What do you guys think about reinstating VIP merbites?

[Julia Sky]

EDIT : wrote my post before I saw EB's post, but I'm glad you chimed in EB. I just *knew* money had to do with it lol. Wanna talk about contributing as a VIP member? then pay a membership. It's that easy.

Now here's the post I wrote :

You guys need to realize one thing though :

We escorts actually pay to use this board and without us there'd be no merb. They have to make money somehow. Wanna talk about contributing? Then start paying a membership like we do or stop whining. You guys are being immature crybabies. Not everyone has the means to/feels the need to see an escort every week. It shouldnt matter that they read your reviews, this is what the site is for. And luvdozer brought another interesting point : out of towners. Imagine not coming to Montreal for 2 years (or even 1 year, hello covid) and finding out on your next trip on the 3rd year that you no longer have access to reviews. The fuck? This is rude and makes no sense, and... This is a recipe for disaster : guys booking scams, scams getting more and more clients more easily, more fake reviews from member trying to bypass the important dudebro limitation...

I also honestly feel like there's no incentive in writing reviews on a site that would block you from seeing reviews. I'd be like "aight fine block my ass, but I'm not EVER contributing then", I'd go find a better board where reviews are here for their purpose and not for a handful of guys to feel special because they can read them and others can't. Reviews are meant to keep the community safe and to share intel. Theyre not meant to be penthouse letters for a selective VIP club to jerk off to.

You guys are trying to gatekeep reviews. This is not how reviewing works. If you want your dudebro boy club only to see the review why don't you create a discord server for the dudebros and share your reviews there instead of on the actial review site for everyone to see?

Do you also get mad at people for eating at this or that restaurant and not reviewing because YOU reviewed and you feel like eating there is therefore a privilege that now only belongs to the people who, too, review?

Grow the fuck up. Clients who see merb ladies and don't review are still contributing to the board : they're paying us and some of that money goes into merb. They also contribute by bringing traffic to the website. They may not contribute to your dudebro boner but this is not the priority here.

Does reviewing to say "saw her and agree with the 5 previous pages, good service" really contributes to the board or is it kind of nice, but not necessary?
On the other hand, if someone sees someone who isn't reviewd, you can't really use the "he used our intel! fucker!" excuse because by definition, if the girl wasn't reviewed, he didn't use anyone's intel.

So my thought is : you guys are complaining for nothing. Go pay a membership or relax and stop crying about other people being able to read reviews. Reviews are there for the entire community - not just you.

 

[EagerBeaver]

One addendum to the post I made above about the early days of MERB. Before this board was started in 2003, no local boards as such existed. What existed was TBD, which was a US based board, and a local website run by Tom where certain local providers advertised. Fred succeeded with TERB so he started MERB. Tom then started another local board known as the blue board within a year. In those early days many of the local hobbyists viewed FZ as a Toronto carpetbagger trying to succeed in Montreal, and for that reason alone posted on the blue board to support Tom. There was a competition between the boards and a fight to get advertising dollars which probably was at its peak when FZ was soliciting for donations. For whatever reason, and maybe just because he was first in time, FZ succeeded despite competing with a well connected local in Tom. I think Tom continued to do fine for quite some time as he had his own website. But if memory serves at that time all the indies advertised either on Tom's site or TBD. It took YEARS before MERB developed a solid Indy advertising base. Anyway this is my memory of it and I am sure I am missing some details. If Cool Amadeus or some others who posted back then are still around they can add other details as needed.

 

[The Nature Boy]

I don’t have a problem with out of towners and yes they may not come to MTL in like 2 years, but SOME form of contribution would be appreciated. Especially if your a poster who just always asks questions Ie hey yea, I stayed @ that hotel, it’s great, ur welcome.

Not trying to creat an exclusive club, but come on, some cases are obvious

 

[EagerBeaver]

In the past one of the greatest MERB contributors was an out of towner posting under handle freedom3. He would visit Montreal once a year for around 3 weeks and see 20 escorts and post reviews on all, as well as comparisons of the escorts and their agencies, in one big shotgun trip report. Sadly, he posted a year or two ago that he had a terminal illness and wouldn't be around much longer but thanked the board and the escorts he had seen, and many thanked him in return. His reviews were very credible and with each report he would highlight who he liked best and who he liked least and why. Back in the day, he saw and reviewed almost all of the escorts at Eleganza. I went to the Eleganza party in 2007 but don't believe he was there and never met him, but corresponded with him via PM quite a bit back then.

 

[Julia Sky]

TNB you know I appreciate you but we disagree here. What does it change in your life?

Why would a married man from croatia or the States or Peru, who comes here every 2 years and sees one or two escorts for example, be obligated to still come here every other month to maintain activity? Do you review the food scene and answer questions asked online by restaurant clients of every city you've ever visited constantly just to make sure you're cool enough to be allowed to read foodie reviews next time you visit Vienna or Paris ? If so, I sure hope you get paid for that shit lmao?

Nah. Some things are meant to be gatekept but reviews isn't one of them.

 

[chinavibez]

TNB you know I appreciate you but we disagree here. What does it change in your life?

Why would a married man from croatia or the States or Peru, who comes here every 2 years and sees one or two escorts for example, be obligated to still come here every other month to maintain activity? Do you review the food scene and answer questions asked online by restaurant clients of every city you've ever visited constantly just to make sure you're cool enough to be allowed to read foodie reviews next time you visit Vienna or Paris ? If so, I sure hope you get paid for that shit lmao?

Nah. Some things are meant to be gatekept but reviews isn't one of them.

Nailed it. It’s gatekeeping at it’s finest and IMO it would kill a board that already seems to be on the quiet side lately.

 

[LeafsSuck]

The out of towners aren't the people I (we) are upset with, well at least not me. That is understandable, it's the guys who hobby regularly and benefit without sharing their 411. This board to some degree is based on reciprocity. You can't only take take take and never give. If all the guys were to do that, we would have the advertising section only. If you don't want to post reviews, that is fine too, you will have access to the advertisers but not the reviews. If you want access to the reviews and not post then you should pay a nominal fee, say $1/month, $5/month, I don't know what the fee should be but you have to contribute something!

 

[Fradi]

A lot of guys constantly bitch about the price of escorts can you imagine how many would stick around if they had to pay to belong to this board.
Membership would dissolve pretty fast and along with that the ladies that pay to advertise here as it would not be worth it for them.
I get that members get pissed that some are constant lurkers and don’t contribute, but then you have the same ones that are complaining about there being lack of reviews being the first ones to attack a negative review for trying to ruin a favoured’s reputation or in case of a positive review accusing them of shilling to the point of being banned and I am not making this up I have been there.
Merb is a great forum and I will always be grateful for the ladies I have met through it but turning it into some kind of exclusive club to stroke each other’s egos is not the way to go, you can do all that through back channels and PM if you want.

 

[PSEfreak]

I'm not really ok with this idea.

>> Not every client is rich. To some clients, having to write 20 reviews could mean waiting 2 years before being able to read others' reviews. That means 2 years of taking chances and potentially losing money on subpar meetings - because you weren't able to read reviews.It really advantages the rich, even though they're the ones who can afford a subpar meeting more easily than the client who would need 2 years to see 20 escorts.

>> On the other hand, this could bring even more fake reviews. How many clients are going to post fake reviews just to get to that 20 review goal and be done with it?


Now letme break down some (not all) of the points you brought up :

encourages more honest reviews, because they cannot base it off of other people's opinions
Maybe. On the other hand, as I said above, it could very well encourage more fake reviews.

gives back some of the market purchasing power back to the clients.
I fail to see how?

gives a better chance to rising stars
How so?

gems will be more common, because they need to stand out somehow.
Most of us "gems" (yeah throwing flowers at myself, but also at my fellow sex workers haha) were giving great service before even hearing about review boards, this doesn't correlate.

girls will care more about their reviews, thus service remains more consistent
You may be right, but personally I fail to see how "half of these guys can't even read my reviews" would be a motivation for a girl to do better (?)

reduces the inflation of the industry / reduces the amount of HDHs in the industry who don't necessarily belong in that category / returns value to indies who have worked their way up to HDH.
How so?

brings more value to reviews
Because less people can read them? Sure, I guess. But my earlier point about fake reviews stands here too.

brings in more reviews overall
Yeah, and how many fake ones?

reduces shills a little bit because they will be more obvious
I don't think they're going to be more obvious? To most people it'll be the same level of obvious, as for the others, they won't be able to read the reviews which means less people to potentially call out shill.

adds more value to senior merbites, therefore more sharing of gems
What makes you think being called "a senior merbite" would make one more prone to sharing gems?

most importantly - discourages lurkers who inflate the popular girls
Fun fact : merb constitutes a small percentage of clients, and the amount of times we meet a client from merb has zero (0) impact on whether or not we increase our rates.

reduces stupid questions in the 411
Hm? More guys who can't read reviews = more questions in 411 section, no?

Not trying to sound rude or anything, I'm just genuinely confused about most of your points. Haha! Not really fond of this idea. P.s after all, you've met me and did not write a review Chowzilla. (lol, just teasing here)

This post / reply nails it 100%

The part I agree the most with is people WILL post fake reviews to get to the "20" cap or whatever the number might be. it was the first thing I thought of myself.

Julia's & EB's post should put this to rest.

 

[rosedelacourt]

I think something that hasn't been mentioned is that many accounts of ''lurkers'' silently look at ads and book escorts. Not every client wants to read reviews. Truth is, most of my clients choose not to read reviews as they very well understand that it may not depict what they would themselves get. I pay monthly for MERB (over a hundred dollars per month btw) to ADVERTISE. Not to get reviewed. I understand it's part of the game and don't mind reviews as long as they remain discreet and respectful, but the typical reviewer isn't who I'm chasing as a customer. (most likely they are not interested in booking me anyway cause price, muscles, tattoos etc). I think once a girl has a handful of review and prove that she is legitimate, then reviews are just redundant.

I've said this multiple times, but the very active guys on here are not the majority of clients. What you demand or what you want isn't want EVERYONE wants. Some want to see a same lady multiple times, which means they'd never reach the demanded 20 reviews. Some don't care about reviews and just look at ads. Some didn't even know there was a review section. They show up, look at the ads and leave.

Most of providers just post our ads and leave. We get a lot of clients from MERB that are not reviewers. I think considering we spend money to advertise here, we shouldn't remove that source of income for us based on the fact that they chose not to participate in the review culture.

 

[The Nature Boy]

TNB you know I appreciate you but we disagree here. What does it change in your life?

Why would a married man from croatia or the States or Peru, who comes here every 2 years and sees one or two escorts for example, be obligated to still come here every other month to maintain activity? Do you review the food scene and answer questions asked online by restaurant clients of every city you've ever visited constantly just to make sure you're cool enough to be allowed to read foodie reviews next time you visit Vienna or Paris ? If so, I sure hope you get paid for that shit lmao?


Nah. Some things are meant to be gatekept but reviews isn't one of them.

Yea I see your point, makes sense. However there are a ton of dudes who ask a ton of questions and just give no feedback or trip report or whatever. Just doesn’t seem fair

 

[EagerBeaver]

However there are a ton of dudes who ask a ton of questions and just give no feedback or trip report or whatever. Just doesn’t seem fair

There was a ton of guys who were non contributors asking endless questions when there were VIP members. You just have to suck it up and deal with them, shame them into contribution when possible, and don't extend their threads, and eventually they will retreat into the lurker status from whence they came.

 

[luvdozer]

[...]


I’m not directing this comment to you, but [...] if someone hasn’t contributed in one way shape or form to this forum in a year by posting any relevant info, they shouldn’t be allowed to see reviews on girls. There’s plenty of sections to contribute, doesn’t have to be a review.

Why? How is a lurker harming you? How is a lurker harming any provider? is he costing you any money? Is he making it harder for you to book the girls that you want to book? Lurkers have absolutely zero impact on your life as a hobbyist.

Public reviews serve to increase the chances that a customer will book a session with a girl who is the right fit for him. That benefits both parties.

Think about if Yelp had a policy that the only people who could see reviews were those who have posted 20 reviews. It would be utterly useless. Are there ridiculous reviews on Yelp? Sure. Any reasonable person can spot them. Are there people who only read yelp and don't post reviews? Sure. Does anyone in the Yelp community care? Not even a little. The more people who read the site makes the site more useful as a whole.

Hatred of lurkers comes from a place of wanting to be in a private little club where information is restricted to the special people those special people want to wear their status. What makes MERB great is that it is not a private little club. It all kinds of hobbyists as well as agencies and independent girls who participate in the community to exchange as much information as possible so that people don't get ripped off; dont book girls who are bad fits for them; behave like reasonably customers during sessions; and, otherwise enjoy the best city in North America for this hobby.

 

[luvdozer]

The out of towners aren't the people I (we) are upset with, well at least not me. That is understandable, it's the guys who hobby regularly and benefit without sharing their 411. This board to some degree is based on reciprocity. You can't only take take take and never give. If all the guys were to do that, we would have the advertising section only. If you don't want to post reviews, that is fine too, you will have access to the advertisers but not the reviews. If you want access to the reviews and not post then you should pay a nominal fee, say $1/month, $5/month, I don't know what the fee should be but you have to contribute something!

Actually, it is not based on reciprocity - it is based on maximizing the amount of information and making it available to everyone. Yes, it is true that if no one posted reviews, the site would not work. That doesn't mean the opposite proposition is also true - that anyone who does not post a review is somehow harming the community. Lurkers do not impact your life in any way.

Why doesn't yelp require people to pay even a nominal fee to read reviews? Because if they did, no one would read them. No review site on any subject succeeds by restricting access to those reviews.

 

[rosedelacourt]

One could even argue that lurkers actually benefit this community, as they are clients for us (almost 90% of my clientele even), which drives us to advertise here. Not everyone wants to write reviews.

 

[Bbw hunter]

Why? How is a lurker harming you? How is a lurker harming any provider? is he costing you any money? Is he making it harder for you to book the girls that you want to book? Lurkers have absolutely zero impact on your life as a hobbyist.

Public reviews serve to increase the chances that a customer will book a session with a girl who is the right fit for him. That benefits both parties.

Think about if Yelp had a policy that the only people who could see reviews were those who have posted 20 reviews. It would be utterly useless. Are there ridiculous reviews on Yelp? Sure. Any reasonable person can spot them. Are there people who only read yelp and don't post reviews? Sure. Does anyone in the Yelp community care? Not even a little. The more people who read the site makes the site more useful as a whole.

Hatred of lurkers comes from a place of wanting to be in a private little club where information is restricted to the special people those special people want to wear their status. What makes MERB great is that it is not a private little club. It all kinds of hobbyists as well as agencies and independent girls who participate in the community to exchange as much information as possible so that people don't get ripped off; dont book girls who are bad fits for them; behave like reasonably customers during sessions; and, otherwise enjoy the best city in North America for this hobby.

Great points, Luv. My God...why take this so seriously? There is plenty of info to be had on the backchannel and you can always ignore "lurkers" there if they annoy you ( I don't ...guess I am too much of a nice guy ).
Besides, there are literally thousands of members here. Is it even practical to have all Johns here write reviews? It would be chaotic. Not everyone is good at writing anyways. Maybe it is best that we don't have to suffer all those attempted literary excursions.

 

[Richard111]

[...]

Yes I absolutely think this is being a lurker. I say this as respectfully as possible. Not trying to be rude, sarcastic or unwelcoming. Actually to the contrary I welcome you to share your experiences with the people you meet or contribute some relevant info to this forum. Reviews can be even as simple “ saw provider A and it’s same as all above, she was awesome.” Is welcomed. One of my fav reviewers does that a lot. No one said it has to be blow by blow. Even a “saw provider X and in line with all the reviews above she’s awesome, i agree her BBBJ is amazing.” Takes two min. No one is asking people to review every girl, but some sort of contribution to the community instead of repeated posts asking questions like some do is welcome.

I’m not directing this comment to you, but [...] if someone hasn’t contributed in one way shape or form to this forum in a year by posting any relevant info, they shouldn’t be allowed to see reviews on girls. There’s plenty of sections to contribute, doesn’t have to be a review.

Here's another point of view . posted as my contribution to MERB.
After reading this thread I contacted the lady I met on my last visit to Montreal .[ An Indy who is a regular advertiser on MERB } to to ask if I could post a review of our last meeting on MERB
She replied " Please don't , but do tell your friends what a great time we had !! ""

Richard 111

 

[The Nature Boy]

I don’t have a problem with someone not posting a review or leaving out details if provider says “hey can you not mention this in the review.” Fine.

I am all for respecting the wishes of SP’s when it comes to not writing disrespectful reviews but that’s another thread in itself. I’ve been told by girls to write it all, every dirty little detail. So there are both ends of the spectrum when it comes to what SP’s want told about encounters with them

Here’s a few things to contemplate

1. There are those out of town dudes and even locals sometimes who come on and just ask a shit load of questions. Where do i stay, air b n b or hotel?, which is the best agency? Do I tip or not? How much if so?

I just think if you ask all these questions and people come out and help you out, you kinda owe it to the community to reciprocate with a trip report. Maybe me who answers your questions can benefit from info from your trip? Dudes just come and ghost sometimes, lol. I think it does hurt the community. And it is a community, not just of SP’s, but of hobbyists/johns/fuckers or whatever you wanna call the other half. Clients have rights too we have a place in all this as well.

I’m not advocating blocking all access to lurkers who don’t review. You can be a merb member and have access to certain sections on the forum, just not reviews, unless you contribute. Or if you want, have limited access, like a review section for non-regular/active members. Like blocked access to the detailed review but access to a short synopsis that says “pics are accurate, had great time, will repeat and recommend.”

 

[Fradi]

I don’t know why people get annoyed by questions from lurkers.
There is nothing forcing you to answer them or even read them.
I get the community part and actually like that part but again it is voluntary you either want to be part of that or not.
I relied a lot on Merb before in the beginning for selecting an SP to see and it is still very valuable information but now I find I am using it more as a community discussion forum.
I can just as easily ask any of the ladies I am seeing or have seen to recommend someone if I want to do something different or want a certain kind of session they are more than happy to recommend one of their friends or colleagues, they are not a jealous bunch and will even call their friend to tell them that you are someone they like and it often makes a world of difference for a first encounter.

 

[The Nature Boy]

Yea I mean you can ask bookers too who is currently getting the best feedback from clients. Point is the community aspect and contributing to the greater good. I can stop writing reviews tomorrow, lol. Honestly I can. I do it because if I meet someone who I think is fun and others would have fun with I’ll write a review. Now, As stupid as this sounds, in the environment of COVID with so much gloom, it’s a two way benefit system telling guys about awesome chics and getting awesome chics clients. It’s like when an SP repeatedly retweets postings from other SP’s that they may like and support and not getting any support back?