June 16I just learned about this site and I will report here as I learn my way around. As a web publisher, I am both excited and sympathetic to see these folks succeed and fill a much-needed gap. It's more than just a site full of penpal ads. Yet it's not the full-blown "social networking" (I see that as a bad thing) website either. I don't play Facebook, as most of my friends know. For many reasons.
PenPal Gate takes a little help to get into at first. You can sign up from the front page, but once you have, you can't log in from there. It will get fixed soon enough I imagine. You have to go to the forum log-in page at http://www.penpal-gate.net/Forums/index.php
NO -- CORRECT THE PARAGRAPH ABOVE. ONE OF THE TEEN MEMBERS WAS VERY HELPFUL IN SHOWING ME WHERE THE "LOG-IN" AREA WAS. UPPER LEFT, IT IS IDENTIFIED WITH A LITTLE MAN AND A RING OF KEYS. I FEEL KINDA STUPID, BUT I REALLY DIDN'T UNDERSTAND THAT IT MEANT "LOG IN HERE".
I have not checked out the live chat with language translator yet. I don't normally chat, I prefer to compose letters, but I just have to try out this technology.
Because of stupid American law, of course, they don't knowingly accept members under 13. You can either post unlimited public messages to people on their pages, or you can email them (from the site) anonymously (4 per day). To send more than that, and get a few extra features, it will cost you a dirt-cheap donation (lifetime). I really believe this is a non-profit setup. Normally I think everything online should be free, and I don't like places that have "extra features for a price". But this is different. If any of my friends needs help with additional features, talk to me about it.
You can do everything you need to do for free. I would like to see them get more members, more of us using their site. I don't know if they will throw you out for registering as 13, then saying, in your profile, that you are "almost 13". You can put up a picture if you wish, and limit viewing it only to other members. On this kind of site (it's a bit like InterPals), profiles without pictures just don't get looked at. If you are not allowed to have your face online, then do something in the way of a pix. Something interesting. Best is something that shows a bit about you without revealing your face. Best of all is to have a good pix and not be as revealing about where you live.
June 17
The emails you can send are limited to only 600 characters :-( I had to send one in 4 pieces. You can pay to get 250 emails per day instead of 4 emails per day, and it's dirt cheap, but you can also plan ahead and write tiny stupid emails. I wish they didn't make you choose between being a good penpal and paying money. It's still worth doing, just plan a way around the restrictions.