Slashdot Mirror
Of Science and Choice In Online Dating
Must be summertime, as online publications turn to the contemplation of Internet dating. The NY Times's piece (registration may be required) takes a not particularly deep look at the reality behind the "science" claims of chemistry.com, eHarmony.com, and others. "The question is how much it really matters to users if the methods have any scientific basis. A friend of mine... said she looked at several dating sites and chose the ones that looked like they had 'the least riffraff.'" Technology Review focuses on studies showing that the overwhelming number of choices presented by many dating sites can be counterproductive: "...more search options lead to less selective processing by reducing users' cognitive resources, distracting them with irrelevant information, and reducing their ability to screen out inferior options." The article concludes with a look at the startup Omnidate, which offers technology for 3D virtual dating. The site has had twice as many women (by percentage) sign up as the other dating sites typically see.
In the salary cheque that is.
No?
The camera doesn't lie:
http://collegeotr.s3.amazonaws.com/images/blogs/b422245a96af7340b70921c641e0b6db.jpg
Simple. Set up a dating site which costs a thousand+ a month for guys but is free for women.
Deleted
Do people even know what they want from a partner?
People talk and talk about wanting this trait and that trait but they often seem to date people that are nothing like they claim they want. I'm honestly convinced people in general have no idea what they want, so by extension I struggle to see how you could create a site that offers people those things...
Random selection based on
- Age
- Geographic location
- Large important decisions (e.g. Family, yes/no?)
- A few shard interests
Would likely have a very high success rate.
Some people need to get one life before worrying about a second one.
It's not "dating" so much as it is being efficient by running the population through a filter. If I filter out all women under the age of 22, all political conservatives, and all evangelical Christians, I'm probably not missing out on the love of my life an it let's me focus on people I might actually be compatible with.
The reality is that the vast majority of people in the US seem to have gotten married because they figured "it was about time for that" or something similar. If you have anything resembling standards, dating is really, really fucking hard.
Hope that marrying someone wonderful and having a family isn't part of what you need to be really happy, because it sure as hell isn't guaranteed.
+++ATH0
This is a very facile thing for someone in your position to say. For many of the rest of us "experiencing life" all by itself simply means interminable years of crushing loneliness.
I have started to come to the following realization:
Happiness is guaranteed to no one. The best one can expect out of life is that you can always find some way to respect yourself and say "I did something with my life that I can look myself in the mirror and approve of." That status of self-respect is prerequisite for happiness, but it is by no means a guarantor. There is every chance that you'll just get out there and do your thing and live your life and be alone and lonely right up until the day you die.
+++ATH0
...at least when it comes to attraction.
Getting into a relationship you better use your head or your life will turn to crap. You've do NOT want to hook up with someone who's self centered and irrational.
But determining if there'll be sparks....forget the science and go with your gut. Most of the people you "should" get along with based on statistical methods and science you will find boring. Many of the people you shouldn't be attracted to will turn you into a horny toad. The trick is to find someone who's good for you, and be good to them back. Oh and by the way those hormones that make the sex great will make any kind of reasoned rational logic go out the window at least for some of your relationship.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
That 'free' bit is a great selling point but is probably one of the site's biggest flaws. The comment in the summary about 'a site with the least riff-raff' isn't just a silly notion. When I used OKCupid regularly, I encountered a large number of women I would classify as crazy. That's not to say the other sites manage to filter out 100% of the crazies but personal experience has shown a connection between 'Cheap' and 'Crazy,' thus a free site is going to have a higher proportion of 'riff-raff.'
I'm in my late 20s, have done the online dating thing off and on since college, as well as asking out people in real life. If I go back and think about which were the best relationships/sex in terms of online vs offline meeting, offline meeting tended to be the best. There's just far too much useful information you get from seeing someone up close, listening them talk, watching their body language. We have lots of mental machinery dedicated to parsing that stuff, and almost none of it is activated during online dating (even pictures are no good, because they're so often old photos or outright deceptive).
...with the exception of Slashdot, of course. ;-)
So, at this point in my life, I'm trying to reduce the amount of time I spend on IM, forums, computer games, etc. and spend more time around real people in the real world. I think it happens to a lot of nerds as we get older. We look back and realize we don't have much to show for all the thousands of hours spent on inane IRC conversations, first person shooters, and forum flame wars. All that stuff is so much emptiness when you get right down to it...
PoF's for nerds? All I've seen are a bunch of cheap, English-challenged women who kind of need a lift in other areas of life...
As a resident of New England, I feel I can say from my own anecdotal experience that the "excess" of single women in this area are single for reasons that do not in any way assist an average tech-inclined guy in getting a date. Add to this the general innate hostility of a large number of New Englanders and the general disinterest (outside of Cambridge, perhaps) of doing any activities that don't involve sports and/or drinking, and I have had much better luck with "web dating" in other parts of the country, however less attractive the odds may appear on the surface.
By "stupid", I'd suggest that would include those viewing marriage as a romantic union, rather than a social union rooted in an an exchange of property rights (i.e., a business agreement).
Cynical? Perhaps.
I would regard that as realistic rather than cynical. Emotions are subject to change. Regardless of how you feel about that person during dating or on your wedding day, at some time you will feel differently. You will get angry, frustrated, etc at some time. Your spouse is not perfect and will do you wrong at some point, you also to them. A marriage based on emotions is doomed. Building and maintaining romance is the method by which you make your marriage work, not the reason to get married. It takes deliberate effort and will require you to act contrary to your emotions on many occasions.
http://marriedmansexlife.com/
It appeals to the moronic masses who believe in stuff like Astrology, or new age religions. You might be shocked to hear that usually these are women.
These systems are designed to precondition potential matches into thinking that some mystical, all-knowing, compassionate sentient computer brain has made the perfect match made in heaven.
"Well, shit, I spent three effin hours filling out eHarmony's wanna-be MMPI-2 by 'Dr' Warren ... and the system didn't even reject me! I'm suitable, and there must be some validity to this."
(next time, I probably shouldn't lie to eHarmony about my possibly kinky autoerotic asphyxiation fantasy, or that thing about small rodent insertions.)
The point is, after a match is made on eHarmony (or Chemistry,) people go into the first date believing that there is a higher probability of the relationship being successful. The time is no longer completely fearful, but actually there is some mystery and *gasp* optimism about it.
And that, my pale, geeky friends, is the magic behind these heinous systems. Follow the yellow brick road.
I have much, much more to say on this topic, but I'll save the rest for some other time. peace out.
I vehemently disagree. All of my life experience has shown me that if you don't have chemistry in a relationship, it's doomed to failure at worst, or ennui and boredom over the long term at best.
You can't be objective about chemistry, or at least, I haven't yet seen a good solution to determining it without a face to face meeting.
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
What are the downsides?
No boobs to play with. Sore ass. Did I mention no boobs?
Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
Try men?
I think it has more to do with the fact that they no longer have to. Men will do the cooking, and like all people, women have a tendency to do the least amount of work to get what they want.