Skype is not a dating service! How can I minimize intruptions w/o looking like I am not at my computer?

Question

I need to use Skype for work so shutting it off is not an option. My status options are Online, Offline, Skype Me (I never set it to this), Away, Not Available, Do Not Disturb, and Invisible. If I set myself to "Away" or "Not Available" people that need to get in touch with me think they can't. If I set it to "Do Not Disturb", my contacts think I don't want to be bothered, but random guys ignore the status and still try to chat.

So far I have tried putting up an unflattering cartoon as my avatar and putting a greeting message that sounds commerical. This has helped, but guys who are desparate, insane, unable to speak English, or a combo of the 3, remain undeterred.

When I tell some of these guys that I am married and not interested, some get hostile and ask why I am on Skype if I do not want to send or receive naked pix and don't have a webcam.

Is this just happening to women or are guys being hassled? Is there a vast misconception out there that Skype = Match.com?

I will try some of this stuff... I did the people search thing myself and I think the "problem" is that I am one of only a handful of women on Skype in the country where I live and my name is first on the list. 100,000,000 users, huh, now I am depressed because I only get about 25 people hitting on me per day...pretty low average.

Answer 1

First off, not all guys are on the make. But now that there are over a hundred million Skypers, the law of large numbers means that the community will have a little of everything. Including thousands who use Skype's person finder to look for members of the opposite sex.

Change your profile so it doesn't say you're female. Assuming you're not a highly visible public figure with your Skype name on your blog or business site, you're being found in Skype people-search results for women.

The principal benefit of setting your profile's gender to male or female is when you have a sexually indefinite first name (Chris, Sam, etc.) and a popular last name (Smith, Jones, Wang). Setting gender may help people you know find you. Otherwise, turn it off.

Generally, if you do that, you should be able to remove the fake mustache on your avatar, reset your profile to be otherwise correct, and lie like a normal person about your conversational availability.

As to whether men are similarly harrassed, I can't speak from personal experience. Perhaps I'm not cute enough or too old but, despite my fevered hopes, I've not been barraged by hot, desparate, insane women yearning to talk sexy to me.

Answer 2

Open your skype window. Click on "Options". On the left, click on "privacy". There, you have the option of hearing from anyone, only from those in your contacts list, or only those w/ whom you've shared your details with. You can do that for both, calls, and chats. Also, there's a square box that allows you to choose whether or not you want to allow your status to be shown on the web.
Also, there's a scroll-choosing box that allows you to choose how long you keep the chat history. In other words, if these guys are contacting you through the chat (text messages), you'll have their records for as long as you tell it to save them.

Answer 3

How about putting up a *male* avatar instead? Your business contacts will know it's still you if you notify them (and why you're doing it), and new contacts won't mind anyway. I like your idea of making it an unattractive avatar - just make it an unattractive *male* avatar. That oughtta cut down on it further.