That's right, although I think good UX is the main reason why CS got more popular than HC (hospitalityclub.org).
I joined CS several years ago when travelling across the U.S. At that time CS was a bit more popular in the States, but HC had more users overall, especially in Europe.
HC website was terrible with ads everywhere. There was a great community there and it's not website experience that matters, but many HC-ers first started using both HC and CS, and then tended to use HC less and less often. Although I've heard from a few people that while HC website sucks they had better experience with guests from HC than from CS.
Then a group of volunteers tried to rewrite HC website, but they got conflicted with the owner and started BW (bewelcome.org). I don't know what's the state today.
I joined CS several years ago when travelling across the U.S. At that time CS was a bit more popular in the States, but HC had more users overall, especially in Europe.
HC website was terrible with ads everywhere. There was a great community there and it's not website experience that matters, but many HC-ers first started using both HC and CS, and then tended to use HC less and less often. Although I've heard from a few people that while HC website sucks they had better experience with guests from HC than from CS.
Then a group of volunteers tried to rewrite HC website, but they got conflicted with the owner and started BW (bewelcome.org). I don't know what's the state today.