Did I really promise a follow-up to my piece on Grindr and Scruff back in March? My bad. I really meant to get to it before now. For, in this gay age, this kind of stuff (phone apps) is really important to the horny homosexual on-the-go. GPS not only helps you find that new trick’s house/apartment/trailer/dumpster; it can also tell you if that hot guy in the skinny jeans and faux-hawk standing across the mall piazza is up for sucking your dick in the mens room of the nearby JC Penney.
For this post I’ll be covering Jack’d I’ll also be giving you an update on what’s new on Scruff.
Jack’d
Interface:
This set-up is pretty straight forward. I had no trouble setting up my account and the layout of the program is easy to use as well.
There are two rows of buttons at the top of the screen. The first row is fairly self-explanatory: Members, Inbox, Match, Favorites, and Account. I’ll cover each of these in the features section. The second row: ??? There’s five symbols, the first of which looks like a series of little boxes. Press this to change your view on the main/members page. You can either have member profiles appear in little boxes – like on The Hollywood Squares, or you can opt to show them in list form. Profiles are sorted according to proximity.
The next symbol is a circle with tiny lines – I am not sure what it is supposed to be. It will be greyed out if selected. I think it has something to do with showing you profiles in your location based on proximity. Next to it is a stop watch. You press this and you get a bunch of random guys who are like thousands of miles away from you. What purpose this serves, I do not know, as I never spend any time in this view. Who would? I want to talk to the dude a mile away who I might actually convince to fuck me, not some dude in Atlanta, Georgia whose pic may or may not actually be his.
Next to that is a little radar screen symbol. This will bring up a map of the area you are in… which may be really helpful if you’re travelling. It’s a bit jumpy when zooming in and out and will not show you a little dot that says “You Are Here”. So, again, I am not sure what this feature is all about, but it may be useful to travelers. To get out of map mode, you hit the symbol again and it will return you to the main screen. When in map mode, there is a text box where you can type the name of a city and the map will automatically glide over to show you the location of that city. That’s kind of nice.
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The last symbol is a little road sign with a curved arrow. Press it, and two grey boxes appear at the bottom: Scene and Filter. With Scene you have the option of limiting the profiles you see to those who have indicated an interest in a specific type of dude. Categories include: All, Twinks, Bears, Big Muscles, Strictly Friends, LTR, and Bi/Straight-curious. And that’s it. Seriously. File this little feature under well-intentioned but under-developed.
On the other hand, the Filter feature is mega cool and unlike anything on any other app. Tired of having to scroll through the profiles of a bunch of 18 year olds? You can specify what age range you’re interested in. You can also look for a specific height and weight. Or if you’re only in the mood for a specific race, or you don’t want to be bothered by a specific race, you can sort accordingly (I find this part a little racist, but, just as there are 45 year olds out there who can only get it up for an 18 year old, there are guys out there who are only turned on by a specific race). You can also filter to only see the profiles of people who are currently on-line, have pictures, or are new users. The only filter I use is the age one. I put my range as 29-99. Which is great for viewing purposes. Unfortunately, filtering does not work in reverse, and is not the same as blocking. So, while I don’t have to view a bunch of 18 year olds on my members screen, I cannot prevent them from contacting me, and I keep getting hit up by 18 and 19 year olds on this site. Not that I mind – it is flattering – but I am always suspicious of their motives and am tired of conversations that begin with “Can I suck your dick?”.
Use the back key on your phone to navigate around.
Features:
Inbox: Messages appear in list view, by most recent, with a tiny profile pic. To open a message and subsequently the message history you’ve enjoyed with a given member, just touch the message. It goes to full screen. Don’t remember who the dude is or want more info? To access their profile, click the menu button on your phone, a grey box will appear at the bottom of the screen that says ‘View Profile’. Hit it and you will be taken to that member’s profile. Your Inbox will also have a Sent button, and you can see who it is you have unlocked your private pics for or tried to contact, again appearing in order of most recent.
Report: You can tattle on others! Well, you can report minors, people openly soliciting things they shouldn’t, escorts/sex workers, and folks who post inappropriate pics. Don’t overuse this feature, or you will get banned. In other words, this is not the means to get revenge on that bitch who rejected you because ‘you too ugly’.
Block: Yep, you can block ‘em, but once that is done, they are gone forever. You can’t unblock, check them out, and then re-block.
Members: Orange Dot= Off-Line, Green Dot=On-Line. Sorted by proximity.
Match: Jack’d ‘matches’ you with someone. You have the option to skip, indicate you’re interested, or decline. There’s also a world-wide picture match. I have no idea what criteria they use to make any of these matches.
Favorites: You can designate someone as a favorite. You can see who has designated you as a favorite. And you can see who has viewed your profile.
Profiles:
Under ‘Account’ you can: Make a Donation, Insight, Pictures, Basic Profile, Detail Profile, FAQ, Tell A Friend and Sound, Password Lock, and Viewed By.
Make a Donation: It’s a free service, but it costs money to maintain and improve. If you’re feeling philanthropic and want to contribute, this is for you.
Insight: This is a fascinating little feature. It is like a mini report out with graphs about your preferences and activities on the site, including Reply Rate (mine is 75%), Age (range of interest: mine is 40-49), Average Height (6’) and Weight (220!), Scene (50% Strictly Friends/50% Big Muscles), Ethnicity (100% Caucasian! I don’t think so!). These stats update on a weekly basis, and are not cumulative. Kind of cool.
Pictures: You get three public – no nudes allowed – one of which will be used for your main profile pic, and you get two private ones which you have the option to unlock for other members. Unlocking is a great way to introduce yourself to others on the site, or not, if you get one of those psychos who insist they are not on-line to look at penises (fucking liars). The site itself does not monitor what you put up, but if another member reports you, you could have that pic disappear or be banned from the site. So read the guidelines and remain somewhat conservative in your choices for your public pics. A face pic will get you more attention than a torso shot.
Basic Profile: Includes Email (not sure why – you can’t share it), Password (which you can disable under Filters), First/Last Name, Age, Height, Weight, Ethnicity, Some General Info Box (I list my activities outside the bedroom), Scene (Twinks, Bears, Big Muscles, Strictly Friends, LTR, and Bi/Straight-curious) and the option to have your stats listed as miles/pounds or km/kg.
Detail Profile: This is where Jack’d kind of has it over all the others. You can list: Location, Activities, Interest, Music, Movies, and Books
Sound, Password Lock, and Viewed By are all on/off features. Password Lock and Veiwed By are only available to members who make a donation
FAQ: Basic questions/Straight forward answers
Tell A Friend: Share the fact that you are using the app with someone via Bluetooth or Email
Viewing Other People’s Profiles
When you are looking at someone’s profile, their public pics will appear in small form on the left of their profile. Their private pics will appear here also, once the member unlocks them for you. To view a pic in full size, touch the pic. To return to the profile, hit the back key on your phone. Any info the member has chosen to share with the dudes of Jack’d will appear on the right side of the profile. In the upper right of a profile, you will see a little road sign with a curved arrow. You can touch this or use the menu button on your phone to access more options – including Message, Favorite, Unlock Pics, Insight (unless you donate all you will learn about their user habits is % of replies), Interested, and More. More will take you to Block, Report and Cancel.
Performance on Droid:
Overall Good. Sometimes it takes a long time to load a profile, but again, this one performs much better than, say Grindr
Issues:
You can’t sign off. Your profile will disappear from the list of members on view after three days and will denote your account as not on-line, but that profile remains up there for dudes to click on for three whole days after you are no longer looking. That just allows others to contact you and keeps you coming back on-line to respond to their messages. A little icon will appear at the top of your phone (the same place that notifies you re: new text messages) when you get a new message on Jack’d. So, if you’re one of those closet cases, or are terrified others might find out IT’S YOU – then this is not the app for you. That said, you can always upload some lame picture of your cat or favorite hunk of flora. Then nobody will know IT’S YOU, but then nobody is likely to hit on you either and keep in mind that other may find it annoying when you hit on them because you have no self pic.
There is no way to send someone a picture on the app.
Member Matches: using what criteria? You would think that, say, having the same book listed under favorite books in your profile would match you up, but, no. Some of the profiles I am matched with have no details, so I have no idea why they would think I, who list just about everything in my profile, would have something in common with someone who shares nothing.
Loading Profile Pics can be a bit slow.
Members:
Everything you can imagine. Jocks, Pigs, Aging Circuit Boys, Twinks, Chickenhawks, The Boy Next Door… you name it, it’s here. The nice thing about this site? It seems everyone who is on here knows exactly what this site is for, so I have had very few bad experiences. The guys are well behaved and down to earth. I really enjoy it when somebody unlocks their pics, because it is usually a pleasant surprise. Yes, I have hooked up with a few on this site. My success rate on Scruff has been better, but this one has done well for me, too.
So, that about covers everything I have to share about Jack’d. I like it because the owners/operators of the site really allow the membership to dictate what is acceptable and appropriate. I also like that it doesn’t kid itself into pretending to be something (a dating site) that it is not.
Scruff Update
Scruff continues to lead the pack as far as innovation. One of their latest editions is a private pic feature. You can upload up to three naughty photos if you are not a member – unlimited for members. You can unlock for any member you want and relock them at any time. It’s nice, because not being able to see more than one photo of someone was kind of a drag, and also, now you can indicate you’re interested in them by unlocking. Non-members have a limited number of profiles they can unlock for at one time.
Also check out under Profile Editor the Community options and the Open To options. Kind of fun.
The other thing I have noticed? The people that run Scruff have come to accept that gay dudes have waists. I used to have my pics removed from this site for showing the waist of my work out pants! But something (the other profiles) tells me that they have relaxed their stringent guidelines. Yay!
Next Time: I’ll take a look at GROWLr, an app that keeps bears happy in winter and summer alike.
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