Welcome to my blog!
My name is Shimrit Elisar and I am the author of Everyone's Guide to Online Dating ,
the UK's first online dating book. All opinions expressed are my own unless posted in a comment by someone else.
I first found a version of this so-called psychological test online about 6 years ago. I think it was supposed to be some Jungian thing, but I actually have no clue who came up with it. I’ve been reminded of it recently and of the fact that it can be quite a fun way to get to know new people. I reckon it would be a great thing to use on a first date to see if you and your date are on the same page. The answers to these questions tend to change many times throughout life, depending on where you are, your mood and one’s changing outlook on things, so they are never set in stone, but they can certainly be quite telling. I wouldn’t go basing whole relationships on this test, but you’ll be surprised at how accurate it can be. Try it on yourself first, before scrolling down to read the answers. Obviously, there are no right or wrong answers, although there may well be answers someone could give that would make you think you’re not entirely compatible.
Ask your new friend the following questions:
1. What is your favourite wild animal and why?
2. What is your favourite domestic animal and why?
3. What is your favourite body of water and why? (things like the ocean, rivers, ponds, springs, lakes, etc.).
Vicki Larson, writing in the Huffington Post interviewed Dr. Eric Anderson, author of a new and “controversial” book that talks about how monogamy is wrong for men, who need to be having sex with different people to be happy. The non-monogamy thing becomes a hot debate every once in a while and while I’m all for opening it up again and again, I’m kinda fed up of the whole evolutionary psychology bull that comes with it and seems to put men in the centre of the need to have different partners, while women are assumed to be more into picking a partner that would care for the children. Then again, I’m also fed up of hearing about how men cheat because their brains are programmed to make them spread their seed and women cheat because they want to breed with alpha males but have the betas look after their young. I’m not saying this book says this last bit, by the way. I’ve not read it so I couldn’t tell you for sure. It’s just that whenever the non-monogamy debate is raised it’s all men men men and, frankly, we’ve already had the school of man-only polygamy being the norm (and in some countries it still is) and focusing on it from a pseudo-scientific angle seems dangerously close to the school of thought that claimed the female orgasm doesn’t exist – it completely ignores the fact that many women experience the same urges and have the same psychological needs as men when it comes to relationships.
In the conservative society we live in (and conservative it is, even though it pretends to be liberal) saying that men need to stray to be happy may be controversial, but it’s certainly not groundbreaking or new. It would be nice, just for a change, to have a broader debate about the whether monogamy is suitable for either men or women. I suspect, though, the answer to that is a little bit more down to the individual, which would paint a much more complex picture than going on about how men need to get off with other women all the time to be happy.
A new UK study has found that the language used in men’s mags is surprisingly and frightfully similar to the language used by rapists to talk about their victims. Obviously women have been complaining about this sort of thing for years (and often branded “feminazis” for saying it), but you’d think men themselves would be able to easily tell the difference, showing the feminists they’re totally overreacting to the whole issue. After all, rapists are evil, whereas men’s mags are harmless fun, right?
Well well well…
It seems men themselves can’t tell the difference between a rapist and an article in FHM. So now a Middlesex Uni study showed some men quotes from FHM, mixed up with quotes from something called “The Rapist Files”, a collection of transcripts from interviews with convicted rapists. All the men had to do was say which quote came from where. They failed miserably. You can actually test yourself with a few quotes here, to see how you’d do.
Then there was a follow up study, where men had to grade each quote according to how derogatory it was to women. FHM quotes actually came out as worse than the stuff rapists say.
Now, people who know me know that I have absolutely no problem with non-PC and even offensive humour, but when you’re a magazine publisher and the stuff you publish is actually seen as worse than the stuff a convicted rapist would say to justify sexually assaulting a woman, then you have a serious serious problem.
This post first-date email is doing the rounds on the net right now and is possibly the perfect example of what NOT to do after a first date with a woman. Nobody quite knows whether or not it’s real (though it at least appears to be real on the surface), but speaking both as a dating professional and a woman, I can tell you such men really do exist. Basically, this investment manager guy went out on a date with a woman. The date, according to the woman, was absolutely horrible. Then the guy texts and leaves messages for the woman, which she never replies to. The man then goes and sends here a terribly long, freaky email which you can read here.
Note to guys who think that’s acceptable behaviour – if the woman didn’t reply to your texts, she’s sure as hell not going to reply to your strange and detailed rant. She’s just going to run away and, if you’re unlucky, she’s going to put it up on the Internet like this woman did. But, what struck me most about the email “Mike” sent “Lauren” is that “Mike” has obviously spent some time reading about body language and subconscious, non-verbal signals to the point where he considers himself an expert on the matter. The fact that he accuses the woman of leading him on using what are generally accepted to be subconscious signals is pretty precious too, but this should be a lesson for anyone who spends too much time hunting for signals and not enough time paying attention to how the date is obviously going badly. Nobody owes anyone anything after the one date so just accept things and move on. Save the 1000 word rants for your breakup with the woman who actually dates you more than once.
If you want a little “awww” moment, take a look at this. It’s quotes from a bunch of kids talking about the meaning of love as they see it (often as a result of looking at their parents’ marriage or the way their grandparents are with each other). Some of it is pure poetry. I’m not even sure if it’s real or not, but who cares? Love it!
I just noticed the matchaffinity 3 day free trial is still on for December 2011. You need to use a special link to access it, though and sign up through that link. If you haven’t signed up to the site yet, then use the link below to go to matchaffinity and get the trial. Make sure you read the small print to see how you can cancer before being charged, as I assume you need to put in your credit card details to get the trial.
If you have already signed up and not paid, use the link below to access the site and click on the “already a member” link at the bottom right of the page and maybe you can still get 3 days for free.
I thought Christianity was meant to be a religion of tolerance. Words can’t describe how annoyed I get when I read stuff like this. Seriously, people, if you don’t want to marry someone of the same sex then don’t, nobody’s forcing you to do it. But to fight for the denial of rights to people who are in love and want to make a commitment to each other in this day and age is seriously unnecessary. I just hope the Scottish parliament goes ahead with the plan anyway.
Here’s a quick run down of speed dating and singles’ events companies that are holding events across the UK in December. See my post about singles events and speed dating in London for info about London events in December.
December actually starts tomorrow and these parties seem to be selling out fast, so if you’re keen to go speed dating this December or to attend a bowling night, lock & key party, a Christmas party or any other specialist singles’ event, I suggest you get your tickets early before other hungry singles get there first.
Speed Dater are the UK’s biggest organisers of speed dating events, lock and key parties and singles’ parties. They have events all over the UK, generally in trendy / semi-upmarket bars and venues with a few events at more upmarket places, as well as special events like bowling nights, cocktail parties, etc.. They have plenty of parties all over the place in December, including big Christmas parties and a massive NYE party in London. They cater for quite a few age ranges, as well as having events for professionals, international professionals, Asian singles, Muslim or Christian singles, etc.
Here’s what they are offering in December:
Speed dating in Aberdeen, Bristol, Cambridge (4 different events), Newcastle, Reading and St Albans.
Speed dating, singles parties, lock & key events and a big NYE party in London
There are even more cities covered in January, including Edinburgh, Glasgow, Birmingham and Manchester.
SlowDating have similarly good coverage, similar (or lower) ticket prices and also use trendy bars and venues. They only run speed dating events as far as I can tell. They are running a lot of parties in December, but they are selling out fast.
Cities where speed dating events are happening include:
UrbanSocial specialise in speed dating events, singles’ parties and wine tasting parties for singles (also the occasional beet tasting singles’ events and singles’ cocktail parties).
The speed dating and singles’ parties event are similarly priced to the other companies, but the wine tasting events are slightly more expensive. Over the month of December they have events in London, Brighton, Norwich, Scotland (Edinburgh, Glasgow), Wales (Cardiff), Northampton, Leeds and Milton Keynes.
SingleSolution cater particularly to “well educated professionals” and offer speed dating and singles’ parties all over the country. In December you can attend in London, Aberdeen, Brighton, Birmingham, Bristol, Cambridge, Guildford, Milton Keynes, Nottingham, Norwich, Reading, Oxford, St. Albans and Windsor.
Ever wondered what the top dating and relationship deal breakers are for men or women? eHarmony actually asks its users exactly that question as part of its personality matching process and they’ve released the data. I came across a post on the Detroit Free Press site listing the top 10 of each. Handy if you want to know what to avoid if you’re looking for a long term relationship or marriage.
It seems both men and women (on eHarmony at least) see lying, cheating and rudeness as the top three deal breakers, in that order. Infidelity follows at number 4 for women and is, interestingly, number 6 for men, preceded by poor hygiene and mean-spiritedness. I am at a loss as to how infidelity and cheating differ on this particular scale. Could it be that cheating at cards or cheating people out of money is further up the list than cheating on your partner? Ho hum. Men will surely be encouraged by the fact that poor hygiene is only number 7 on the list of women’s turn offs and being overweight isn’t even in the top 10. Women, on the other hand should note that excessive weight is the number 9 male turn off.
London is one of the best places in the UK to go speed dating or enjoy singles’ parties, lock and key parties or even bowling or wine tasting events for singles. Seeing as December is usually big on parties anyway, it shouldn’t come as a big surprise to you that the last month of 2011 is jam packed of opportunities to hook up with eligible Londoners. I figured I may as well write about some of these parties here, as I keep getting asked about party options.
Below are some dates to keep in mind, including classic speed dating, more standard parties and some more creative options. You can find out more about the companies that organise these in my post about UK singles’ events companies.
December 1
Speed dating event for graduate professionals at Firefly for singles aged 24-38, £23.95 (organised by Speed Dater)
December 2
Speed dating event at Firefly for singles aged 21-31, £21.95. (organised by Speed Dater)
Wine tasting event at the Flame Bar for singles aged 24-38, £35 (organised by UrbanSocial)
December 3
Speed dating event for graduate professionals at The Warwick for singles aged 24-38, £23.95 (organised by Speed Dater)
Bowling night for singles aged 24-40 in Bloomsbury. £25.95 (organised by Speed Dater)
December 6
Speed dating event at the Carbon Bar for singles 25-37, £22 (organised by SlowDating)
Speed dating event at Anexo for singles aged 25-35, £21.95, (organised by Speed Dater)
December 7
Mixology / cocktail party at Revolution for singles aged 24-38, £29.99 (organised by Speed Dater)
December 9
Christmas Cocktail Party at Alibi for singles aged 24-38. £39 (organised by UrbanSocial)
December 10
Singles’ party at The Union for singles aged 41-62. £16.99 – £19.99 (organised by SingleSolution)
Merry Kissmas singles’ party – lock & key, speed dating and photo wall at the Abbey Bar for singles aged 24-40. £13.95 (organised by Speed Dater)
December 16
Speed dating event for graduate professionals at the Bond Club for singles aged 24-38, £23.95 (organised by Speed Dater)
December 17
Speed dating event for international professionals at The Warwick for singles aged 24-38, £21.95 (organised by Speed Dater)
Christmas party at the Punch Tavern for singles of the 36+ age range, £19.95 (organised by Speed Dater)
Singles’ party at the Abbey for singles aged 25-47. £19.99 (organised by SingleSolution)
Speed dating event at Kanaloa for singles aged 21-31, £21.95 (organised by Speed Dater)
December 20
Speed dating event at Anexo for Graduate professional singles aged 24-36, £23.95, (organised by Speed Dater)
December 22
Free Christmas / cocktail party at the Patch Bar for Lovestruck.com members and their single friends. I’m not sure if you have to be registered as a Lovestruck member to attend.
December 28
Speed dating event at the Dover St. restaurant and bar for singles aged 32-42, £21.95 (organised by Speed Dater)
December 29
Speed dating event at the Dover St. restaurant and bar for singles aged 38-50, £21.95 (organised by Speed Dater)
Maybe it shouldn’t surprise me to find an overly-generalised, simplistic and nosy article on a site called “Hollywood Life”, but when I was surfing the web for dating-related articles, I couldn’t help but read the “experts views” about whether having threesomes destroyed Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher’s marriage. The answer, apparently, is yes and there follows a bunch of conjecture about said relationships which is somewhat derogatory to say the least.
Apparently, “cougars” (oh how I hate that term) like Demi will often turn to having threesomes to make their men happy (cause after all, what sort of man would be happy with an older woman, right?) but find that those will lead to “twosomes” not involving them, resulting in the end of the marriage. So we’re back to the age thing, it seems.
But are threesomes really that bad? I was getting pissed off at the article’s stance, but the end of the post does include a quote from one expert who admits to knowing people for whom threesomes work as a regular thing and I personally know plenty of people in open relationships for whom there are clear and comfortable rules and no jealousy, so I’ll let that one slide, but seeing as the norm is still monogamous relationships, maybe we should talk instead about the reason why normally monogamous people would want to invite someone else into their bed.
Feeling insecure or bored is not just for older women, you know. When people have been together for a while, they may sometimes want to experiment and that experiment may lead them to realise the relationship is over. Threesomes, therefore, are more likely a symptom, rather than a cause, so sweeping that desire under the carpet to “save the marriage” may result in exactly the same unhappy ending. Relationships where threesomes work are always ones where the partners are honest with themselves and each other about their needs and willing to cater to their partner’s needs when expressed. At other times, threesomes are indeed a stepping stone on the way to breaking up, as people try to hide their dissatisfaction or insecurity from their partner or themselves.
Moore and Kutcher were together for six years, so maybe their love had simply run its course. Who knows what would have happened if the age gap was smaller, but do we really need to go over every minute detail of their relationship and make sweeping generalisations about “cougars”? Apparently so.
December is approaching and with it comes party season. There’s no better time to attend a singles’ event and if you want to meet London singles, then you’re in luck. There are a few big events coming up for New Year’s Eve which you can get in on right now. In fact, if you’re quick you can still grab yourself an early bird ticket and get a very reasonable deal.
SingleSolution are having a big (200+) party at the Slug & Lettuce in Westminster. It’s aimed at professional singles, 29-50 and tickets currently cost £30 (and will rise to £40 soon).
SpeedDater are having a big party for professional singles aged 24-40 at Jewel (St Paul’s branch) and you can get tickets for £25 right now.
If you’re thinking of starting the new year by meeting and greeting fellow London singles, then book while everything is still available and cheap.
Politics are a sensitive issue, obviously. So when you’re trying to land yourself a date, a marriage or a relationship, should you talk about yours openly in your personal description or dating profile? Dating sites vary in their offerings when it comes to giving you the choice of listing your political leanings alongside things such as favourite music or whether or not you smoke or drink. It would seem that this is because the vast majority of people choose not to disclose their political views when dating online. In fact, recent research quoted in The Big Think has found that only 14% of online daters disclose their political views in their profiles. But considering the fact that most married couples share political views, you have to wonder why more people don’t put this in their profile. Even people who don’t see politics as an important activity (i.e. don’t particularly like debating politics with their partner) prefer to be with someone who shares their overall political views, so why don’t more people state theirs? The answer seems to lie in the fact that people are keen (desperate?) to find a partner and want to attract as big an audience as possible to their dating profile without forcing any difficult issues. Apparently, the less desperate you are to find someone, the more likely you are to express your political views. Older people are also more likely to express these views openly.
The Big Think article compares this to the fact that most people won’t state in their profile that they want to meet someone of their own race, but end up with people of their own race anyway. No one wants to come across like a racist, which is why people leave this information out of their profiles, while secretly only messaging people who fit the bill.
While mentioning your politics is not likely to make you come across as a bigot (unless your political leanings include bigotry), it would make you come across as actively political, which may well not be the case. Most people are not activists, though most do harbour opinions about the world. If you take the time to write about your views in your personal description (as opposed to or alongside things like hobbies, likes and dislikes) it sends a clear message of the role of politics in your life.
On the other hand, if your dating site allows you tick boxes, pull down menus or compatibility tests where you can quietly state your beliefs without making too much of a big deal out of it (such as on eHarmony), then I suggest you make use of it, unless you’re looking for a casual relationship or sex, or unless, of course, you genuinely don’t mind what your long-term partner’s political leanings might be.
The Telegraph tells me “Sugar Daddy parties” are about to become a hit in the UK, having established themselves as a “thing” in the US. This isn’t the first time the sugar daddy debate has come up in the UK, where several sugar daddy online dating sites are already active.
Whenever I read about this sort of stuff, I tend to get annoyed about several things. First, it always amazes me that some of the women involved are naive enough to think these sort of “arrangements” are not akin to a form of prostitution. This could be owing to the women’s young age, or the fact that they don’t really want to think of themselves as sex workers, but unless your “arrangement” specifically does not involve the promise of sex from the offset, don’t be surprised if the man who’s paying for your time and company expects to be able to treat you as a high class hooker.
Of course, most women who enter these arrangements wouldn’t dream of stating in advance that they are not intending on sleeping with their sugar daddy. After all, the sugar daddy might choose to go with someone else. Instead, most of the action happens in the grey area between what the man expects to get and what the woman expects to give. With a big of clever maneuvering, a woman can pocket some handy dosh before push comes to shove, without having to actually sleep with her patron, although the much more likely result is some form of borderline non-consensual physical contact before the relationship is severed. So in a sense, while prostitution is an honest trade, these “arrangements” can often end up being deceitful and dishonest. The women don’t necessarily get paid for sex, they get paid for the promise of potential sex, which may or may not materialise into the real deal. So basically, a woman entering such an arrangement can either be a prostitute or a liar, using naivety as an excuse for being either. This is, of course, unless the arrangement is clear in advance on the fact that sex is not part of the deal. I assume this is actually the case with some sugar daddies, who are happy to be seen in the company of young, fit women.
Another issue I have is the hypocrisy involved in the whole morality debate. Personally, I have no issue with what a woman chooses to do with her own body. My issues with prostitution on a global scale is that women are often forced or coerced into the business, but in this particular case, women are choosing to meet rich patrons out of their own free will. If both the woman and the man are clear about their aims and goals in this matter, then I see no real problem with it. On a personal level I may well find such men desperate, sleazy and psychologically damaged and the women calculating, naive or cold, but morally I see no reason why we shouldn’t let them just get on with it.
This is so awesome – the female orgasm captured with brain imaging technology. It clearly shows how practically all parts of the brain are activated during orgasm. Apparently only an epileptic seizure activates more of your brain. Scientists hope to use the information gained by this brain scan to help the 25% (!) of women who rarely or never orgasm.
For the purpose of full disclosure, I must start this post by saying that I personally really don’t understand the obsession some people have with the actual act of marriage Vs long term commitment. My own personal view of it is that the obsession with the wedding ceremony and what it represents is mostly to do with religion / tradition, sometimes disguised as something else because of family or society pressure.
So when I read articles like the one I recently found on IOL Lifestyle, talking about why men marry some women and not others, it actually takes me some time to adjust to the mindset, which, of course, I have to, as the marriage question is a big deal for most people.
Big enough, apparently, for men to be sharing their lives with women for years without seeing the woman as “marriage material” and for women to be sharing their lives with said men while secretly feeling dissatisfied for the lack of the ultimate declaration of love and commitment.
The article I read references John Molloy, author of Why Men Marry Some Women And Not Others. I’ve not read the book, so I can’t comment as to whether the book itself is as simplistic and as shallow as the article would make me believe, but essentially, what we’re looking at here is yet another one of those guides to women written by men, feeding on women’s fears of being “left on the shelf” and teaching them how to become the “wife material” of their dreams.
The news is, of course, that there’s no news. Men, apparently, prefer women who are presentable, well groomed and can be “taken anywhere” (hence, perhaps, the fact that so many men say in their online dating personal description that they would like to meet women who are “as comfortable in jeans as they are in a little black dress”). And although the article doesn’t say it in so many words, it seems men still don’t like “sluts” – women who are too sexy and flirty or wear clothes that are too revealing. Instead, they prefer women who are “discreet”, “loyal” and “kind”. While the book, or at least the article, didn’t go into factors such as the woman’s level of education compared to the man’s, it did offer the curious revelation that men (Western, I assume) don’t actually like women who cook and clean for them all the time, but prefer those who are “aware of their own worth”. It also suggests that women looking for a husband should start hunting around the age of 28.
So basically, while cooking and cleaning as a full time job may be a thing of the past, the so called big news is that women should be pretty to look at, demure and not too overtly sexually liberated. There you go ladies, your carriage awaits! Do your nails, button up that cleavage and off you go. What a depressing society we live in when there’s a market for a book such as this (and let’s not fool ourselves that there isn’t – chauvinism is as popular among the ladies as it is among the men).
But wait, women can do more to assure a happy marriage – not be too fussy! If you turn down a reasonable man now, you may find yourself single in your 40s and who’d have you then?
Oh, and do push the marriage issue, because apparently a high percentage of women who are married made it clear they expected a marriage proposal.
This last point is interesting, as the article opens with a story of a woman who was co-habiting with a man for years, didn’t push the point and ended up with the man leaving her and marrying another. One wonders whether pushing the issue would have resulted in A. a marriage (as opposed to a quick break up) and B. a happy marriage. As Molloy’s book treats marriage as the point of happily ever after, the form a marriage takes when you’ve molded yourself into the shape of the perfect trophy wife is irrelevant to our current fairytale, but I do agree that women who view marriage as such an important thing should ensure their man knows this at some point.
On the other hand, it also makes me wonder whether all these women who hang on to these men without making any demands aren’t secretly aware of the fact that the man himself is not “marriage material” and are letting things carry on regardless because it secretly suits them.
But that is perhaps a story for another post, because for this book / article, we’re apparently limiting ourselves as women to simply wanting to “land the husband of our dreams”.
The Vancouver Sun recently published an article with some interesting online dating statistics and recent research. It makes for some interesting reading. Apart from stating the obvious – that men on online dating sites prefer women who are skinny and shorter than they are and that women prefer men who are taller than they are and wealthy, it did point out the interesting fact that men who are slightly overweight tend to get more replies from women. I wonder if it ties in with that bit of recent research that showed women are happier in serious relationships where the man is the heavier one? Or could it be that being slightly overweight is some sort of subconscious signal that the man is financially stable?
Either way, these figures are good news for men (go on, have that doughnut!) and somewhat bad news for women worried about their weight.
There are a few others interesting bits of statistics in the original article, including the answer to the age old question – how many people lie in their personal description.
eHarmony UK is an extremely popular site and many people do very well on there. On the other hand, no dating site is suitable for everyone. Whether you’ve tried eHarmony and didn’t like it or you just don’t like the concept of the site, below are a few alternatives you can try if you are in the UK.
But first, a bit about eHarmony itself. eHarmony may be a good dating site for you if:
You’re looking for a serious relationship
You like a somewhat slower pace of online dating
You want a dating site that does all the matching / searching work for you, rather than having to browse thousands of profiles yourself
You don’t mind filling out a lengthy and detailed personality test truthfully
You don’t mind paying a bit extra for your monthly membership (although you can always safe money using an eHarmony promotional code)
With this in mind, here are some other sites worth trying.
Selling points: strong compatibility test, great customer care
Boasting a very well-researched personality compatibility test, Parship is aimed at people looking for serious relationships and has a similar pace to eHarmony. Just like on eHarmony, you can’t search for your own matches, but the site delivers them to you. Photos are blurred until both parties are comfortable sharing them. This site attracts educated professionals.
Selling points: You can search for your own matches as well as get them sent to you
The personality compatibility testing site from match.com is aimed at people looking for serious relationships. The personality test is simpler and shorter than the others, but you can search for your own matches as well and move fast or slow, which gives more control.
Selling points: free, great personality test, alternative people
This free site is only worth using if you’re willing to spend days answering hundreds of personal questions. Otherwise, you’ll get an eyeful of scammers, spammers and timewasters. If you do take on the full might of its personality test, though, you may well love this site. Their matching system is superb and you can move at your own pace, whatever it may be. Note that this site is not solely aimed at people looking for serious relationships.
It’s worth mentioning the fact that match.com itself also has a simple matching system based on a personality test. If you want to pay standard online dating prices, search for your own matches but have some sent to you as well, you might want to give it a look as well.
Having recently been in India, I’m still quite interested in how relationships and dating work there. It’d been 15 years since I was last there and I remember reading in my guidebook then about the fledgling gay scene (lesbianism was never discussed then) and how, even though physical contact between men is far more accepted in India, once it it seen to go beyond friendship, things are not tolerated. So I was quite interested when I saw this article about lesbians in India. It seems things have somewhat moved on a bit since the 90s, though there is still a long way to go. In a country with arranged marriages, people living with their parents till a very old age and heavy expectations on producing heirs, I’m frankly amazed and impressed some people dare to be openly gay. Here’s hoping things will keep getting better for the Indian LGBT community.
matchaffinity is having a free weekend againm starting today, Nov 4th and ending on Sunday. Sign up to the site now and you’ll be able to contact your matches free of charge all weekend. on matchaffinity you can search for your own matches or have them sent to you after you complete the personality test. So basically, if you’re quick, you could be communicating people this weekend already. If you’re looking for a new site to try, then this is a good opportunity to see if you like this one.
It’s funny how your work follows you wherever you go. I used to watch detective shows on TV and joke about how convenient it was that the detective would always get caught up in some sort of mystery, even while on holiday, visiting family or friends or just going about their daily business. Since I got into the dating industry, though, I’ve found that it’s pretty much impossible not to end up talking about dating and relationships sooner or later. At the moment I am actually in India and it only took 2 days before I found myself having a conversation about love and marriage with my Indian tour guide in Delhi. He’s in his early 30s, married for 4 years, one son (2) and expecting another baby. His marriage was arranged by his parents. I asked him if he loves his wife and he said he didn’t know. I asked him if he was happy with her, he said he said so so. He did, however, say that when he saw her he immediately agreed to marry her. I told him the whole concept seemed incomprehensible to me, which it is, but I must say I’ve heard all kinds of stories about arranged marriages in my time and they weren’t all bad. If anything, people I’ve spoken to and others stories that have been related to me show that many young people in India and elsewhere are actually quite happy with the concept of arranged marriages. I’ve also been told of a more modern compromise that’s been doing the rounds here, where single women are introduced to several men by their parents and can then choose between them. Many people here say that you can actually learn to love a partner you’ve been married to by your family. On the other hand, I also gather that divorce is on the rise in India and that there are all kinds of sad stories of people in love with one person who are practically forced to marry another.
At the end of the day, I don’t think I’ll ever get used to this concept, but the picture I get from speaking to people here is that the arranged marriage love life is no more or less diverse and complex than the Western one.
I actually think OKCupid is a really good dating site. It’s also free to use, which means they need to make their money by other means. Still, I was quite surprised to read about how they sell user information to external companies that then auction that information off to advertisers and who knows who else. Dating sites often do stuff like this (especially free ones) but in this particular case, some of the info sold on is bound to make people rather annoyed. This is according to a recent privacy study highlighted in the WSJ. The original article came out on Tuesday and made some very seriously scary claims. It said that apart from the “usual” (but still scary, if you’re one of those people who think the Internet is private and secure) information like user ID, gender, age and zip code, OKCupid also shares relationship status and “drug use frequency”. Since them, there have been a few clarifications made, but if I understand all the crossed out bits and non-crossed out bits in the article, things are still a tad creepy.
Two companies buy data off OKCupid. One gets the relationship status and drug use info and one doesn’t. The one that does, something called Lotame, claims it doesn’t use the drug frequency info, which begs the question of why they buy it in the first place and why OKCupid sells it to them.
Of course, considering the fact that this follows recent debate about whether Facebook tracks you online even after you’ve logged out (which it supposedly doesn’t) this is not going to go down well at all. I guess the most you can say for OKCupid is that it’s not alone. Apparently 45% of the top 185 websites in the US share some sort of user info with others. Happy surfing!
Less than a month left to save 50% on one month’s membership to PerfectMatch.com. If you want $30 off (standard membership is 60%) then sign up and pay before October 31st.
I may be a bit of a cynic, but I always snigger slightly when I see a survey that has a whiff of something cooked up in the PR lab. First, there was the recent one conducted on behalf of Pfizer (who just happen to be the people responsible for viagra), which found that European women were most turned off by bad breath, followed by erectile dysfunction and flatulence. Now, there’s a new survey that’s come up on behalf of Bayer Health, who also make a pill aimed at curing erectile dysfunction. This survey takes things a step further and suggests that while Scottish men are the least sexually satisfied, they’re also least likely to go and talk to a doctor about it.
The solution is, of course, to go to your doctor, which is fair enough. Getting treatment can really help and people would do well to get over the embarrassment involved. For all I know, Scottish men really are the worst out of British men for hiding their sexual problems and it’s important for men to know they’re not alone.
On the other hand, these surveys are funded by big pharma who want to sell more pills but are prevented from advertising their wares in the usual way (in the USA they can just have TV ads). I just hope GPs are smart enough to not just dish out tablets. Underlying conditions are a serious factor and are mentioned on the NHS site, but so are psychological conditions, which are often ignored.
Barring serious underlying physical conditions (which are pretty common and require separate treatment), I can imagine a quick fix tablet is far more appealing than costly, lengthy treatments involving, for example, going to a psychologist and talking about your childhood issues (after all, the attitude towards mental health in the UK is embarrassingly poor compared to other Western countries). Even lifestyle changes can seem too much when you can just pop a pill. There’s no denying that these pills do work and do help many men all over the world, but as tempting as that can be, I’d like to suggest that if you are in that situation (or a woman who’s sleeping with a man in that situation), you should get over the urge to keep taking pills to fix the symptoms and make a serious attempt at looking at the underlying causes. Being dependent on big pharma for sexual satisfaction should be a last resort, not your first choice.
With so many dating sites out there, people are constantly looking for better ways of hooking up with people who are likely to be more like them. So the Internet is full of all kinds of niche dating sites aimed at particular crowd. of course, if you’re not working in the dating industry, what you may not realise is that many of these sites that cater to particular types of people with similar religious views, hobbies, lifestyle choices, etc. are actually owned by the same company and using the same database of singles.
For example, many of the dating sites “run” by various newspapers and magazines are actually run by “white label” online dating companies. If a newspaper wants to cash in on the online dating craze, it’s actually a lot cheaper for them to use this white label solution than to write and populate a dating site from scratch. So if you sign up to the site via the newspaper’s branded user interface, you may well meet people who also read your favourite paper, but you’re likely to also meet people who don’t.
But what happens when the people you meet on the site you signed up to are radically different to the ones you were promised? Well, trouble ensues, as can be seen in this recent story about a “vegetarian dating” website run by Global Personals. Apparently people who expected to meet and date vegetarians were not at all impressed when they realised most of the people on the VeggieDates site were not actually veggie.
This is a bit of a poor show, really, because if you have a system set up to work your database into something suitable for white labeling then surely you should be asking your members about their dietary habits and using that info to feed the right people into the right website. I understand that you may want a bigger database than what your vegetarian pool alone would allow, but filling it up with blatantly unsuitable matches is disrespectful to the users. If someone’s going to pay to use a site that’s branded as a veggie site, it most likely means that this issue is important to them.
There’s an interesting article in the Telegraph about controversial columnist Dan Savage and his suggestion that monogamy may be one of humanity’s greatest problems. Savage, who’s gay, suggests that heterosexual couple should follow the model common among same sex couples and in particular gay male couples where successful long term relationships are maintained without sexual monogamy. The idea that serious, loving relationships can thrive without the imposed sexual exclusivity of monogamy is still groundbreakingly radical and / or intolerably controversial for many people. Savage created quite a stir after making his suggestions in his blog, which ought to be quite surprising in this day and age.
There is no question about the fact that monogamy is not right for many people. The fact that marital infidelity is relatively common can certainly serve as proof. Even those who are faithful to their partners throughout life are not always free of the desire to stray. While it’s true some people remain true because being in a monogamous relationship with the person they love is enough for them, I would hazard a guess that many others are held back not by love but by fear of doing something that is understood to be morally wrong or of hurting their partner – much in the same way some gay men and women in conservative societies choose to deny their true feelings and live “normal” heterosexual lives.
It’s interesting to think about why gay men are more likely to have open relationships, male libido aside. After all, straight men can be just as sex obsessed as gay men and there is no huge campaign for making heterosexual non-monogamous relationships the norm. I often wonder if the fact that gay relationships were traditionally placed outside of “normal” society and the fact that any post-coming out gay man (or woman) have had to go through some sort of personal awakening means people are more aware of their needs and able to live the lives they want to live without having to make allowances for any more pressure from society. But considering the fact that monogamous relationships are a growing trend among same sex couples as well, could it be that gradual acceptance into “normal” society is making gay couples accept or feel obliged to follow in heterosexuality’s footsteps? If so, it is certainly a shame. A certain crossover of relationship values resulting in more personal freedom would be far preferable.
You can read more about Dan Savage’s original claims here.
Next time you think you’re having a bad online date, spare a thought for poor Leah Gibbs who went out with a guy she met on Facebook only to be used as a getaway driver when he robbed a bookies (gambling shop) for the princely sum of £245. Mr. Right asked to stop at a Ladbrokes on the way to the date, only to emerge from the shop minutes later brandishing a gun and wearing a black bandana. He shouted “Drive!” at the shocked Gibbs.
The young single mother of two was initially arrested, as it was thought she was in on the fun, but was released when it turned out the guy was acting alone and she was merely an unwitting victim.
The matchaffinity free trial may be over, but this weekend you can enjoy the site for free, meaning you can still try it out without paying a penny. If you haven’t signed up yet, do it now, because from tomorrow till Sunday, you’ll be able to not only review your matches but also to send and receive messages from your matches for free. I’m not sure when the next free trial weekend is after this, so make use of it while you can, as it’s a good opportunity to try out the site and see if you like it.
OK, joke headline aside, apparently while research has now shown that married / cohabiting couples often live longer and tend to give up bad habits such as smoking, now there’s another bit of research that says that apparently some people actually pick up bad habits from their long term partners. In straight relationships, it is apparently the men who are seen as the bad influence. Gay couples just tend to blame each other for promoting unhealthy habits such as smoking, drinking, eating junk food, etc.
How does this fit in with previous studies showing the opposite? Well, you know, I guess some people go one way and others the opposite way – same as with anything else in life. We all know some people bring out the worst in us and some bring out the best in us.
So if you’re looking to get healthy together with someone who shares your vices, you’d better make sure your potential partner is also keen, or you may find yourself slipping back into your old habits. Of course, if the longevity studies are correct, you may still add a few years to your life just by being married.
If you want to use eHarmony for free, you’re not the first. Actually, lots of people come to my site after wondering whether eHarmony is free to use. It isn’t. You can take the personality test for free and “review your matches” (basically, look at people’s profiles the site has chosen for you) but if you want to communicate with anyone, you’ll need to pay up. Luckily, if you’re new to eHarmony, you can try it out for 7 days with a full money back guarantee. That’s basically a 7 day free trial for eHarmony – free eHarmony! If you don’t cancel within the 7 days, though, you’ll be charged the full amount of the membership you chose, so make sure you read the small print!
To make use of this offer, you need to visit the site using this special link that leads to the special landing page.
Visit my previous post about the free eHarmony offer for full instructions and the most up to date link.
matchaffinity are currently offering a free trial. You can get 3 days for free on the site if you sign up between now and August 22nd.
To make use of this offer, follow this link to matchaffinity’s special free trial promotion page and follow the instructions on there. Seeing as you need to fill in their questionnaire (not particularly a lengthy or in depth one, though still more than you would on a site that doesn’t offer compatibility features), I suggest you do it sooner, rather than later, as you’re going to get no action on the site till that’s done. Unlike other similar sites, though, matchaffinity does let you search for your own matches, as well as receive some to your inbox.
OK, this has to be one of the weirdest things I’ve seen in a while as part of my search for dating and relationship related news. Yes, ladies, apparently sexbots for you are not that far away (note: this is just someone theorising about them one day being available. You can’t buy them in shops yet and as far as I know, none are currently being built). so there’s a whole discussion about how they could be used for women as well as for men. Personally, I think that’s stretching it a little bit – just look at the ratio of men and women on dating sites. That’s to do with the fact that men are a. early adopters, b. more financially affluent and c. are a better market for sex dolls in the present.
Even if cyborg sexbots are in the pipework, I think we’re going to see loads more femmebots before any male cyborgs are lining up on the shelves in the vibrator aisle.
Anyway, if you need a laugh on a rainy day (it’s raining in London today), here’s a full discussion about sexbots for women and how the whole thing might work.
John Walters recently wrote a piece in the Guardian about how online dating sites are “eroding humanity”. This is where I would be expected to get in to a big rant about how he’s wrong, which I do believe he is, though I do see where he’s coming from as well. If the world was really as he seems to see it, then we’d potentially have a problem on our hands.
Walters claims that by using online dating, we’re trying to control the uncontrollable thing that is love and turn it more into a business transaction, the way arranged marriages were, but worse. Personally, I think it’s an exaggeration, possibly for the purpose of making headlines and sparking off a debate. But if online dating really did manage to take the unpredictable out of love, it would indeed be quite a change from what we know of as humanity. Unlike Walters, I don’t necessarily think that would be a bad thing. To me, the reason people have so much trouble with love is that as a species, we’re struggling to combine our primal urges (remnants from when we were living in the jungle and love was free and a free for all) and the confines of an advanced society with rules, regulations and religion. Much of what we see as beautiful art and poetry grew out of real misery of the people involved in creating such art. Ultimately, wouldn’t it be nice if for most of us, there’d be a way to eventually say goodbye to the perils of incompatible love affairs and have a way to conveniently pick the people who were right for us at this moment in time? Wouldn’t we be able to do more creative and productive things with our time if the love aspect was taken care of?
Of course, that is not the case and could never be the case. The human element is far from nonexistent in the online dating world. Even on sites where you rely on a computer to connect you with “compatible” people, there is a random element. Would there be someone compatible for you on the site? Would anyone compatible on paper actually be attractive to you physically, or even genuinely compatible? Would there be chemistry? Would you manage to keep a relationship together through the years? Would you remain compatible or drift apart? As long as there are people involved, humanity is present. Using an electronic tool to find another human is hardly eroding your humanity any more than using traditional matchmakers, some of which would make you fill out a form and never actually meet you in person. At least with online dating, as opposed to arranged marriages, you get to choose your own partner based on your own intuition. If the description you read is accurate – you’ll have a happy, long lasting relationship with someone who wants to develop and grow in the same direction as you. Otherwise, well, that’s pretty unpredictable and random right there.
I have to say that I personally prefer dating sites where you can run your own searches, exactly because of the element of randomness (and I say this even though I write regularly for a dating site of the other sort, which uses what is actually quite a decent and in depth test to send you matches). In my experience, though, people meet and fall in love on both types of sites and sometimes even on really crappy sites you would never have thought would work. If that’s not the unpredictable nature of love at work, I don’t know what is.
Clare Wood was killed by a man she met online. A tragic case, no doubts about it. Now Clare’s father and Hazel Blears MP are working to bring in a law that would make it possible for women to learn about their new partner’s history of domestic / relationship abuse. This is one of those proposals that appeals to the most primal of gut instincts – the Internet is a big scary place, women know nothing about who they meet, now they can find out. That is, by the way, what makes it a populist law. It’s not hard to see why Clare’s father would want to bring this law in, to supposedly stop other people’s daughters from becoming victims like his own.
But personally I believe more care should be taken before we open up people’s private police records to, well, the entire public. Now, I know the privacy implications of this law are pretty atrocious, but considering the fact that a woman was killed, I realise many would forsake the privacy of someone else (any man?) because they believe the safety of women comes first. To be fair, if I thought this was a workable solution, maybe I would tend to agree. If it went both ways, at least.
I don’t think the exact details of this proposal have been worked out yet but for now is no mention about whether men can find out the abuse history of women they meet online (domestic abuse by women of men may not be as common, but it certainly does exist and is a real problem). There is no mention of what violations would be enough to tarnish a man as an abuser.
But of course, there is also, as far as I can tell, no mention of the fact that many cases of domestic abuse remain unreported, thus unlisted in the police database. In fact, isn’t the nature of most domestic abuse that which only escalates to the police when the abused women get battered so badly, they can no longer hide it from those around them? With a bit of luck, a man can be dangerously abusive to a GF or spouse and still appear all squeaky clean on record. If this law comes into effect, such men could actually “benefit” from the new system – women would search, find nothing and conclude the man in question is absolutely fine, when otherwise they may have exercised more caution.
In many ways, this law is no different than match.com saying they’re going to background check members in the US. It’s not enough. Not only is it not enough, but it makes people think it is enough, thus making the situation worse. Short of sending the thoughtpolice to scan people’s brains and figure out if they’re prone to murderous thoughts, there is nothing you can do that’s foolproof. As always, it’s best to educate women (and men) to spot dangerous signs, rather than open the door to some really dangerous legalisation. After all, if we’ve got our hands in someone’s private data, wouldn’t we want to be sure he doesn’t have any drunk driving offences (dangerous for our future children), public order offences or drug problems?
There’s an article out on the Guardian website about older women and the online dating industry. I occasionally get asked about this and it saddens me to say that yes, women in their 40s, 50s and 60s do suffer online, as men are often looking for younger women. This is the one time when I tell people to lie online – when the woman looks and feels younger and just wouldn’t make it into most guys’ search on the site. The fact is, online dating on standard sites – the ones not aimed at older daters in particular – can be pretty harsh for older ladies. It’s not impossible and some women do find love in this way, but it’s not as easy as finding someone when you’re a happy go lucky girl in your 20s.
One of the ideas touted at older women in the article is to look for younger men on sites that cater for “cougars”. Personally, I hate the term cougar, because I don’t think women interested in younger men ought to be such an unusual thing so as to warrant a special name or a club. Men do it all the time and while some of us may raise an eyebrow when a man dates a woman half his age or younger, it seems to be socially accepted as a common enough thing. I guess we’re OK with men doing it cause it reminds us of polygamy days when it made sense for the guy to keep adding younger women to his harem so that he can keep producing kids even when his other wives got older. Women doing it for companionship and fun? Maybe weird enough so that we have to counteract it with cougar pride.
Either way, dating younger men if you’re both up for it can be fun. You can get more tips in the article itself.
Not literally, but they did have a very big long article covering the subject. Really good and thorough article, though seems to be covering a lot of stuff that only few people wouldn’t know about nowadays. Whenever I read something like that I wonder whether there are still people out there (in the West) who know so little or nothing at all about online dating or whether the article is just really really late to the party. Explaining who match.com, OKcupid and eHarmony are, for example, is quite unusual nowadays. Either it’s to do with their editorial conventions or New Yorker readers are way way behind on online interaction. There’s also a lot of stuff about the concepts behind online dating and all kinds of issues to do with it, which is cool and insightful, but again, nothing particularly new.
A dating site called “BeautifulPeople”, which prides itself on careful screening of its members for attractiveness and only allowing beautiful people to be matched has been hit with a sneaky computer virus that seems to have made a mockery of the whole thing.
The site recently had to delete over 30,000 profiles of members who had managed to skip the site’s voting process and put their profiles on their site without being vetted for attractiveness. Talk about revenge of the nerds! But the best part? The virus was actually called “Shrek”.
Supposedly suspicion fell on a disgruntled ex employee, which would make sense, as they’d have an understanding of the way the system works and, most likely, the technical ability to break it. I was sort of hoping it would be a gifted reject who’d create this cyber protest. Perhaps they are one and the same?
My jury’s still out on sites that cater to “beautiful” people. On one hand, rejection can be quite harsh and make people feel bad about themselves at a time when they are looking for love – not a good thing. Also – should being shallow about looks be encouraged?
On the other hand, there are so many dating sites out there with so many people. The ability to concentrate your search on people who actually fit your standards can be a godsend and ultimately, people want to meet singles who are similar to them. Attractive people tend to want to meet other attractive people – it’s evolution in action. On the grand scale of online dating horrors, it’s loads better than sites promoting extra-marital affairs, etc.
Either way, this story made me laugh. Wouldn’t it be even funnier if people managed to meet someone “ugly” on the site and fall in love before the accounts were removed?
You can read the full story about the ugly virus here.
I wrote a while back about match.com getting sued in the US and deciding to start screening their customers against the sex offenders list. If you’ve been following the story (and my opinion of it), you may also be interested in the following article, published on the blog of Iovation, who specialise in online fraud prevention.
It goes into some detail about your personal responsibility as an online dater and why you should not expect dating sites to be 100% safe, even if they do their best to be.
Here’s a dating thought for the day. There’s often talk of how fairytale romance (think Disney) has made us have unreasonable standards when it comes to love. Little girls are taught to wait around for Prince Charming and many of us grow up feeling like we’re missing out on something amazing, always looking for the perfect man or woman and feeling vaguely disappointed by the reality of our relationships.
So the answer to that? We’re told compromise is a must, that nobody’s perfect (including, of course, us) and that we need to accept the fact that there is no Prince Charming. All good, important stuff, but here’s the thing. Take this backlash to the extreme and what do you get? Another fairytale! In this fairytale, the beautiful prince is trapped in a frog’s body. You kiss the frog (i.e. compromise) and it turned into your wonderful Prince Charming, giving you the ultimate happiness you desire.
Now, I’m not disputing the fact that relationships often involve compromises, especially the ones you want to last. I’m also not disputing the fact that a significant number of happy couples would never have gotten together had they not compromised on things they once thought mattered.
What I’m saying is that it’s important to know when to compromise your standards and when to hold out. The mere act of compromising won’t be your magic key to unlock the door to ultimate happiness.
In matters of love, you should lead with your heart and your body and not with your head. That is, unless all you want is a child and you’re willing to make your love life nothing more than a business transaction to attain said child.
If you don’t fancy someone and there is no chemistry between you, don’t force it. My experience of talking to couples who got together even though they didn’t fit each other’s “type” has taught me that there was always some sort of spark there that made whoever it was who was uncertain at first give their partner a chance anyway.
If you feel that you have to ignore your heart or your body because you feel that you ought to be in a relationship for some reason or other, then you’re onto a loser. All you’ll get at the end is the same frog you started off with.
As much as some online dating sites would like you to think that your intuition and instincts fail when it comes to forming happy, long-term relationships, let’s not forget that people have been loving each other for thousands of years.
Most people have Facebook accounts nowadays, though in my experience, even the most avid Facebook users would shy away from using the site for strict online dating. When it comes to hooking up with complete strangers, rather than friends of friends, people still prefer the relative anonymity of dating sites. But let’s face it, the Facebook / online dating crossover isn’t just about the things you do by choice. Once you reveal enough about yourself to your new online beau or belle, they’re going to be rushing to Facebook and checking out your profile. Some may even ask you for your Facebook details, making it hard to refuse. This opens up a whole can of worms, from having your Facebook profile embarrass you with bad photos to giving personal information out to someone who may turn out to be a freaky stalker. You want to make sure your Facebook is ready for this onslaught in every possible way.
Here are 5 things you can do to make this integration smoother.
1. Watch your profile pic.
You’ve gone all out with your dating site pics, showing off your best side, but your Facebook pic is a blurry, unflattering shot of you pulling faces while drunk at a party. FAIL. No matter what you do, your Facebook profile pic will be seen by anyone looking at your profile, so if you’re trying to get dates, make sure it’s also up to scratch.
2. Make everything private
You can make most things on your Facebook profile private to anyone who isn’t already your friend or your friends’ friend. You then have the choice of who to share your information with, rather than the choice being forced upon you. Just go into your privacy settings and make sure nothing it set to “everyone”.
3. Control your tags
You don’t want last night’s drunken hen or stag night shots popping up on your profile when you’re trying to charm your future husband or wife. Luckily, Facebook lets you decide who can see these in your privacy settings. Choose “only friends” or even “only me” and the problem is solved.
4. Stop random people from searching for you on Facebook
In the “connecting on Facebook” section of your privacy settings, you can control who can search for you on the site. Setting it to everyone means any random person can look you up. This may mean more friends from your forgotten past, but it could also mean people you don’t know very well can look up your profile. If you reduce the permissions to “friends of friends” you may well lose out on some friends (like Facebook tells you), but you may win more peace of mind.
5. Make a special group for your online dating friends
It may be more convenient for you to add your new online dating buddies to Facebook than continue chatting to them on the dating site, especially if they seem fun and friendly. If you do, consider creating a new friends group and adding them all to that. This way you can control what they see more easily (for example, the aforementioned tagged photos) and collectively avoid them on Facebook chat if you’re not up to being sociable with people who are not close friends. The various privacy options all have a “custom” option, where you can hide stuff from a particular person or group.
An exclusive offer for onlinedatingbook.co.uk readers! Save 33% on a 3 month subscription to eHarmony UK. You actually don’t even need a code. All you need to do is visit the following page and sign up. Your promotional code is already built into the page so you can see it there.
This offer is only valid for the month of May 2011.
eHarmony promotional codes in the UK used to be more common, but now that the site has become very popular, they’re not releasing as many coupons and vouchers. This particular offer (and link) is unique to this site, so you can only get it by clicking the above link and going through to that particular landing page.
So if you want to save money on eHarmony this May, now’s your chance.
Swoon is offering up to 30% off subscriptions until June 4th. To make use of this promotion, simply click on the above link and use the discount code “swoon” when prompted during the payment process.
This is a good opportunity to try a different dating site or at the very least an excuse to have a look and see if you like the looks of people on the site. A word of warning, though – the site makes you sign up for a free account before you can even look at the people. You don’t need to put your complete address or any payment details in, though, just choose a username and password and fill out parts of a profile (you can skip most things and fill them in later, if you want).
Swoon is a simple to use dating site that has a basic personality test (nothing too lengthy or complicated) to help you find people who are more compatible than your average random stranger. Great if you want a little bit extra in the personality matching department, but more for fun and an extra reason to see and contact people than a serious and heady psychological analysis of you and your partner.
eHarmony UK have a free communications weekend on NOW to celebrate either the bank holiday or the royal wedding or god knows what.
It actually started yesterday but I only found out about it now. Luckily, it goes on till Monday 2nd of May, so if you sign up for eHarmony now, you should be able to try it out completely free this weekend. Sign up earlier rather than later, as it can take the site a while to send you matches you’re actually interested in. Hopefully, a lot of new people will join this weekend as well so you’ll have even more of a choice!
I’m just the messenger here. I just had this email land in my box. The same production company is responsible for QI, so obviously I’m going to help them out with this! They’re looking for interesting dating stories and online dating is a definite angle, if something interesting happened to you along the way.
If you’re interested, drop them a line and you could be on the telly
Back with a second series, The Rob Brydon Show is looking for people with funny / interesting stories to be in our audience.
Have you got any dating disaster stories? Did you meet your partner in an unusual way? Are you a strange pairing?
If you have ANYTHING funny or interesting you’d like to share with us we’d LOVE to hear from you.
Please get in touch ASAP via therobbrydonshow@talkbackthames.tv
match.com in the USA is to begin screening its members against the registered sex offenders registry. This follows a sad case where a sex offender met a woman on the site and assaulted her. She’s now suing Match.
It’s important to note (as the site’s president points out) that these lists are not exactly reliable. Match say that since there have been improvements in the quality of these measures and the lists then it now makes sense to do so.
Unfortunately, even with these measures there’s no guarantee criminals won’t slip through the net. Not every rapist or sex offender in the US is on the list. Some haven’t even started raping yet. Now, before you freak out and stop online dating entirely, just remember that these people don’t live inside the Internet. They come from somewhere outside of the Internet and can be met in bars, shops, bible classes and dark alleys all around the country.
On the other hand, you shouldn’t let the fact that Match (and probably other sites soon) are covering their asses stop you from observing the safety rules. I know I keep repeating myself here and talking about safety rules quite a lot, but I worry that measures like this one could make people complacent and actually put them in more danger, as they’d assume they’re 100% safe when in fact, they’re only a little bit safer than they had been. I think it’s great that Match are adding another layer of safety to their already strongly moderated site and I hope more sites do this, but that should never take place of personal responsibility and awareness of personal safety.
Recently, more and more people have been commenting on this blog and saying they’ve met scammers on Facebook, pretending to be British or American soldiers stationed abroad. It seems social networking is turning into a battle ground as well.
As if that wasn’t bad enough, a recent study has revealed that social networking sites have overtaken dating sites when it comes to stalking. Cyberstalkers can target complete strangers on social networking sites such as Facebook and the victims can be both women (60%) and men (40%). Unlike real life stalking that’s often the result of a past relationship or an actual acquaintance, cyberstalking does not depend on the victim having more than a casual acquaintance with the stalker. Sometimes, the stalker can be a total stranger.
Unsurprisingly, cyberstalking has overtaken real life stalking. After all, it’s easier to do and you don’t actually need to know the victim…
This cyberstalking can involve repeated unwanted messages or it can involve serious intimidating and even death threats. It would seem the Internet is the choice of weapon for weirdos who think the anonymity it offers puts them above the law or under the radar.
You can read the Guardian article about the survey here, which offers advice on what to do if you’re being cyberstalked.
But I’d like to offer a different sort of advice. Websites like Facebook are notorious for compromising your privacy in all kinds of ways you’ve never even dreamed of. If you want to protect yourself from stalkers, consider taking the following steps when using Facebook:
* In your privacy settings on Facebook, avoid using the “everyone” setting for sharing anything such as your status updates, photos, etc.. Show as little as possible of your profile to strangers.
* In your “connecting on Facebook” settings (also in the privacy settings), you can decide whether you want everyone to be able to send you a friend request, message you, see your friends’ list, etc. It’s up to you how private you want to be. If you’re happy just being in touch with your friends and their friends, you can stop anyone else from every contacting you or adding you as a friend.
* I know people love all these checking in services, but personally I think they suck. The right to privacy is something that was bought in blood from big brother totalitarian governments. Now whole generations are happily broadcasting their whereabouts to the world without giving it a second thought. Apart from the businesses themselves, the only people who care about the fact that a person’s checked in at a supermarket or a petrol station are obsessives and stalkers. Seriously. I say avoid using these services completely, not just because they’re compromising your privacy but also because any tiny benefits they could give you are totally outweighed by the benefit to the businesses involved and the fact that they are using you for free advertising. Your privacy is precious so don’t sell yourself short.
I know a bar that offers people a free drink if they check in there 15 times. I’d rather stick with a paper punch card or, a radical thought, buy my own drink and maintain my privacy (and dignity). No free drink is worth advertising to the world where I am at any given moment 1984-style.
If you must use these services, for example, Facebook’s one, make sure you limit who can see your check ins (also in the privacy settings). I suggest limiting this to your friends only and choosing your Facebook friends wisely.
Lavalife.com has had a change of heart this April and is now 100% free for US customers. That’s right – no credit cards, no free trials but then you have to pay, no nothing. It’s 100% free if you’re US based.
So if you’re curious about what Lavalife is like and want to check it out, now’s the time. It won’t cost you anything at all.
match.com in the USA just released their latest survey results about the current so called rules of dating in the USA. It’s an interesting look into how online dating has changed American dating habits and, more interestingly, how it hasn’t.
It seems most women would still expect men to pay on the first date and while 41% of them would offer to pay, the majority of the men asked (37%) felt that they should pay.
Fast paced modern life aside, it seems the vast majority of people (80%) disapprove of sex on the first date and prefer post date phone calls to texts and email (80% again).
Men are still expected to make the first follow up call and the majority of them will wait at least a day before calling.
You can read the full article here. It has some other interesting facts.
I quite like surveys like these because they remind me how, with all the technology advances and social networks and all these new and exciting ways of meeting each other, we are still just people and doing things in quite traditional ways.
Some might say we need time for our brains to catch up with what technology allows us to do. Maybe our children would have a totally different outlook as to what makes proper dating etiquette and behaviour. On the other hand, I for one hope we never evolve past the need to hear a friendly human voice, although women going halves on the restaurant bill is bound to make quite a few men happy.
When I first started working in the online dating industry, I had a conversation with a friend about the concept (it was a bit less common then) and we joked about him making a dating website where there would be no other men but himself. Women who joined would be given a choice of dating…. him. We weren’t sure about whether it would be funnier to have different profiles for him or just the one profile with one picture.
Now it seems someone in the States has gone and done more or less exactly that, only he seems serious, even though the idea seems like it could be plucked straight out of a viral. I keep expecting some sort of story to enfold with a match.com punchline, but for now, it seems there really is a guy called Chas who wants to be hooked up with his future wife and is willing to pay $10K for the pleasure. If the pictures are anything to go by, Chas is actually quite dishy, too.
So if you know anyone who would like to date Chas, you can go to HookChasUp.com and try to claim your $10K. It’s a great idea and, frankly, I don’t even care whether or not it’s real.
