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The Hospitality Club
The hospitality club is the largest hospitality network today. The club has more then 200,000 members in about 200 countries. Membership is free. The club is supported by volunteers. Members can look at each other's profiles, send messages and post comments about their experience on the website.
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CouchSurfing Project
The CouchSurfing Project is a newer, non-profit hospitality exchange organization, founded in January 2004. As of April 2006, there are over 75,000 members all over the world in 192 countries. Membership is free. It is optional to become "verified member" (US$25 one-time fee) to increase security and keep the project running. Extended Profiles are given and extended search is possible. After using the service, you can comment ("leave a reference") about your host or guest. People with extremely bad references (like sexual harassment) are deleted from the site. It is possible to see if people are travelling themselves, and the percentage of messages responded to
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GlobalFreeloaders
GlobalFreeloaders.com is an online hospitality network. As of December 2005, it has over 35,000 members. Australia is especially well represented
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Servas
Servas was created in 1949 by Bob Luitweiler, an American who lived in Denmark. The organization spread rapidly all over the world and has thousands of hosts and travellers in more than 120 countries. Servas is also recognized by the United Nations.
Servas recommends applying for the program at least 4 weeks in advance of travel. Participation in Servas requires paying a membership fee, which varies by country, and an interview with a local Servas coordinator. After the interview, the traveler gets a "letter of introduction" that's good for one year of travel, and a list of hosts in the countries they're visiting.
Travellers have to write letters to prospective hosts weeks in advance, giving estimated dates of travel, and they have to telephone one or two days in advance to confirm. They can stay with hosts for up to 3 days and 2 nights, and are encouraged to stay the full time to develop a deeper relationship with the host.
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Stay4free
Stay4free claims to be the first free accommodation network, but its webpage doesn't offer lots of information about the network and its goals. There is also no terms of services. It seems that the network allows members to publish their name, address, email address, and basic information about their interests, and to browse other members' profile geographically. The website seems to be ran by a Dutch Web hosting company, and may have been founded in 1998 or earlier. The amount of members is undisclosed.
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Amigost
The heart and core of the members club is connecting between people and helping them find
accommodation among friends all over the world.
Want to meet new people and experience different cultures? Want to travel to your dream
destination at low cost and get to know it through the eyes of its residents? Then join Amigost
and discover the exclusive members club and its wide possibilities.
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Welcome Traveller
We offer our hospitality to others who are travelling in our part of the world, and parke in others' hospitality when we travel. We ARE NOT a group of commercial Bed and Breakfast establishments. The hospitality club operates through our members' hosting of each other. We are unique among hospitality clubs in that we sort our database by the interests of our members.
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Place2stay
is for anyone who wants to spend a short time during their travels staying with a local person for free. We provide a place for people to make contact, and the rest is up to you.
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