Monday, November 30, 2009

Social Networking for Gays

Filipino gays are hot into online hookups. Well, I guess most gays anywhere rely on the internet to meet gays for social and sexual relations. Unfortunately, the hottest social networking site for gays in Manila is no longer around. Nearly 9 out of 10 guys had a guys4men account. Not really. I don't have any statistic to prove that assertion. But guys4men was so hot that public events were even entitled, G4M, the initials and nickname for the site. People liked the no-nonsense layout and the ease of use. The white background, the absence of banner ads, the event announcements and the forums added to its wide appeal.

Guys4men could not sustain their site, as they claimed. The growing number of users and the competitive environment made it an unrealistic business model. Guys4men merged with planetromeo.com or gayromeo.com. (The site has dual urls to assist users in places where the word "gay" is filtered from access.) The abrupt disappearance of guys4men and the lack of appeal for planetromeo sent gays into withdrawal. No more source of information for events. No more sharing of resources through forums. Planetromeo did not fill that void perfectly but people had to make do with what was available.

Another site tried to substitute for guys4men, pinoyg4m.com, but that died too.