow, I am so glad to see I am not alone. I am absolutely incensed by this article. It is blatant advertising and I can't understand why it is still there. I have added a paragraph about this which will no doubt be removed by the badoo representatives. How can we get rid of this? --Robotics1 (talk) 23:53, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

I got such an Invitation as well, 99% sent by a robot, then my account was deleted after I complained (wanted to know, where they've got my email from) ... If there would have been a part of the article "criticism" or "spam" with what I read now here in the talk, I would never have created an account and even uploaded a picture to try to read a private message, witch finally was: "this could be interesting for you". First step in signing up was: "give us the password of your email-account to see if some of your friends are at badoo as well". That's how they got my email probably, cause I don't get spam apart from that. I would appreciate very much more criticism on this page. Don't let us loose the fight against paid badoo agents advertising on wikipedia. (german version of badoo) JohanDeGaule (talk) 23:34, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

Advertising

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)

If we can't write this article properly, we should delete it

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)

You misunderstand Wikipedia's purpose. It is not to supply information. It is an encyclopedia. It does not store any or all information nor does it store indescriminitly. Wikipedia must maintain a nuetral point of view and not give undue weight to a particular side, especially without reliable sources. I already went to WP:3 about this and they agreed that it should not be added without reliable sources. Please, let's not drag this subject out anymore until someone finds a source for the claims. I am not in the UK, have never even heard of Badoo before this article, and am not signed up, I am a completely nuetral party trying to stick to the policies of Wikipedia.--TParis00ap (talk) 17:46, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Actually, Palefire and others here seem to understand better Wikipedia's purpose which is more than mindlessly repeating the rules. We also need a rule for common sense. If anyone is interested in the systematic problems that this discussion reveals, they are quite simple: Reliable sources frequently rely on unreliable or commercial sources. (duh!) Reliable sources can be used to construct unreliable statements. The Guardian article and the McAfee "clean bill of health" here, so widely used in previous revisions, are simple but symptomatic examples. The Guardian aricle is a despicable press-junket; it printed what the Badoo PR department offered as "a source" to some fake softball questions. Reliable newspapers print and rehash commercial press releases all the time. Is this a surprise to you? They also print ads. The McAfee robot database of "innocent until proven guilty" websites answered a different spam question than the one being discussed and was not any verification that Badoo doesn't spam. (Thanks to those editors who managed to point this out and fix the outrageous BS reality that this article was constructing at one point...) Seriously, people, if you think that infomercials which are on TV are reliable because TV is a reliable and established broadcasting medium, then there is something wrong with the system. Or, if you think that because Symantec said that Brian Madoff's computers were new and up-to-date, it means that Symantec verified the reliability of Madoff's corporate financial systems... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.215.113.48 (talk) 09:32, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

I broadly agree with both Palefire and 75.215.113.48 above in that maintaining a high standard of verifiability is coming at the cost of the completeness of this article. But I still think deletion is an over-reaction. I note that the second sentence of the current version of this page is "In a Cambridge University report, [Badoo] was given the lowest score for privacy among 45 social social networking sites examined." That really ought to set off alarm bells to any clueful reader. And 75.215.113.48 — we do have a rule for common sense — see Wikipedia:What "Ignore all rules" means#Use common sense. Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} 11:22, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

WP:Verifiability is a policy and states that the threshold for inclusion is verifiability, not truth. Just because we say it is true doesn't mean it can be included. Also WP:LIBEL is a Wikimedia policy, which trumps WP:IAR which is a Wikipedia policy. Just because we say it is true doesn't mean it can be included. Wikipedia cannot defame Badoo without reliable sources, it would open the WMF up to being sued. Unless reliable sources are found, we just cannot add anything about the spam from the site. Unfortunately, others mistake Wikipedia as being a source of information rather than a collection of encyclopedic content. I've already openned up one RfC for this and the result was not to include the information without reliable sources. If you feel it is neccessary to do it again, feel free. I am not mindlessly citing rules, I am supporting my argument against the addition of the information with community agreed upon rules. Don't be upset that your position cannot likewise be supported.--TParis00ap (talk) 21:45, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

It's not clear who you're referring to in your last sentence, TParis00ap. Palefire and I understand your arguement and are not pushing for the inclusion of unreliable sources. Seems to me that all of us, including the IP above, are simply frustrated we can't make this a better article. Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} 04:48, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

I gotcha. Sorry if I implied your lack of understanding. I've been at this debate for quite awhile and most folks don't seem to get it. I understand folk's fustration and I am sure I'd be fustrated too if I received those emails. Anyway, sorry again.--TParis00ap (talk) 21:24, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

Hey no worries, my post wasn't as clear as it could have been. If only there were as many good sources about Badoo as there are about Tagged. :-( Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} 08:19, 21 November 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)

Candidate for deletion due conflict of interest, and possible corruption of WikiPedia?

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)

References - are they acceptable?

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)

Please stop edit warring and adding your own WP:OR. All information must be from a reliable source. You can't just say 'the cookie contains xxx'. Even if that is true, it's still original research. --sciencewatcher (talk) 18:29, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

Sciencewatcher - please refrain from attempting to control Wikipedia. Your opinion is one of many, and you need to learn to deal with that. I hope you can find peace in your mind. If you do not know how to use a computer, I would suggest you donate it to your local primary school, as there are people there who can use it properly. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Perambulator3 (talk • contribs) 19:39, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

It's not my opinion - it's wikipedia policy, which I'd advise you to read. Also please be WP:CIVIL. --sciencewatcher (talk) 20:22, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

It is your interpretation, which is de facto, your opinion. From WP:OR "The prohibition against OR means that all material added to articles must be attributable to a reliable published source, even if not actually attributed". Please explain how a public website, that can be checked by anyone with an internet connection, is an allowable, even attributable, source for publishing an article on Wikipedia, but that exact same source is not allowable for commenting on the article in a response? I am being civil, I did not insult any primary school children. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Perambulator3 (talk • contribs) 21:00, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

I checked the source code for the page, and also the cookies. There is no SQL code in the source for www.badoo.com for a non-logged-in user, and there isn't even any utmv cookie. So you have done some original research and apparently found out these things which only apply to YOU when you yourself are logged in. Even if anyone could see that info by looking in the cookies and html source, it would still be original research I believe, but because it only applies to you it is DEFINITELY, 100%, NO QUESTION ABOUT IT original research. On the other hand if you wanted to write a blog post about this AND if you got it published on a news blog like techcrunch.com it would be okay to reference it. --sciencewatcher (talk) 21:28, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

Then sign up and repeat your experiment - it is free, according to the website - if you are seriously interested in a valid article. My edit explicitly states 'when logged in to the website'. Why did you not sign up, do you have privacy concerns? It is also interesting that you concentrated on revoking edits regarding privacy, but you have not even performed a visit to the website until now, and have still not checked the veracity of the references in the article itself. I await your report having used the website as a registered user. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Perambulator3 (talk • contribs) 22:08, 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)

Mcafee on unsolicited emails

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)

How is McCafe, a leading corporate designer of anti-spam and anti-virus software, not a reliable source?--TParis00ap (talk) 17:47, 4 October 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)

Ok, that makes sense. Thanks. In that case, would it not help the case for those who believe it is a spam based site to include it with that explanation you just gave me but Wikified? Although it would have to be written so as not to be WP:OR and not give WP:UNDUE.--TParis00ap (talk) 21:29, 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)

Spam 2

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)

Because no-one's yet found a reliable source we can cite that describes it as such; that's what most of this talk page is about. If you find one, please tell us! Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} 03:48, 13 January 2011 (UTC)

There were recently a few items regarding Badoo on one of Finland's largest daily newspapers [[3]] and [[4]]. Unfortunately, both of the articles are in finnish and thus might be less than useless for readers of the english article. DiscoNova (talk) 15:50, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes – some information from the former was just incorporated into the article by 193.185.189.163 (talk). The articles themselves might be useless to English readers, but that's all the more reason to work their content into this article, if someone can read them. Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} 03:51, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

I invited a Finnish speaking editor here to have a look. My request is here. I tried to be as neutral as possible so as not to WP:CANVASS. Thanks.--v/r - TP 01:49, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

For the record, I had a change of username and signature. I am TParis00ap from above.--v/r - TP 01:50, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

I made a minor correction based on artice of Iltalehti. I was little busy, so I hadn't time to do it earlier.--Arla (talk) 14:56, 14 March 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)

Spam with Spam and Spam with Spam

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)

No, facebook doesn't send deceptive messages. It's fair enough if an app sends a message to all your contacts saying 'please try out facebook' if the user clicks on a button that says 'invite all my contacts'. What is not acceptable is lying (saying there is a message for you when there isn't), or emailing all your contacts without your permission. Are you saying that deception is a normal business practice in Russia? It certainly isn't in America or in my country. --sciencewatcher (talk) 01:23, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Use by scammers

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

That's odd. Is that based on your observations, or did you read it somewhere? If you read it somewhere, could you post a link? Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} 02:15, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

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.

Full Page Rewrite

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

Badoo Type of business Private Type of site Social networking service Available in 42 languages; Arabic, Albanian, Bosnian, Bulgarian, Catalan, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, UK English , US English, Chinese, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latvian, Lithuanian, Malay, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Spanish, Swahili, Swedish, Slovenian, Slovak, Serbian, Tagalog, Indonesian, Thai, Turkish, Ukrainian, Hungarian, Hebrew, Vietnamese Traded as Badoo Ltd Founder(s) Andrey Andreev Industry Internet Revenue $150 million (2012) Employees 150+ Worldwide (2013) URL badoo.com Commercial free, but with a charge for extra features Registration Yes Users 183 million+ Launched November 2006 (2006-11) Current status Active 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. 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. Users must register before using Badoo . 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 . Just one year after it’s launch Badoo had 12 million members and as of 2013 had over 183 million members worldwide with more than 125,000 new users joining everyday and over 35 million active users per month, uploading over 3 million photos daily . 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 . Badoo has an office in London, UK. 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” . In June 2013 Alexa.com rated Badoo's global ranking as 129. Notes

Lucspook (talk) 19:24, 24 July 2013 (UTC) — Lucspook (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

I've collapsed the draft to make this talk page easier to navigate. 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. The only bit of actual scholarly literature cited in the current article, a Cambridge University study that happens to be highly unflattering to Badoo, has been inexplicably omitted. Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} 03:47, 25 July 2013 (UTC)

b:Thanks for the feedback AJ. As mentioned all edits have been made in good faith. I disagree that this reads like a press release and I modeled the tone and structure on Facebook's wikipedia page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facebook). I have re-inserted the reference to the Cambridge study. Please feel free to share other constructive feedback. Lucspook (talk) 13:11, 1 August 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

Here are the first three paragraphs as they were before you tried rewriting the article. Badoo is a dating-focused social discovery website, founded in 2006. It is managed out of its Soho, London headquarters but owned by a company based in Cyprus, which is ultimately owned by Russian entrepreneur Andrey Andreev. Opinions of Badoo.com on TrustPilot, which are based on user reviews, rather than press releases, rate the site as 'Very low', with a current score of 1.3 out of 10 (as of 20 March 2013). Complaints included fake profiles, and spamming of email accounts of signed-up users. In a peer-reviewed study conducted and published by Cambridge University in 2009, it was given the lowest score for privacy among 45 social networking sites examined. Next, let's look at the first three paragraphs as they were after your most recent edits. Badoo is a dating-focused social discovery website, founded in 2006. 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. 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. Users must register before using Badoo . 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 .

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)

Thanks for the feedback Unforgettableid (talk). I really have been just trying to work on this page to make it better. I took it on as a first project because I have a lot to add and did a lot of work researching the company and its history etc. If you compare the Badoo page to Facebook's for example, the Badoo page is really pretty lacking. I apologies to all editors if protocol was not strictly followed. I made the suggestion of a rewrite and update the entire page and that was rejected which I didn't dispute. I re-wote parts having read MOS:LEAD and WP:CON, took out what may have been seen as unhelpful and keep it more neutral. What has become the reverted page is not a fair and balanced piece either and needs some substantial editing to become a useful encyclopedic article. The changes I made were then gradual, led to some debate and further editing. This was also achieved over a 1-2 month time period a couple of months ago. I will go back to starting new talks for each edits if that is the consensus. I hope we can continue to work on the page in a constructive manner. Lucspook (talk) 13:10, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

New Section: Growth

I propose a new section on growth. I believe it to be neutral, well sourced and cited:

Growth

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 .

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 .

Since November 2011 mobile usage has increased by 100%. Badoo’s Facebook page, as of June 2013, has over 8.7 million likes .

Lucspook (talk) 11:08, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

Given the lack of contention on this section and that consensus was largely reached on this section a couple of months ago I'll put back i unless there are any major issues? Lucspook (talk) 14:13, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

I disagree with this addition. It looks like you're citing press-release churnalism as well as providing original research based on what you see on a Facebook page. Also, if a change was reverted once, or especially if it was reverted more than once, then of course there is contention. Finally, consensus of multiple Wikipedians seems to be that your proposed text is unacceptable: please see my comments of 04:29, 12 September 2013 above. Cheers, —Unforgettableid (talk) 19:12, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

thanks for engaging Unforgettableid (talk). The citations and sources used for this section are legitimate and are already used in the current article such as Tech Crunch and Mashable. I don't believe that multiple Wikipedians find this section unacceptable but only you. Could you expand on your concern about the sources? Do you possibly have textual edits to the section that you may find appropriate rather then just a rejection? Thanks again. Lucspook (talk) 09:51, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Just a rejection. See our article on Churnalism for more information on why I rejected the proposed changes. Cheers, —Unforgettableid (talk) 23:44, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

New Badoo App Section

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 . This was followed by the Android App in February 2011 , Blackberry App in December 2011, Windows in August 2012 and HTML 5 in 2013 along with the new iPad app . 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’ . 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 .

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 . – Blackberry app store – 4 out of 5 . – Androidpit - 4.5 out of 5 with (over 500,000) 489,359 reviews . – iTunes App Store – 4.5 out of 5 from 468 (404) reviewers .

Lucspook (talk) 11:11, 18 September 2013 (UTC)

Given the lack of contention on this section and that consensus was largely reached on this section a couple of months ago I'll put back i unless there are any major issues? Lucspook (talk) 14:07, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

No.

If a change was reverted once, or especially if it was reverted more than once, then of course there is contention.

• You provided self-serving WP:SELFSOURCEd citations to <http://corp.badoo.com/>.

• You provided a citation to <http://www.pcmag.com/slideshow_viewer/0,3253,l=287859&a=287861&po=51,00.asp>. The print version of PC Magazine is definitely a reliable source; I assume the online therefore also is. But, among other problems, that webpage doesn't mention Badoo at all: it's a webpage discussing an Android app named "WhatsApp Messenger".

• You also provide original research discussing the ratings of Badoo's various apps. Consider instead seeking a secondary source which mentions Badoo's apps' ratings.

I'm unfamiliar with TheNextWeb and AppData so do not know whether or not they meet WP:RS.

Please note that Badoo has grown its Facebook app to a point of immense popularity using deceptive tactics to get users to start using the app; would you like more information?

Finally, consensus of multiple Wikipedians seems to be that your proposed text is unacceptable: please see my comments of 04:29, 12 September 2013 above.

Cheers, —Unforgettableid (talk) 19:12, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

How about adding the following line to the article? "Badoo offers mobile apps for Android, the iPad, the iPhone, Android, and various other mobile platforms." I have adapted it from what you wrote above. But it's much briefer, it's more encyclopedic in tone, and it cites no Badoo press releases. Cheers, —Unforgettableid (talk) 22:58, 30 September 2013 (UTC); edited 00:24, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Thank again for engaging Unforgettableid (talk). I've tried to address your concerns in the order you present them.

You are correct that the PC Magazine link was incorrect - it should have been <http://www.pcmag.com/slideshow_viewer/0,3253,l=287859&a=287861&po=53,00.asp>

Original Research - I appreciate the Badoo press release is not ideal. I have found this article in Wired instead and would change <http://www.wired.co.uk/magazine/archive/2011/05/features/sexual-network>.

TheNextWeb is a highly respected news source and runs global conferences drawing global tech CEOs. AppData is a renowned source of reliable data.

The data from Facebook is the data that it is and it should be presented. Isn't the article supposed to be neutral and factual? I have reviewed the evidence regarding the deceptive tactics that Badoo has been accused of using. These are largely historical accusations but they should of course be talked about in the article but should not be the only thing talked about nor disproportionately dominate the article as they currently do. We we should be able to provide all factual information for the reader to make their own interpretation.

I see that you didn't like the edits and reverted them however there was consensus on the page for around 2 months and other wikipedians helped edit my changes. I felt that consensus was acheieved through editing as is recommended in "WP:CON".

Thanks again

Lucspook (talk) 10:36, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

I don't have time now for a detailed response, but I was opposed to your changes, just didn't have the time or energy to do anything about them then. Intervening edits were mostly either partial reverts of your edits (removing the more obvious puffery) or small fixes to wikilinks and the like. You keep comparing this article to Facebook, but Badoo has drawn vastly more criticism than Facebook, especially considering its lesser influence. Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} 13:29, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for finding a correct PC Magazine link. About the Wired magazine archive link you provided: it is definitely an acceptable source. If I am correct in remembering Wikipedia's policies and guidelines, you may not present data from Facebook itself: you may only cite secondary WP:RSes which talk about how many Facebook "likes" Badoo has. There was not consensus for your changes for two months. There was never consensus for your changes. The truth is that it simply took two months for your changes (which went against consensus) to be reverted. Cheers, —Unforgettableid (talk) 00:24, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Hi Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} I refer to the Facebook article as a model given it's structure and tone. I am not making a judgement however Facebook is criticized daily in the news has had multiple court cases against it many of which are ongoing and draws concern from all quarters. The way that you make a judgement of Badoo in the paragraph above leads me to be concerned about your ability to be neutral in presenting facts about the company. Lucspook (talk) 14:18, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Unforgettableid (talk) I will continue to look for better secondary sources for this section and suggest a re-written section for everyone's consideration. Thanks again. Lucspook (talk) 14:18, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Hi All, taking the feedback into account, what do you think of the below?

Badoo Mobile ApplicationsApps

Badoo is present on almost every mobile platform. The first App to be released by Badoo was for the iPhone the summer 2010, followed by Android in March 2011 , Blackberry in December 2011, Windows Mobile in July 2012 , and HTML 5 in 2013 along with an iPad app.

In 2011 Badoo’s Facebook app broke into the ‘Top 3 Facebook Apps in the World’ according to appdata.com and in 2013 Badoo’s android app was featured as one of PC Magazine's ‘100 best Android Apps of 2013’.

As of October 2013 the Badoo app has been rated: Google Play – average of 4.5 out of 5, Blackberry app store – 4 out of 5, Androidpit - 4.5 out of 5, iTunes App Store – 4.5 out of 5.

Thanks again! Lucspook (talk) 19:51, 23 October 2013 (UTC)