You have to pay or you can't send messages or see likes. It's misleading when the little counter gives the number of people interested in you but just because someone looked at your profile doesn't mean they are interested. You can't control the distance. Most of my choices are from over 100 miles away. I frequently get "likes" from other states but I've never heard from any of those people when I respond. Most likely fake profiles just to make it seem this app had a lot of potential matches.