Andalusite
Posts: 2492
Joined: 1/25/2009 Status: offline
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Malkinus, I don't mention it in my profile, but I have a hearing loss. I can still talk on the phone and in person, but I do mention it during or before the first conversation. That way, if I miss something, they'll know to repeat it or speak up a bit, and if I respond with something completely off the wall (because sometimes a word sounds like a different one, instead of gibberish), they know I'm not just being weird. Flogger and Tashina have both posted that they are more severely hearing impaired, and I've e-mailed back and forth with both of them. I met a couple of other people from this site who have mild hearing loss as well, including my Master. So, there may well be a few people who are seriously enough impaired to be considered deaf, but who are legitimate. I think it's one thing to consider, but take into account the rest of their profile, if they've met other people in person, etc. instead of jumping to conclusions. Pentheus and Igor, I don't have a webcam, and when I was looking, I found profiles that demanded webcam "proof" of gender rather rude. I was only interested in local people who I could meet fairly quickly anyway, and I figured that people who would say that would try to pressure me to get naked once on cam in order to "prove" myself. I pretty much lumped them in with the creeps who demanded I show up for the first coffee date sans panties. I've met over a dozen people from here, several more from a different kinky personals site I used in the past, and a lot of people who have profiles on one of the two over on fetlife but I've never e-mailed - they were at BDSM events that I attended or volunteered for. Probably some of the scammers don't have anyone who speaks fluent English, or are free-lancers. lot of the ones who rant about fake profiles and fake people come across rather badly - like Acer says, they're usually pretty easy to figure out, just move on. I think a lot of people accuse others here of being "fakes" when they merely are incompatible, not lying or scammers, although we do get some of those as well. Wyldhrt, you're correct that the operators need to repeat everything as it was spoken, but I'm surprised that they are willing to carry on an illegal scam with a witness! There is a relatively new service with no human intermediary. The person receiving the call needs a special phone which has a small TDD display, and it has computer voice-recognition software which transcribes what the caller is saying. Of course, it misses or misspells words sometimes, but they can generally figure it out. I use it to call my Grandma, who lives in a different state, but I don't know if it works internationally. She can also use it to initiate calls to me with the transcription. I don't need any special equipment to be able to communicate with her. She just talks normally, and hears my voice as well as being able to read the text on the phone.
< Message edited by Andalusite -- 9/9/2009 8:38:34 AM >
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