I remember seeing one of these signs in 2013. I was immediately intrigued since, outside of facebook and craigslist, there was very little web activity in my state, much less my impoverished hometown of 4000. The fact that the town's name was misspelled in the URL was even more interesting.
I also tracked the source down to NuStar Solutions. After a bit of digging, I found that just before the signs went up, a Craigslist ad was posted looking for a local to place signs around town. Not long after, there was a "response" ad posted by the person who had placed the signs, warning others that it was a scam and that they hadn't received payment for it.
Seems bit odd to risk a scam (and the attention it brings along) if you are generating $45M revenue. I would rather just pay out and keep under the radar, considering that the company seems shady enough as-is.
Yup and they're illegal in most places I'm aware of. Public signage requires permits. Private property usually doesn't take kindly to people putting garbage in their lawn. Etc.
"My first stop: WHOIS. The WHOIS database is designed to serve as a master directory of all domain name owners, although in my experience there are no controls enforcing the submission of valid information. Moreover, most domain name registrars now allow registrants to register anonymously by serving as a proxy for the registrant. Despite these shortcomings, it’s always a good place to start."
I know on balance the GDPR is a good thing, but we are really going to miss WHOIS.
This was a fascinating read! I was pretty blind to these signs until recently when my 5-year old son started asking me what they say. There are a number of "We Buy Houses (xxx)-xxx-xxxx" signs where I live. I bet it's a similar type of operation.
I figured these were a step further towards MLM: a single company selling individuals signs and a generic dating site for $3000 or whatever and promising them a portion of the proceeds. That way the central company never has to plant signs or study the local market, etc.
There's also a handwritten sign for a dating site in my city I've seen a couple places now. It's not obviously hyperlocal so I imagine it's someone's actual "I'm going to be the next Zuckerberg" project.
I never saw any "Single?" signs, but I do wonder about all the signs I see around here offering cash for diabetic test strips... I'm guessing those are given out free by some program and then sold, but don't you kind of need those if you are getting them?
My assumption with the diabetic strips is that well insured people can get large quantities from their doctors at the expense of the insurance provider and then sell them for a profit for cash. Alternatively, people in the medical supply supply chain likely have good sources for large amounts of test strips they could offload at a profit.
This is purely my guess having seen the same signs and wondered the same things.
These signs don't seem to be marketing to well insured people or people in the medical supply chain... Unless they are just driving through my neighborhood for some reason.
You also need your blood plasma, but I have plenty of friends who sold theirs in college for some extra money. Economic privation makes people do sad things.
High-pressure sales tactics. They target people who are feeling vulnerable due to not being able to find a good relationship. They get them in a room, pitch them on a match telling them how perfect it is and how lucky they are to make this connection. Then they say: you have to pay $3,000 or we won't give you the name or contact info. And the offer is only good until you leave the room.
There's another reply there that talks about the service more in-depth by a user named "Crumb."
What's interesting is that he got the same $3,000 service for $500. And he actually got to have some low-quality dates! I figured these were full-blown scams. They also sell their leads to other dating companies.
Doesn't sound that unlikely, especially considering how far back this was.
I dunno how prevalent this has been in the US, but back then was kinda the high time of "subscription phishing" in Germany.
Whole websites were designed around the idea of making the user to "agree" with a "signup" get to the actual content, and in the small print (on another page) it would hide costs of subscription for said agreement.
So naive, new to the internet people, like my mother. Would sign up on some weird site, to look for generic birthday greetings and a couple of weeks later would get bills per mail, followed by rather generic letters from a lawyer, and debt collector letters, all over a couple of hundreds of euros.
She didn't end up paying, anything because I told her it was a scam, but many others did, that whole period also lead to the creation of the "Button-Lösung" [0] where users have to give explicit consent to paying anything, by clicking a button.
But back then the majority of average people were still a bit unsure about the legal ramifications of agreeing to something on this Internet thing. So with a bit of pressure, and legal speak, you could (and in some cases still can) convince them to pay a whole lot of money because they entered their information somewhere online.
The article states: "Remember when I said that certain dating businesses can print money? This is one of them. A 2006 reveals that the company was then bringing in about $45 Million of revenue a year."
I'm wondering what the missing word is after "2006". Any clues? Where did the revenue figure come from?
I just knock them down. The ones that block my view when making a left turn anyway, plus any others in the vicinity for good measure. I have relevant sections of the county code bookmarked on my phone but no one has ever stopped me.
This was a nice bit of observation and sleuthwork, but he kinda punts at the end with his conclusion. Who is paying $3000-$15000 for matchmaking in the era of internet dating?
I fully believe there are a lot of desperate low-info lonely people out there who would try a dating website from a random lawn sign. And I believe that there are a lot of desperate wealthy people out there that would pay 3-15k for a dating service. But I really doubt these sets intersect at a high enough rate to make this a profitable endeavor. And the people willing to pay 3-15k are not looking to pay a random lawn sign caliber company.
Most likely the majority of their revenue comes from reselling the info they acquire in various shady methods.
I've seen a sign in San Diego recently for a neighborhood in the uptown area. I didn't go as deep as as the author of the article, but after seeing the site I figured it was either a scam or a more traditional matchmaking venture.
> Why the scattered infrastructure? Is it possible these identical road signs that all appeared within 100 miles of each other are actually operated by different companies?
When I used to be into SEO there was a theory going around about owning multiple sites and linking them together. Different IPs and locations 'looked' better to Google than all these sites linking to each other from the same IP address. Maybe this theory motivated the different servers.
I also tracked the source down to NuStar Solutions. After a bit of digging, I found that just before the signs went up, a Craigslist ad was posted looking for a local to place signs around town. Not long after, there was a "response" ad posted by the person who had placed the signs, warning others that it was a scam and that they hadn't received payment for it.