Check http://www.guru.com/ , they take a percentage (10% for free, 5% with a membership), they show full feedback and payout histories, have a decent escrow system, and they only take a cut when you get paid.
equally BAD as freelancer.com and any other such sites. The inherent flaw is two folds: newphew-makes-websites crowd and $1-equals-$100--in-my-country.
The escrow system doesn't protect the coder at all, it's meant to protect the person paying the commission.
In order to apply to more projects you have to buy premium membership! You have to pay to work for peanuts!
I disagree. There are a lot of projects on there that have unrealistic expectations, but one tends to ignore those projects. It's a side effect of allowing employers to post for free. There certainly are projects that have employers who are willing to pay a reasonable amount for a quality project; they're unfortunately not the majority, so a lot of a freelancer's time goes into picking and choosing where to bid. Such is life.
The escrow system has protected me more than once. It benefits both sides of the equation. I even got help from them (on a one-time basis) when an employer went radio silent after I submitted a non-escrow invoice.
By the way, if it takes you more than the 10 free bids to land a single project, you may not be putting enough effort into your proposals, or you may be bidding on toxic projects.
