| BAY AREA LINKUP |
"Using computers to get people away from them." 
|
| San Francisco | Oakland | San Jose | Berkeley | Palo Alto | San Mateo | Walnut Creek | Marin | Fremont | Napa | Sonoma | |
REVIEWS
I joined Bay Area Linkup 3 years ago, when I was looking for people who enjoyed the same types of events I did and were available at the same time I was. Voila! I found out about things going on in the Bay Area and other people's interesting ideas, and even if I wasn't available to attend, I sometimes went to that show or restaurant or event at a different time. The site is extremely user-friendly and well-organized, and well worth the $4.95/month.
This website has rules, to be sure, but they are very reasonable ones. In my life outside of Linkup I've been frustrated at times by flaky people who said they were interested in something and would be at a certain place at a certain time, and weren't. Well, Linkup vastly reduces the likelihood that that will happen, by making people accountable for their actions and trying to create a "flake-free" environment that benefits us all.
When I didn't see events that interested me on a given day I was free, I created my own... Lo and behold, I have developed a network of lasting friends through the events I have hosted and attended -- people with like-minded interests and reliability. Thanks, BAL!!
—Carol S Posted 3/31/2010
I joined BAL in October 2007, after trying Meetup, Craigslist and other ways of finding activity partners in the Bay Area, and I can honestly say it has changed my life, for the better. Yes, there are rules to follow, which sometimes limit my freedom to cancel plans at the last minute (even if I'm genuinely sick) or show up later than the scheduled meeting time. But, in general, those rules are what make the organization really work: I can plan an outing and know that people are actually going to show up when they say they are! And if I have reasonable concerns about the behavior of one of the guests there, confidence that the BAL system will address it, even dropping the person from the group if appropriate. If you are interested in discovering new activities and making new friends, and are OK with sticking to a set of good rules, don't hesitate to sign up. —Cathy C Posted 3/30/2010
I have been a member of BAL since 2004. I have attended and hosted many events and all of them have been successful. The reason I joined was that there was no 'dating' pressure, as BAL is not a 'dating' service. BAL is an excellent way to meet new people and discover adventures in your area, indoors and out. I don't you step outside your door and see what great friends and adventures you can meet, give Bay Area Linkup a try today (or a linkup in your area). Cheers! —Scott DS Posted 3/30/2010
I moved to the bay area from Dallas in 2007, knowing absolutely nobody. I found out about Link-up 2 1/2 weeks before moving and joined immediately. I was signed up for 12 events before leaving Dallas, the first just two days after arriving. I haven't looked back. The entire experience has been great. It is a vibrant organization with lots of interesting people hosting events that appeal to their own tastes, opening a world of opportunities to others looking for activities, outings, and get-togethers. I've heard all the complaints about the founder and have found him to be not only an open and interesting person, but have seen for myself how much he cares about the organization that he has been instrumental in forming. What has been most appealing to me about this organization is the very thing that other comments here pan, the emphasis on individual accountability that Link-up demands. I know that when I sign up for an event, or host one, the people who are listed on the guest list will be there. I've heard stories about meet-up events, where 20 people sign up and five people show up. That never happens on Link-up. I would guess that of the 300 or more events that I've attended over the past three years, over 98 percent of those who signed up, showed up. That is very important to me. This organization was so important to me in helping me adjust to living in a new city. I can't imagine how I would have adapted without it. I've met many interesting people, have more friends in the bay area than I had in Dallas, where I lived for 50 years, and I now know tons of places to go and things to do that I never would have experienced with Link-up. For me, this organization was a life-saver and I will continue to defend Firinn and his system to anyone who suggests that he expects too much. I think his expectations protect the integrity of the organization and allow participants to attend events confident that they won't be the only one there. And by the way, guys...the women commenting below are right...often more women than men at events...lots of opportunities to meet quality, active women. I highly recommend Bay Area Linkup. —Doug F Posted 3/30/2010
I've been a member of Bay Area Linkup for 4+ years and have had only pleasant experiences. I consider the founder, Firinn, to be a generous, caring person. He has always been refreshingly candid with me and I've found him to be a strikingly forward thinker. I have also found the events he hosts to be the most fun, creative and thought provoking. I would encourage anyone to give BAL a try and see for yourself how it is. It absolutely could not be a better value either. —Gary L Posted 3/30/2010
Whether you're new to town or a long-time resident, Bay Area Linkup is a great resource. I've been a member for almost six years now and have totally enjoyed it. I've joined other BAL members for a "limo crime tour"; done a day trip to Napa for wine tastings; had fresh-caught BBQ'd salmon at a potluck; and gone to countless art exhibits, theater productions, concerts, dance performances, outdoor shows and restaurant events. In the process, I've: --made new friends and widened my circle of acquaintances and activity buddies who thrive on new experiences -- learned about events and places that I might not otherwise have known about, and --gotten recommendations on repairmen and other small businesses, which has saved me hundreds of dollars on quality service and workmanship Some of the most popular events on BAL include hikes, camping, dinners and wine tastings, but the events run the gamut, from book discussions to the annual St. Valentine's Day pillow fight; from travel to volunteering (blood drives and Habitat for Humanity events, etc.); from lecture series to the annual Chinese New Year's treasure hunt; from the opera to an event at Sunset Scavengers artist in residency program. If you want a leisurely walk with a group through a scenic part of the Bay Area, you can have that. If you want to climb a mountain with other adventurous types, there's that, too. In other words, there's a range of events for everybody, with something interesting happening almost every single day, and in all parts of the Bay Area. (Another cool thing is that you can also connect with Linkup members in other cities that you visit, a real plus if you're traveling alone.) Another plus is that the BAL site is very well designed, easy to navigate and use, and regularly gets refined with the addition of new features and services. Once you sign up for a given event, it shows up on a personal page for you with links to all the info (date, time, place, price, contact info) that you need, and you get an automatic reminder of the event a couple days beforehand. Hosting an event, attending one or keeping track of events is easy as can be. BAL gets some heat from former or would-be members over its "flake" system, but as someone who's both attended and hosted a large number of events, I'm fine with the "flake" system. I can't imagine setting up an activity group restaurant event or a dinner event at my home, for example, with no real idea of how many people are going to show up (something that anyone who's been on a Yahoo-type group has seen happen again and again). So, if you want to meet interesting people, if you enjoy a range of experiences, and you appreciate a Web site and operation that's intelligently put together, my recommendation is to check out Bay Area Linkup. Hey, at a cost of just about 5 bucks a month, it's worth a shot. —Paula M Posted 4/11/2010
If they gave a Nobel Prize for Social Innovation in service to Humanity, Bay Area Linkup (BAL) would win it easily. What's not to like? People post events they are hosting. Events can be anything--dinner and a movie, hiking, a baseball game, a concert, a play, wine-tasting, bicycling, kayaking, book discussions, art events, ballot discussions, opera, dancing . . . and on and on and on. For the small price of $4.95 a month you get a daily listing of events. BAL is not paid a fee from the event, BAL is simply a way to connect people who do not know each other to others who share interests. Thankfully, BAL is *not* a dating site--though, I have had romance blossom a couple of times with people I met through BAL. But, I've met many more people who became good friends, of all sexes. To attend an event, all you have to do is RSVP to the event. And, of course, show up. This eminently reasonable second requirement--showing up if you say you will--strikes some people as unreasonable. We all know who they are . . . they're the free spirits we love but cannot count on for anything. (They are not those among us who are free spirits, very creative, who, despite our free-spiritedness, can still be counted on--you know, the free spirits who came to understand other people, too, have feelings). Because BAL hosts know that BAL members are reliable, they can schedule much more risky or high-end events--hang gliding, yes, but also reservations at nicer (and thus possibly pricier) restaurants. Confident that people will show, they can put their name out there and book a nice venue, without fear of embarrassingly sitting alone at a table for 4 at Absinthe because everyone who said they'd be there decided at the last minute they had a better offer for something else to do that evening. What makes BAL be able to promise its members' reliability is that the BAL system keeps a record of your last 10 RSVPs. If you showed up to all, you have an RSVP score of 100. If you skipped three, its down to 70. Hosts can set the minimum RSVP value one must have to attend their event--if its a hike, one might put it low; if it requires a $50 ticket, one might raise the bar. Of course, if you develop a record of skipping after RSVPing, you can be dropped from the system--after all, someone who RSVPs and does not show also keeps someone else who would have shown up from attending. It only takes a little of that for a social system to break down. This system--uncomfortable for those people who are always on the lookout for something better and thus find it difficult to commit--is central to maintaining the respectful interaction and high quality of people who are part of BAL--you know, not snobby high quality, just the low-bar "high" quality standard of if they commit to meeting you, they will meet you. BAL is a very good way to do some interesting activities with interesting people. And, if there's some kind of event BAL isn't holding, you can host it yourself. That's what I did--I regularly now host discussions of non-fiction books. Even so, I continue to enjoy exploring the bay, through hikes, wine tastings, art events, and concerts. BAL really makes it easy for the singlet to join with a group, or for couples to find couples with similar interests. As I said, it's a great design. We're only waiting for Stockholm to wake up and do the honors! —Sam L Posted 4/4/2010
I'll state upfront that I've been a member of Bay Area Linkup since 2007 and the experience has been overwhelmingly positive for me. I intend to remain a member because I see real value in what BAL as an organization offers me and in particular what its founder, Firinn, contributes. As an example of the value that Firinn himself brings to BAL, I'll mention that I recently took several technical classes on web programming through BAL that I thought were excellent. They were hands on, the topics covered mainstream, important web technologies, and were focused on practical applications. I had more success learning these technologies in these classes than several years of reading books on the subjects. They were taught by Firinn. The cost? $5 each. His qualifications? He created the BAL web site himself from scratch. It would be an understatement to say that they were far underpriced for the quality of the content. I've taken university level courses on programming that would compare poorly with these classes yet cost many times more. Firinn also recently held classes on starting your own business. These classes were also immensely practical and useful. Firinn arranged for a variety of people to give presentations. Some had expertise in entrepreneurship, some on the legal aspects of starting a business, and some were in the middle of starting a new business. We learned about business models that work and those that don't, among other topics relevant to creating a successful business. Firinn himself contributed a presentation on his motivations for starting BAL, and why he has evolved it as he has. Several people have written negatively about some of the policies of BAL that Firinn enforces. Some have mentioned http://Meetup.com as a preferable alternative to BAL. I've have also been to several http://Meetup.com events. I've had mixed experiences with http://Meetup.com. One mixer event I attended was fine; one dinner for 4 I attended was atrocious because of the non-stop, mean-spirited gossiping by one particularly angry person who took over most of the conversation; and for one bike event the organizer didn't show up. My mixed bag of experiences with http://Meetup.com illustrates why it is important to have some social standards and to hold people to them. If I had been the creator of http://Meetup.com I would have kicked out that gossipy person that very night. I think Firinn's own words on the BAL front page are worth displaying because they are really important to the health of an organization that promotes meaningful social interactions: "A lack of true accountability in the entire culture has created an environment in which many of us casually let each other down, creating an additional negative social cycle in which expectations of each other are sadly low, hurting our hopes for each other, and the possibilities between us." "The convenience with which computers can provide segregation services based on factors such as age and gender has become an unquestioned way for people to discriminate against each other via demographic slicing and dicing without ever meeting, without ever appreciating each other's unique individual qualities in person. This unquestioned ease of discrimination based on demographics damages opportunities for all of us." "It's time to change all this." I think Firinn has succeeded in creating a community where people do come together to engage in real social interactions and are rightly held accountable to behave toward each other with a certain level of respect. This should not be taken lightly or dismissed as unimportant or inconvenient. We all have a responsibility to be on better behavior when we choose to engage others in social settings. Whenever I sign up for a BAL event I try hard to follow through and show up and not bring an attitude to the event. In all the events hosted by Firinn that I've attended I've found him to be easy to talk to and friendly. I can believe that because he is the center of BAL he has to deal with every problem that comes up, and sometimes that means having to make choices that some people will not agree with. But he has always seemed a reasonable and approachable person to me. I wonder if the people who feel they have been wronged by Firinn in his role as webmaster of BAL have tried just talking to him about whatever it was that caused the problem, without having an attitude and without being disappointed they didn't get their way. —Fil M Posted 3/31/2010
I joined BAL just over a year ago. I personally have found it to be a well organized site that has allowed me to meet a diverse group of people, some of which now I consider some of my best friends. I am doing things that I would have never dreamed about a year ago. Once I got into the hiking groups, I was encouraged to climb my first 14'r. Who would have guessed that at 49 years old, I'd be bagging niners? I'm a gal who gets her nails done every 2 weeks and the thought of sleeping in a tent a thing of the past.... The flake factor is a good thing especially if you are one who is creating events for others to join. I have started to ask for a higher rating in events that I am organizing to avoid that last minute cancellation just because "something better came up". Just Saturday...10 minutes before an event...a gentleman from San Jose called so say he had the "stomach flu". Really? It would have taken him a good hour to get to the trailhead and there was no doubt that he would have made the decision to not participate in the hike prior to leaving his home. There is a good example of why the flake factor is in place. Lying is not good behavior, period. A skill most should have learned by the time they are in preschool. As far as Firinn is concerned, I guess I have had the good fortune to have interesting people at the events who wanted to talk about ideas and passions instead of the founder. If it had gone in that direction, quite frankly I would have redirected the conversation. I am too old for negativity and certainly not at a social event that should be an uplifting an postive experience for all. It is a great site, well maintained, attracts a solid, well educated group of folks and the small monthly charge is well worth the experience I have had so far. If you are new to the Bay Area or have had a life changing experience, i.e. divorce...dead of a spouse/partner, this is a great way to get out and get back into the stream of life. —Jennifer H Posted 3/30/2010
I joined BAL in October 2007, after trying Meetup, Craigslist and other ways of finding activity partners in the Bay Area, and I can honestly say it has changed my life, for the better. Yes, there are rules to follow, which sometimes limit my freedom to cancel plans at the last minute (even if I'm genuinely sick) or show up later than the scheduled meeting time. But, in general, those rules are what make the organization really work: I can plan an outing and know that people are actually going to show up when they say they are! And if I have reasonable concerns about the behavior of one of the guests there, confidence that the BAL system will address it, even dropping the person from the group if appropriate. If you are interested in discovering new activities and making new friends, and are OK with sticking to a set of good rules, don't hesitate to sign up. —Cathy C Posted 3/30/2010
I have been a member of BAL since 2004. I have attended and hosted many events and all of them have been successful. The reason I joined was that there was no 'dating' pressure, as BAL is not a 'dating' service. BAL is an excellent way to meet new people and discover adventures in your area, indoors and out. I don't you step outside your door and see what great friends and adventures you can meet, give Bay Area Linkup a try today (or a linkup in your area). Cheers! —Scott DS Posted 3/30/2010
I moved to the bay area from Dallas in 2007, knowing absolutely nobody. I found out about Link-up 2 1/2 weeks before moving and joined immediately. I was signed up for 12 events before leaving Dallas, the first just two days after arriving. I haven't looked back. The entire experience has been great. It is a vibrant organization with lots of interesting people hosting events that appeal to their own tastes, opening a world of opportunities to others looking for activities, outings, and get-togethers. I've heard all the complaints about the founder and have found him to be not only an open and interesting person, but have seen for myself how much he cares about the organization that he has been instrumental in forming. What has been most appealing to me about this organization is the very thing that other comments here pan, the emphasis on individual accountability that Link-up demands. I know that when I sign up for an event, or host one, the people who are listed on the guest list will be there. I've heard stories about meet-up events, where 20 people sign up and five people show up. That never happens on Link-up. I would guess that of the 300 or more events that I've attended over the past three years, over 98 percent of those who signed up, showed up. That is very important to me. This organization was so important to me in helping me adjust to living in a new city. I can't imagine how I would have adapted without it. I've met many interesting people, have more friends in the bay area than I had in Dallas, where I lived for 50 years, and I now know tons of places to go and things to do that I never would have experienced with Link-up. For me, this organization was a life-saver and I will continue to defend Firinn and his system to anyone who suggests that he expects too much. I think his expectations protect the integrity of the organization and allow participants to attend events confident that they won't be the only one there. And by the way, guys...the women commenting below are right...often more women than men at events...lots of opportunities to meet quality, active women. I highly recommend Bay Area Linkup. —Doug F Posted 3/30/2010
I've been a member of Bay Area Linkup for 4+ years and have had only pleasant experiences. I consider the founder, Firinn, to be a generous, caring person. He has always been refreshingly candid with me and I've found him to be a strikingly forward thinker. I have also found the events he hosts to be the most fun, creative and thought provoking. I would encourage anyone to give BAL a try and see for yourself how it is. It absolutely could not be a better value either. —Gary L Posted 3/30/2010
Whether you're new to town or a long-time resident, Bay Area Linkup is a great resource. I've been a member for almost six years now and have totally enjoyed it. I've joined other BAL members for a "limo crime tour"; done a day trip to Napa for wine tastings; had fresh-caught BBQ'd salmon at a potluck; and gone to countless art exhibits, theater productions, concerts, dance performances, outdoor shows and restaurant events. In the process, I've: --made new friends and widened my circle of acquaintances and activity buddies who thrive on new experiences -- learned about events and places that I might not otherwise have known about, and --gotten recommendations on repairmen and other small businesses, which has saved me hundreds of dollars on quality service and workmanship Some of the most popular events on BAL include hikes, camping, dinners and wine tastings, but the events run the gamut, from book discussions to the annual St. Valentine's Day pillow fight; from travel to volunteering (blood drives and Habitat for Humanity events, etc.); from lecture series to the annual Chinese New Year's treasure hunt; from the opera to an event at Sunset Scavengers artist in residency program. If you want a leisurely walk with a group through a scenic part of the Bay Area, you can have that. If you want to climb a mountain with other adventurous types, there's that, too. In other words, there's a range of events for everybody, with something interesting happening almost every single day, and in all parts of the Bay Area. (Another cool thing is that you can also connect with Linkup members in other cities that you visit, a real plus if you're traveling alone.) Another plus is that the BAL site is very well designed, easy to navigate and use, and regularly gets refined with the addition of new features and services. Once you sign up for a given event, it shows up on a personal page for you with links to all the info (date, time, place, price, contact info) that you need, and you get an automatic reminder of the event a couple days beforehand. Hosting an event, attending one or keeping track of events is easy as can be. BAL gets some heat from former or would-be members over its "flake" system, but as someone who's both attended and hosted a large number of events, I'm fine with the "flake" system. I can't imagine setting up an activity group restaurant event or a dinner event at my home, for example, with no real idea of how many people are going to show up (something that anyone who's been on a Yahoo-type group has seen happen again and again). So, if you want to meet interesting people, if you enjoy a range of experiences, and you appreciate a Web site and operation that's intelligently put together, my recommendation is to check out Bay Area Linkup. Hey, at a cost of just about 5 bucks a month, it's worth a shot. —Paula M Posted 4/11/2010
If they gave a Nobel Prize for Social Innovation in service to Humanity, Bay Area Linkup (BAL) would win it easily. What's not to like? People post events they are hosting. Events can be anything--dinner and a movie, hiking, a baseball game, a concert, a play, wine-tasting, bicycling, kayaking, book discussions, art events, ballot discussions, opera, dancing . . . and on and on and on. For the small price of $4.95 a month you get a daily listing of events. BAL is not paid a fee from the event, BAL is simply a way to connect people who do not know each other to others who share interests. Thankfully, BAL is *not* a dating site--though, I have had romance blossom a couple of times with people I met through BAL. But, I've met many more people who became good friends, of all sexes. To attend an event, all you have to do is RSVP to the event. And, of course, show up. This eminently reasonable second requirement--showing up if you say you will--strikes some people as unreasonable. We all know who they are . . . they're the free spirits we love but cannot count on for anything. (They are not those among us who are free spirits, very creative, who, despite our free-spiritedness, can still be counted on--you know, the free spirits who came to understand other people, too, have feelings). Because BAL hosts know that BAL members are reliable, they can schedule much more risky or high-end events--hang gliding, yes, but also reservations at nicer (and thus possibly pricier) restaurants. Confident that people will show, they can put their name out there and book a nice venue, without fear of embarrassingly sitting alone at a table for 4 at Absinthe because everyone who said they'd be there decided at the last minute they had a better offer for something else to do that evening. What makes BAL be able to promise its members' reliability is that the BAL system keeps a record of your last 10 RSVPs. If you showed up to all, you have an RSVP score of 100. If you skipped three, its down to 70. Hosts can set the minimum RSVP value one must have to attend their event--if its a hike, one might put it low; if it requires a $50 ticket, one might raise the bar. Of course, if you develop a record of skipping after RSVPing, you can be dropped from the system--after all, someone who RSVPs and does not show also keeps someone else who would have shown up from attending. It only takes a little of that for a social system to break down. This system--uncomfortable for those people who are always on the lookout for something better and thus find it difficult to commit--is central to maintaining the respectful interaction and high quality of people who are part of BAL--you know, not snobby high quality, just the low-bar "high" quality standard of if they commit to meeting you, they will meet you. BAL is a very good way to do some interesting activities with interesting people. And, if there's some kind of event BAL isn't holding, you can host it yourself. That's what I did--I regularly now host discussions of non-fiction books. Even so, I continue to enjoy exploring the bay, through hikes, wine tastings, art events, and concerts. BAL really makes it easy for the singlet to join with a group, or for couples to find couples with similar interests. As I said, it's a great design. We're only waiting for Stockholm to wake up and do the honors! —Sam L Posted 4/4/2010
I'll state upfront that I've been a member of Bay Area Linkup since 2007 and the experience has been overwhelmingly positive for me. I intend to remain a member because I see real value in what BAL as an organization offers me and in particular what its founder, Firinn, contributes. As an example of the value that Firinn himself brings to BAL, I'll mention that I recently took several technical classes on web programming through BAL that I thought were excellent. They were hands on, the topics covered mainstream, important web technologies, and were focused on practical applications. I had more success learning these technologies in these classes than several years of reading books on the subjects. They were taught by Firinn. The cost? $5 each. His qualifications? He created the BAL web site himself from scratch. It would be an understatement to say that they were far underpriced for the quality of the content. I've taken university level courses on programming that would compare poorly with these classes yet cost many times more. Firinn also recently held classes on starting your own business. These classes were also immensely practical and useful. Firinn arranged for a variety of people to give presentations. Some had expertise in entrepreneurship, some on the legal aspects of starting a business, and some were in the middle of starting a new business. We learned about business models that work and those that don't, among other topics relevant to creating a successful business. Firinn himself contributed a presentation on his motivations for starting BAL, and why he has evolved it as he has. Several people have written negatively about some of the policies of BAL that Firinn enforces. Some have mentioned http://Meetup.com as a preferable alternative to BAL. I've have also been to several http://Meetup.com events. I've had mixed experiences with http://Meetup.com. One mixer event I attended was fine; one dinner for 4 I attended was atrocious because of the non-stop, mean-spirited gossiping by one particularly angry person who took over most of the conversation; and for one bike event the organizer didn't show up. My mixed bag of experiences with http://Meetup.com illustrates why it is important to have some social standards and to hold people to them. If I had been the creator of http://Meetup.com I would have kicked out that gossipy person that very night. I think Firinn's own words on the BAL front page are worth displaying because they are really important to the health of an organization that promotes meaningful social interactions: "A lack of true accountability in the entire culture has created an environment in which many of us casually let each other down, creating an additional negative social cycle in which expectations of each other are sadly low, hurting our hopes for each other, and the possibilities between us." "The convenience with which computers can provide segregation services based on factors such as age and gender has become an unquestioned way for people to discriminate against each other via demographic slicing and dicing without ever meeting, without ever appreciating each other's unique individual qualities in person. This unquestioned ease of discrimination based on demographics damages opportunities for all of us." "It's time to change all this." I think Firinn has succeeded in creating a community where people do come together to engage in real social interactions and are rightly held accountable to behave toward each other with a certain level of respect. This should not be taken lightly or dismissed as unimportant or inconvenient. We all have a responsibility to be on better behavior when we choose to engage others in social settings. Whenever I sign up for a BAL event I try hard to follow through and show up and not bring an attitude to the event. In all the events hosted by Firinn that I've attended I've found him to be easy to talk to and friendly. I can believe that because he is the center of BAL he has to deal with every problem that comes up, and sometimes that means having to make choices that some people will not agree with. But he has always seemed a reasonable and approachable person to me. I wonder if the people who feel they have been wronged by Firinn in his role as webmaster of BAL have tried just talking to him about whatever it was that caused the problem, without having an attitude and without being disappointed they didn't get their way. —Fil M Posted 3/31/2010
I joined BAL just over a year ago. I personally have found it to be a well organized site that has allowed me to meet a diverse group of people, some of which now I consider some of my best friends. I am doing things that I would have never dreamed about a year ago. Once I got into the hiking groups, I was encouraged to climb my first 14'r. Who would have guessed that at 49 years old, I'd be bagging niners? I'm a gal who gets her nails done every 2 weeks and the thought of sleeping in a tent a thing of the past.... The flake factor is a good thing especially if you are one who is creating events for others to join. I have started to ask for a higher rating in events that I am organizing to avoid that last minute cancellation just because "something better came up". Just Saturday...10 minutes before an event...a gentleman from San Jose called so say he had the "stomach flu". Really? It would have taken him a good hour to get to the trailhead and there was no doubt that he would have made the decision to not participate in the hike prior to leaving his home. There is a good example of why the flake factor is in place. Lying is not good behavior, period. A skill most should have learned by the time they are in preschool. As far as Firinn is concerned, I guess I have had the good fortune to have interesting people at the events who wanted to talk about ideas and passions instead of the founder. If it had gone in that direction, quite frankly I would have redirected the conversation. I am too old for negativity and certainly not at a social event that should be an uplifting an postive experience for all. It is a great site, well maintained, attracts a solid, well educated group of folks and the small monthly charge is well worth the experience I have had so far. If you are new to the Bay Area or have had a life changing experience, i.e. divorce...dead of a spouse/partner, this is a great way to get out and get back into the stream of life. —Jennifer H Posted 3/30/2010