As you may or may now know, I have a couple of very active threads on this site discussion online dating scams, in particular soldier dating scams. Here’s a comment one helpful lady identifying herself as LilyRose posted the other day. Please read this one and save it somewhere safe. It gives very important information about the difference between real American soldiers serving in Iraq or anywhere else and dodgy African (or other) scammers pretending to be them to scam you out of money.
The fact that Parship, the dating site with the most comprehensive compatibility test, has a gay / lesbian offshoot may come as a surprise to you, especially if you live outside of the UK.
Well, now their gay dating site, gay-parship.com has gone international and is available in 9 (count them) different languages.
Check it out if you’re gay and looking for a serious relationship. The way this site handles things like communications and even viewing pictures is a bit different to most dating sites you’re likely to come across. Handy if you’re tired of the more meat-market sites.
If you’re not gay, you might want to give the straight Parship site a go.
For obvious reasons, I am no stranger to the world of rehashed, convoluted dating features that fill the pages of newspapers and magazines nowadays. I’m sure you know them too – articles dealing with “relationship trends” and other such so-called global matters of the heart that may be affecting people in this modern world blah blah.
Well, here’s what happens when spoof news site, The Onion takes a jibe at such fluff…
Get 3 months for the price of two on eHarmony UK with this exclusive offer to readers of onlinedatingbook.co.uk! You’ll need to click through this link to get this 33% discount and enter the code listed in the post.
Here’s a hilarious, tongue firmly in cheek Youtube animation dealing with the more annoying, frustrating site of online dating. Cupidian Raphsody is a story about dating on OKCupid.com, narrated by spoons, dressed as Queen.
Here’s a new relationship compatibility test to try. It’s not a part of a dating site, but a standalone site. It’s been developed by Dr. Robert Epstein, an American psychologist, author and editor specialising in behavioural sciences.
He is interested in the study of love and motivation and this alone is quite fascinating.
You can read an interview with Epstein here where he raises some interesting theories about falling in love.
The compatibility test is free to take and is available here.
eHarmony.com (United States site) is having one of their famous free communications weekends starting this Friday 23 July. Only this time it’s not a weekend, it’s 10 whole days!
Tomorrow night, July 21st from 6PM – Midnight, you can try out DatingDirect.com for free! Yeah, that’s right, if you’ve never used it before and sign up during that time, you’ll be able to use all the features of the site for free.
After posting about common online dating scams, this blog has become a bit of a hub of activity when it comes to exposing scammers. The blog posts regarding this issue have become very busy with comments and I think they are becoming difficult to read.
Because of this, I have started a basic forum where things will hopefully be easier. If you’ve come across a scammer, been a victim of online dating fraud or suspect the person you are falling for may in fact be a scammer, please go to the forum and post over there.
This will be more relevant to you if you’re in the UK. There’s a very good offer coming up on the 21st of July. I won’t give any more details just yet, but check in on Tuesday to find out what it is.
It’s to do with one of the UK’s biggest dating site and a really good free trial offer!
Well well well, it seems that online dating profile advice such as the kind I offer on this blog has finally made the BBC news headlines.
They have an article talking about the industry of helping people with their profiles and asking whether it’s good or bad, i.e. whether it’s a legitimate thing for people to want to do or whether it’s fraud.
Can you guess what time it is? Yes! It’s yet another free comms weekend from the American eHarmony.com site!
It’s happening right now until Monday.
So sign up over the weekend and start getting your matches through. You’ll be able to message them for free.
Unfortunately, it can take time for the site to match you up with suitable people, but maybe you’ll get lucky, or at the very least get a taste for what the site is all about without having to pay. If you do want to sign up. check up the special offers on the sidebar of this blog and you can save up to 20% off subscription costs.
The UK site doesn’t seem to be doing a free cooms weekend right now, unfortunately. You can still visit eHarmony UK and sign up to take a look around the site.
New research suggests online daters have a false sense of security when dating online. But is the increasingly popular trend of pushing for intrusive background checks the way the online industry should go?
A new dating site aims to match up complete opposites but is this concept really helpful or is it just another gimmick with no purpose apart from making the site some money?
Well, if you tuned in to BBC Radio Oxford this morning you could have heard me speak about the merits of online dating on Louisa Hannan’s show.
I should have perhaps posted this before the event, but in the (unlikely) case you missed it and are interested in hearing me talk about the disappearing stigma, liars and the suitability of online dating for finding a long-term partner, you will soon be able to tune in online and listen to the show, where the first hour was all about finding love. I come in around 10 minutes before the end of the first hour.
Check out this link where I assume today’s show (28/6) will appear in the next couple of days.
I’m always happy to speak about online dating on the radio. Especially when reminded that the stigma is indeed disappearing and people are indeed realising that it’s actually a viable way to meet people.
I’ve met quite a few couples recently who’ve met online, including people in their 60s and 70s. The system works!
You can try to ignore the FIFA world cup, but chances are that if you are in the UK, you won’t be able to. Signs, flags, big screen TVs and the eternal sound of the dreaded vuvuzelas are everywere and online dating, too, takes its traditional hit, with a small but significant slump during game time.
I seem to have blinked and missed the global day of action against online scams, but if you’ve been a victim of online fraud of the online dating variety (and, of course, any other variety, but this is an online dating blog) and are a UK resident, you are encouraged to report it to the UK’s National Fraud Authority where each complaint is taken very seriously.
This is good news in a way, but the fact that “millions of Britons” are losing a total sum of 3.5 billion pounds a year to online scammers is pretty worrying.
An Australian online dating company has recently come out with some useful safety tips for online daters, including a very handy reference guide for the ten most common online dating scams. It’s a good site to check out if you want to educate yourself about the dodgier side of online dating.
Australia has been hit quite hard with online dating scams and online scams in general, so it’s good to see people doing something about it (even if it does get their sites a bit more publicity along the way).
Match Affinity is having a free communications weekend this weekend! This means that from Fri-Sun you’ll be able to send and receive messages on the site for free.
If you’re looking to try a new serious relationships site with a personality test, you can give this one a go absolutely free this weekend. Just make sure you’re all signed up (for free) and have completed their personality test by Friday if you want to make best use of the site.
eHarmony.com will be having one of their famous free communications weekends on 28-31 May 2010.
The UK site is in on it too. If you’re in the UK, visit eHarmony UK to sign up.
This is when you can send and receive messages for free on the site, so get in there and sign up quickly if you want to get enough matches thrown your way by the time you’re ready to message them without paying!
Times they are a changing… New research in America confirms what some of us have been saying for years: nowadays, gender roles are changing and it’s far more socially acceptable for the woman to be the better educated, high earner in a relationship.
I already wrote about the Lovestruck.com iPhone app. Seeing as Lovestruck is aimed predominantly at busy city professionals who are often on the move, it makes sense. Now there is an Android app too, allowing owners of the Google Phone to also interact with their online dates while away from the PC. More smart phones are to follow.
These apps serve London and the UK’s other major cities, plus New York, Dublin, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Singapore and Sydney.
Lovestruck.com, in case you’re wondering, is a location-based online dating site aimed at city professionals in the world’s major cities.
Niche dating sites are all the rage nowadays, aimed at people who value certain aspects of their lives and want to start off their search for love by looking for people who share their interests and hobbies.
Now there is a site dedicated to fans of Apple, the company and its products. The new site, Cupidtino requires all its users to be owners of an Apple device and to be enamoured with it.
Here’s a bit of interesting news – online dating apparently yields more marriages than meeting people in bars. It’s now the third most common method of meeting people for marriage.
US cheaters’ dating website, Ashley Madison is apparently going to expand to the UK market. I can’t wait to see the response their incredibly annoying ads will get in the UK. Apparently UK cheaters looking to have affairs can already register on the site, but there hasn’t been any marketing done yet in the UK.
For the record, I think cheating is a complex issue and you can’t (or shouldn’t) judge everyone who cheats and condemn them to hell. I find it sad, more than anything else. Sad that people can be so bad at communicating, they’d go behind people’s backs rather than be open about their own needs with themselves or each other. It’s also sad that in the 21st century there are still people trapped in loveless marriages without being able to legally or safely leave.
On the other hand, I’m not entirely keen on so-called “lifestyle cheaters” – people who knowingly choose to cheat on their spouses / partners because they enjoy the thrill of the forbidden. I’m certainly not keen on sites such as Ashley Madison that actively encourage people to cheat on their partners and then pocket the cash.
Still, I’d rather people who want to cheat go somewhere like that and leave the normal dating sites to actual singles.
What do you think? Will this site get a good reception in the UK? Will ads encouraging people to cheat go down well with the British public?
A tag cloud generated by leading online dating white label company, White Label Dating (responsible for many many dating sites) reveals what the most commonly used words are in online dating messages.
At least for one day, April 13th, 2010.
If you needed further proof that online dating is now squarely in the mainstream as a household name, look no further than this BBC comedy-drama.
It follows the online exploits of a middle aged woman looking for love online. There are apparently 4 parts and you can listen to it online.
I’ve not had a chance to listen to it yet, I must say, but it’s good to see the BBC are giving the subject of online dating a stage, even if it’s one of those “candid looks” things that are not particularly flattering.
This will mean very little to anyone who’s not a part of the online dating industry, but Allegran, the company I used to work for (the one that launched my online dating career) has been sold again. This time, it’s been sold to Easydate, who know what they are doing, as far as I can tell, so hopefully we won’t see a repeat of the last sale fiasco, when the Daily Mail Group screwed it all up for everyone (including themselves).
Allegran used to be a market leader in the UK, with some of the best minds in the business. Here’s hoping this sale will do justice to its dating sites and will see them helping more and more people find love in years to come.
I wrote here a while back about MatchAffinity, the compatibility testing offer from Match.com that’s recently hit the UK.
Well, they’ve just launched a TV campaign. I wonder if it will have the same effect on this site as their other one did on their main site? Could MatchAffinity become another household name in the UK online dating industry?
Yes it’s that time of year again, at long bloody last. The flowers will soon be out, as will the sun and everyone is feeling a little bit like a good, old-fashioned spring clean.
There’s no better time to take a look at your online dating profile and see whether it too needs a bit of a spring makeover. This is especially true if you’ve been dating online for a while (maybe since your new year’s resolution?) or have been losing interest and hope in your online dating adventures.
So think – is your picture up to scratch? Would a fun new picture of you looking at your best make you feel better about putting yourself out there?
When was the last time you looked over the text in your profile? Does it still represent who you are? Have you done anything exciting recently you’d like to include? Is there anything you’ve learned about who you are and who you’re looking for in the course of your search you think would make an interesting read? I mean positive stuff, of course. Nobody wants to hear you vent about bad dates!
It could also be time to expand your search criteria on sites that run the searches for you, especially if you’ve been online for a while and not getting enough suggestions.
Either way, taking stock of who you are, where you are and what you want to get out of your online dating experience can be a really good thing, even if you decide all is well with your profile and nothing needs updating.
Think of it as a checkpoint on your quest, just at the point where, say, a new year’s resolution may start to flag.
Just like the new year, spring is also a time of new beginnings, so what better reason do you need to help the seeds you planted previously grow into something beautiful?
eHarmony.com just released details of their next free communications weekend. Make a note in your calendar – March 18-21.
Sign up to the site by then and you’ll be able to send and receive messages for free over the weekend.
Sites like Ashley Madison that actively encourage people to cheat on their spouses are becoming increasingly popular. The Pittsburgh Channel recently ran an article asking whether cheating is now becoming the new norm and whether such sites are responsible for it. But has the state of play really changed so much? Or are we simply being hypocritical and naive?
CNN ran a weird article recently, about people who lie on online dating sites. The article details research done by a professor in the University of Kansas, looking into people’s lying habits on one “big long-term relationship dating site” (unnamed, but I have my suspicions).
The researcher spoke to over 5000 people and asked them whether they would lie on a dating site and why.
The results seem to imply that those people who said they would lie are the type of people who want to please people and tell them what they want to hear. They don’t lie out of malice, but because they want people to like them.
Both the article and the research seem to blatantly ignore things such as scammers, married people passing themselves off as single and players passing themselves off as serious.
All of these are, sadly, a big part of the online dating industry, which people should be told about and taught how to spot and avoid. Unfortunately, I doubt any of those types of online dating liars would take the time to answer the good professor’s survey and share with us the reasons why they choose to lie and cheat.
On the other hand, we’ve learned that people who are lonely, looking for a serious relationship and willing to take a (most likely lengthy) survey for no personal gain are apparently keen to please. Who’d have thought?
And… get this!
“Online daters shouldn’t be concerned that most people are presenting a false impression of themselves,” Hall said in a news release before Thursday’s phone interview. “What influences face-to-face dating influences the online world, too.”
The fact that the professors conducting this survey tell people that they don’t have to worry about people lying to them online just shows me how out of touch they are with what’s going on out there. The only worthwhile conclusion of this so called “research” is what everyone in the online dating industry knows already and has done for years:
the people who would lie to you online are the same people who’d lie to you in the real world, be they scammers, compulsive liars, cheats or just “self-monitors”, to use a term from the article itself.
Did someone actually pay for this research? If I were paying taxes in America I’d be well pissed off.
You can read the full text of this, frankly rather lame, article here.
The Australian consumer watchdog reports a rise of 30% in online dating related scams. Could it be because people in Australia are becoming more exposed to online dating and are throwing caution to the wind a little bit too much?
With online dating becoming more and more mainstream, there should be more information available about the potential dangers.
People often put their trust in their dating site, sometimes blindly, and no dating site likes to admit that some scammers may have gotten through.
Having worked as a moderator on a dating site I know how hard it is to catch everyone who’s up to no good. We were always aware of how important it is to catch these people before they fleece innocent daters and steal their money, but even with all the hard work we put in, sometimes these scammers managed to con people before we got to them.
Never assume the site you’re on is 100% safe. No site is. You need to arm yourself with information and learn how to spot a scammer, so you can avoid their nasty plots.
Now’s a good time as ever to brush up on your online dating safety knowledge. Here are some handy online dating safety tips from my book.
Comscore (an Internet monitoring and market research company) is reporting a 16% rise in use of online dating among Britons. This is particularly interesting considering the global dating market has seen a drop of 1%
Feeling the pinch in the American market, the big online dating companies are going to be putting more effort into their UK campaigns, so I’m guessing we’re going to see a lot more of their advertising in the near future.
Hopefully, this will mean tougher competitions and therefore better deals and more variety for British online daters.
Lovestruck.com have come up with a convenient little iPhone app (convenient if you have an iPhone, at least).
Subscribers to the site can use the app for free, which is handy, as the site is aimed at busy city professionals who want to meet like minded singles who live or work near them.
Being able to easily arrange such informal dates on your mobile sounds like a damn fine idea.
I know lots of people go to ballroom dance classes to meet single men and women, but the problem is, a lot of the people who go to dance classes don’t want to be chatted up by people. They want to dance.
So where do you go if you want to dance and also want to meet like-minded singles?
Well, I got news of a fun singles’ dance / speed dating event coming up in March. It’s organised by Yogo Dating in conjunction with the Children’s Trust and even has some people from Strictly Come Dancing in it.
I don’t know Yogo Dating, but I think this is a brilliant idea. I’ve been to my fair share of tango classes and I know for a fact that any type of couples’ dance gives a great insight into what someone is like as a partner in a relationship (and some might say in bed, but I’m saying nothing).
It makes for a good speed dating event and it’s for a good cause too.
Being single may suck on a day when everyone seems to want to ram romance down your throat, but the buzz this date creates around love, dating and online dating can only mean one thing – new blood on dating sites!
It’s like a gym in January full of fresh-faced hopefuls with brand new tracksuits and 10 Christmas pounds to shed.
With so many dating sites having special offers on, too, now’s your chance to take another look at the dating site you’re already on, the one you looked at and thought wasn’t for you or ones you never even tried before. You never know who might have joined in the meantime…
Well, it was bound to happen. Here’s the first of the Valentine’s day offers. Unsurprisingly, it’s from eHarmony.com. From the 11-15 February, you’ll be able to use the site for free, no credit card needed.
eHarmony Canada is also having the free communications Valentine’s weekend.
If you’re in the UK, eHarmony UK are running their Free comms weekend from Friday the 12th and it will run until the 15th.
It’s that happy time again. Forward thinking to Valentine’s day, Parship.co.uk are letting you use their site for free until Sunday. Hurry up and give it a go if you want to see what it’s all about.
On a site that won’t let you view pictures before you pay, being able to see who you’re talking to for free is a big big plus, I’m sure you’ll agree.
How do fate and luck factor into online dating? What can we do to improve our chances when dating online, to prevent ourselves from falling for the wrong people?
Here’s an interesting new site from Match.com. The new site is called MatchAffinity and is based on Match’s personality test. Once you complete the 10 minute test, you can get matches sent to you, as well as look them up yourself.
If you like the way the Match.com site works but want a bit more of a psychological assessment to help you think of people in terms of long term compatibility, then this is a good site to have a look at and see if you like their style.
If you like DatingDirectAffinity, you will find this site extremely familiar…
Well, that’s hardly surprising, is it? With the UK braced for even more snow madness, everyone’s apparently been staying at home and hitting the dating sites.
This is a brilliant opportunity to start your new year on the right foot. I know a lot of you will have made a new year’s resolution to find someone, because this is the perfect time to do it. Not only do you have the power of the new year behind you, you also have many thousands of people out there who have made exactly the same resolution. Maybe one of them is your person?
So use this time (when you’re not out making snowmen and stuff) to work on your profile, try out a few dating sites and teach yourself how to work these to get what you want.
