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Why Nobody Wants You On OKCupid
Hugh Pickens writes "Social awkwardness has the most opportunity to shine in your very first message to a potential sweetheart, write Andrea Bartz and Brenna Ehrlich at CNN. Bartz and Ehrlich enumerate and humorously describe seven types of message senders: the generalizer, the autobiographer, the 'eccentric,' the creeper, the gusher, and the wordless wonder. Our favorite: the generalizer, whose typical first message may be 'hey, wuts up?' Why does no one want the generalizer? 'You're probably stupid. Or possibly illiterate,' write Bartz and Ehrilich. According to OKTrends, bad grammar and bad spelling are huge turn-offs in a first message. 'Our negative correlation list is a fool's lexicon: ur, u, wat, wont, and so on. These all make a terrible first impression. In fact, if you count hit (and we do!) the worst 6 words you can use in a first message are all stupid slang.' Other tips from OKTrends' analysis of successful keywords and phrases from over 500,000 first contacts on OKCupid: Avoid physical compliments, bring up specific interests, and if you're a guy, be self-effacing."
I would never suggest to anyone to change who they are just to find a date. That would be losing all integrity, and that's not someone I would choose to date. Unless you just want to play the game. Of course there can be a middle ground, but I'd rather find that than abuse this info.
"if you're a guy, be self-effacing." Like we didn't already know that women want men who believe they're greater than we are. Maybe I like women who aren't threatened by my knowing what I want...
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
We've got no chance , no matter how much theory we know.
Speak intelligently.
My karma is not a Chameleon.
I'm marrying the sexy librarian I met on OkCupid next May. They're out there guys, just rarer than diamonds.
I'm not on OKcupid and I'm not looking for dates, but I read OKcupid's statistics blog regularly with a lot of pleasure. The guys who run the site have fascinating insight and great data analysis skills. And they are also good at explaining things simply. Well worth reading for geek minded people. Especially if they don't have a mate yet !!!
Non-Linux Penguins ?
Too soon.
Science advances one funeral at a time- Max Planck
is your weight. If you are overweight online dating will not work. In person dating might work if you carry yourself well, but in the online world where the next profile is a click away you less of a chance than a snowball in Hell.
After weighing up my options on an online dating site, I chose the more expensive option of allow other members to message me even if they didn't have a subscription. In my opinion, you're more likely to get a response if the other person doesn't have to pay anything.
I wish I hadn't bothered.
Currently I'm talking to 5 women and it's going nowhere beyond small-talk. Weather, plans for the weekend, and how your week is going. As soon as I ask them if they'd like to meet up, they go quiet and never message me again. <PotKettle>It's clear to me why these people are on a dating website, they have no personality</PotKettle>.
Has anyone actually had any luck with this, because at the moment I've paid £90 for 3 month's worth of pen-friends.
I get the impression the article was written by someone who thinks they're "quite good" at understanding this whole e-dating concept. The fact that they make fun of religion (despite it apparently affecting your reply rates negatively) on a dating site comes across as quite arrogant:
"But ideally you should just disbelieve the whole thing. It can help your love life, and, besides, if there really was a god, wouldn’t first messages always get a reply?"
I suppose they had to end the article in an edgey way though. They're a little too cool for me, I'll just have to stick with the one wife.
Just keep doing what you're doing, and you'll find the girl who appreciates your slang, lack of grammar, and poor typing skills. You'll deserve each other.
Good luck.
women complain men are obsessed with t&a but women are exactly the same: if you're not tall, it doesn't matter if you are a CEO and run 3 charities: she'll pick the tall guy who still lives with his mom
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
After all my time spent in online dating this looks like everything that I know, but what I'm really interested in is 'what works'. I'm guessing that the reality is that 'winning' submissions as often exhibited one or more of these mistakes, yet still were acted on. To me, based on what I might call my 'successes', it's timing more than anything.
The force that blew the Big Bang continues to accelerate.
Andrea Bartz and Brenna Ehrlich are regular contributors to CNN - and every single one of their articles are this kind of drivel. A drinking game could involve their weak attempts at inserting every possible hipster keyword in every article. Their idea of snark is including the sentence 'Not.' at the end of a paragraph. Maybe I'm just getting old, but if this is what passes for humor with people their age, I'm not looking forward to the post-hipster generation one bit.
[
I was wont to make a U-turn along the way to Angkor Wat while seeking the Book of Ur.
I can't comment on the homosexual side of things, I presume that there is less nagging and hormones in general
Aha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!
Wrong, 'cos gay or straight, you're still in a relationship!
Summation 2
While I too feel that bad spelling and grammar make me think someone is an idiot, wouldn't a professional writer expressing this be a little biased?
Wat?
U cry?
Boom, your mind just exploded.
but they'll have a lot less fun boasting about it!
I'm in the UK, not exactly in the middle of nowhere (a medium sized town) but not exactly London either. There are virtually no women on the site within a reasonable distance of me.
It helps to live near New York or Los Angeles.
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
As someone in a relationship, I cannot see why people would want to go through all the nagging, barking madness, and second guessing that a relationship brings, not when you have a lovely computer and/or cats to spend your time with instead.
So why are you still in the relationship?
Would it have been so hard to write "online dating sites" instead of "OKCupid" so everyone knows what this is about (not to mention that this is sort of product placement, given that there are definitely other such sites; heck, the article even mentions others!)?
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
The site said that self-effacing men have greater success rates, with words such as "awkward, apologise, kinda" and "probably" likely to increase success because "appearing unsure makes the writer seem more vulnerable and less threatening".
Let's see how many guys put all of these words in their first messages! :)
From my experience with online dating (been using it mostly on-and-off for a few years), I don't think this is the biggest reason why some (many?) guys have problems finding anyone on these sites. Instead, I think the real issue is two-fold: bad (boring) profiles and bad (boring) pictures. Besides the fact that lots of guys online come off as horribly desperate or think a bathroom pic of their pecs/chest will land them something, there are very, very, very few profiles that are enticing or interesting enough to read through them. Additionally, not a lot of folks post pictures that make them really stand out; with most online dating sites having way more men than women (by design), this becomes a problem in the long run. First messages are definitely a problem as well; women I've met online usually tell me about the many guys that either say the stuff outlined in the summary ("hey baby," "what's up," "you look beautiful/really good") or send long messages about themselves that they've already covered in their profile!
My profile and messages were really boring and borderline desperate when I first started out; consequently, I wasn't very successful. I had a lot more success when I put pictures of me doing different stuff and changed my profile to better reflect my real personality.
It's not just the men that have work to do, either. Women's profiles start to become one in the same after a few minutes of looking, and many of them aren't very engaging in conversation either. (This is really a two-way street, though, so it's not fair to put that fault solely on them.) However, since women are the "commodity" on these sites, they generally don't have to worry as much. In fact, really hot women, like in real life, don't have to do anything at all if they're after attention; they'll get hundreds of messages a week without even thinking about it. (This is worse than it seems, though.)
Despite me having said all of this, I think it's better to find people in real-life. (I hate the term 'meatspace;' who the hell came up with this?) Your first impressions aren't bound to still moments or clever word choices, and it's the only way you can really capture someone's "energy" right then and there. People can definitely lie in this respect (clubs, bars and parties are great examples), but at least you know that guy isn't a 80-year old grandma or that woman isn't really 80 pounds more than she looked online.
"I have 500 men admiring me on my profile and trying to get my number or a date. I have no time for your tears."
I think we can keep recursing like this until someone returns 1
Yes, congressman.
help me i've cloned myself and can't remember which one I am
For men, the dating game online in the US basically (well, statistically) boils down to a person being white, not overweight, and moderately presentable. Grammar, hobbies, and all the other stuff that's in the filler profile is secondary, but it basically only paints a story around the guy in the picture. At work, we used to look at the men who were the most successful on the site and read their correspondence with women since we were mostly all single developers. Well one day, one of less attractive developers at work copied all the introduction methods (emails) that the best looking guy on the site used and modified them for his own purposes. His success rate was terrible, until he got into conversations and just started lying about his profession and wealth. He had some success from lying, but the success was with the sort of people no one would want to be associated with for more than ... uh ... a few nights at best. The article has some elements of truth to it, but in terms of maximizing success it's not about the correspondence -- particularly among less educated people.
If you're not white, I'd honestly not waste a dime on any paid dating services unless they're niche services targeting your particular ethnicity. It's not that you (as a minority) won't meet someone, it's just that the effort you'd have to put in to make the site worth your while is just not there (in terms of outbound contact vs. inbound responses.) I don't know what the legalities are, but for paid dating site, I'd give tiered pricing to minorities to increase their numbers and increase customer retention. For free services, I'd just advise minorities to write bots to do outbound correspondence and spray the sample set.
I highly recommend it. I did move to the US from Canada to be with her, so whether or not you can find someone who'll match you well within your city is questionable, but seriously, give it a try before pay sites like eHarmony. (Not to mention that just by its nature, it's far more geek-friendly; the people behind the site code a lot of C++ and are big math people.) Protips: Answer as many of the questions as you can, since that's how it matches you. More questions answered equals better matches. Ask questions when you message people, and mention something specific to their profile. And for God's sake don't mention sex in your messages for a while unless that's specifically what you're looking for, since you're likely to creep relationship-seeking folks out.
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
Nerd will use 3 or more of those at a time.
I'm so so glad we slashdotters are finally getting some dating tips. And I understand we have to start slow and at an easier environment, like online dating. Guys, get ready, we still have about 6 months for the next valentines day (in the US at least).
self-effacing (s lf -f s ng). adj. Not drawing attention to oneself; modest.
Yes, be self-effacing because women don't like successful, rich, powerful, well-known, flashy guys. That is why rock stars, movie stars, professional athletes, etc. find it so hard to meet women and get laid.
/sarcasm
Hey, OKCupid, why don't you do a study about the physical characteristics of those who get the most messages and most replies? Say, height, weight, body type, fitness level, rated appearance, and apparent income level. And, you could include a "rate yourself" and use it in the study. I am sure it would be an eye-opener.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
According to the tips, I get the following text would be perfect:
How's it going. I'm sorry I'm an cool atheist, but I noticed that your name pretty much shows a good taste, haha. I also apologize that my favourite movies are awesome. I'm think vegetarian zombie metal bands are pretty good, but grad school physics literature is kinda fascinating, too. I'm curious what pretty awkward tattoos you probably won't mention, lol.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
I try to be self-deprecating, but I suck at it.
This being slashdot, I don't expect that many of you will understand this advice. Nevertheless, here goes:
A big turn-off is someone who does not know how to communicate well. A relationship and a marriage are all about communication. This article is about a written introduction that makes a first impression, so you want to look your best. It's the same reason you would think carefully about what to wear and where to go on a first date.
Starting off with sexy talk is typically a turn off to a person looking for a relationship. If the relationship works, the sex will happen. Starting off with sex talk first is usually an indicator of someone whose expectations are quite shallow, or someone who is utterly disingenuous. Either way, it doesn't present an impression of someone who communicates well. Besides, trolling for sex in a place that advertises relationships isn't very honest.
I write this as someone who has been married for fifteen years, has three children, and watched with sadness as numerous other relationships and marriages of friends and acquaintances have fallen apart.
Nearly fifty percent of all graduates come from the bottom half of the class!
As soon as I ask them if they'd like to meet up, they go quiet and never message me again. <PotKettle>It's clear to me why these people are on a dating website, they have no personality</PotKettle>.
Has anyone actually had any luck with this, because at the moment I've paid £90 for 3 month's worth of pen-friends.
I've actually had good success with dating sites. It has lead to some great first dates, many subsequent dates and two very nice longer term relationships. The current relationship is very rewarding. I don't consider my self much of geek anymore, though I really enjoy geeky things. I think what helped with me is the following:
Don't have a psychology degree and think most of this is common sense
I love the sound of distortion in the morning -- webcommando
The author is single ;)
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
"Taking a short break right at work and noticed that you looked at my profile so I looked at yours too. :) Hi! :) Randomly, what's your take on Monty Python, There's Something About Mary and O Brother Where Art Thou? :)"
how is babby formed?
a first glance at TFA title I thought it said: OKStupid.
My karma is not a Chameleon.
More specifically it shows self-awareness, a quality which is conspiciously lacking from genuinely awful human beings.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
I love your mind, am fascinated by everything you say, and think your interests are amazing. And also, I suck, and am not worthy of someone as amazing as you. And yes, I *do* agree that that bitch at work has no business talking shit about you behind your back.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Of course, "works" is somewhat hazily defined. What does "works" mean?
- Your message gets a response?
- Your message eventually results in a date?
- Your message eventually results in sex?
- Your message eventually results in a monogamous relationship?
- Your message eventually results in marriage?
- Other?
OK Cupid's stats seems to be all about the first one -- which admittedly is an important first step towards any of the others. But how many of those responses are negative ones, or ones that will put you off continuing the conversation? Perhaps for some of those, it would be more of a win not to have had a response at all?
I'm an ugly bugger. Now I know better.
From a pragmatic standpoint, I think it's a lot like a sales gig. You have to put your best face forward. It can be difficult (for a guy) to write multiple thoughtful emails, due to the amount of effort required to find someone compatible who will hopefully turn into a date. A friend commented on this the other day. Lets say after 3 weeks of a start of a "cycle" you'd end up with 10 women who you've chatted with. Out of those 10, 3 lost contact and most likely found something more interesting/ eyecatching (due to the overwhelming number of men on the site), 3 would not be ideal candidates for whatever reason, 3 lost interest in you, and you'd be left with two first dates.
Hopefully one of the two would be a compatible match, but for whatever reason it's not always the case. I think overall it can be difficult to keep up the positive and personal persona of first emails. It can be a bit disheartening as well, but sometimes it does pay off. I met my girlfriend of 2.5 years on that site, and my friend has been dating for about 6 months now.
So if you look at the odds stacked against you, it's very important to write a thoughtful, proper introductory email. There's always someone better looking than you on there, so sending out poorly thought out emails only works if you're a male model.
Saying they want their report back. Mindless rehashing of something OKcupid themselves already published 2 years ago is not journalism.
I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?
I'm 6'6 and 270. I'm not poor, not rich, and I don't live with my mother. (Though, she's pretty cool and lives in the mountains, so I don't know why that would be an issue for someone I would want to date. Materialistic people are certainly not my type.) I do terribly with American girls, because they like pretty, skinny boys, just as most American boys like pretty, skinny girls. Culturally, I find non-American women more fun to hang out with. They are less paranoid, there's typically less drama, and they are not weighed by Puritan guilt. They also seem to be less vain, and more interested in ideas and personalities rather than style and status.* Women of the Enlightenment are hard to find, but damn, they are worth looking for.
In any case, if you're hitting on someone with 30% less BMI, you're probably wasting your time. There is an element of Darwinian attraction in any initial meeting, and the superficiality of internet communication makes your photo the only thing that matters, as the GP stated. The only couple of times I batted outside of my league is when I met someone by chance in meatspace, and they happened to be single and looking when I was.
(* This is a generalization, so of course there are exceptions. I think Americans in general are institutionally programmed to be materialistic, overly competitive, and totally upside down when it comes to putting important things like family, charity, and social betterment ahead of their own narrow self-centered aspirations. It's not something I blame on people individually, but I certainly avoid them when I can.)
Fuck Andrea Bartz and Brenna Ehrlich.
"Stuff Hipsters Hate". Really?
No one give them any play for being shallow people.
The shoe is on the other foot now!
I can tell you what has worked with me (a reasonably typical actual geek female) in the past:
- As TFA suggests, communicating well. If you don't care enough to express yourself well then why should I care enough to listen?
- Don't be an egotist (again, the TFA suggests this). If you're wonderful, I'll figure it out; don't brag to me.
- Be interesting, not generic. By this I mean why say, "I like to read books" - well, no shit, Sherlock, but what books? Why?
- Don't be cynical. "This probably won't work/this is probably a waste of time/you're probably not a real person" - then why try? We all know that it's statistically unlikely, and we all know that there are spammers and bots out there. Why start with a negative?
- Do be employed, don't live at home. I neither want nor expect a man to pay my way, but I expect him to be a functioning adult in society, not a manchild. I know with the economy the way it is now that many people are unemployed - that's fine, but I'm not going to date an out-of-work guy and I think he probably shouldn't be dating either as he has bigger problems to work on than being dateless.
- Do be in reasonable shape. If you don't take care of/care about yourself, why should I care about you?
Basically, if I get a message from someone that fails any of that, it'll go into the bin.
As far as past that - yes, part of it is timing, part of it is just that spark that does or doesn't happen, and part of it is luck. The point of my post, and the larger point of TFA, is that without getting past that first part you can't get to the part that involves timing, spark or luck.
Since I can't tell them apart, I treat all ACs as the same person.
So we should be interested because two vapid girls got a job being professionally gossipy, snarky and vapid. How about no and shut up.
Hate to break it to you but "what works" will be different for each person. You're just going to have to figure it out from scratch every single time. But that's where the fun is right? Good luck!
...two theories from e-dating users. They're somewhat contradictory.
1) The gender balance is skewed, leading to women shopping from a large pool of available men. This makes sense, as it seems to follow typical mating behavior in American culture (ie, men solicit women, women choose which man to accept) as well as following a sort of larger skew of technology use.
It was also thought that younger women (under 35?) of average or better appearance generally have more real-world dating options than men do as they are more likely to be solicited by men than women in day-day life, thus reducing their interest in online dating.
The first opinion came from a friend of mine who'd I'd describe as generally attractive and in great physical shape but overly picky. I think he used match.com and e-harmony. I think if he had been less picky, or had taken profile answers with a grain of salt (ie, assuming that some answers may have been weakly held preferences instead of assuming they were zealously held beliefs, cast in stone) he might have had a bigger pool to draw from.
2) Once you get outside the pool of women looking for a husband (ie, over 35-40, with white-collar careers and either never married or divorced, the chances of getting dates goes up significantly.
The theory behind this is that this pool of women are (no longer?) interested in the fairy tale of husband, kids, house in the suburbs, etc and are more interested in general companionship, casual dating, etc. They have good paying jobs and are generally comfortable in their single status and don't "need" a man for economic and social security. They're also on the declining side of physical attractiveness, and thus are less likely to believe they can be picky, especially if they are competing with women 10 years younger. I've heard this theory before and it makes some sense.
The second theory was from a guy who I would describe as of below-average appearance -- moderately overweight, and neither a snappy dresser or well-groomed. He seemed happy and said he went on "first dates" every couple of weeks and occasionally second and third dates but said he was more interested in having fun than finding a life partner.
My guess is that if you choose from the right pool and aren't overly picky, you'll do OK. It probably sucks to be 29 and trying to use online dating as I think the expectations of young women are really unrealistic.
Of course, "works" is somewhat hazily defined. What does "works" mean?
- Your message gets a response?
- Your message eventually results in a date?
- Your message eventually results in sex?
- Your message eventually results in marriage?
OK Cupid's stats seems to be all about the first one -- which admittedly is an important first step towards any of the others.
It's also the only one they can really measure. People are unlikely to provide feedback on any of the others from the list. As well as possibly changing to a different communication media.
Also the last two have the strange property of many cultures expecting everyone to want them. In just about any other context the idea of everybody wanting (or even liking) the same thing would be dismissed out of hand.
It started because I read the statistics blog and wanted to try an experiment... I wanted to see if I could land dates by simply doing everything the statistics suggested would work. At first I stuck to what the script, but in the end I realized it's just a matter of not being a creeper. After I actually met some girls in person we had good laughs about the kind of people out there. Looking at the messages, they're all pretty much as creepy as possible, and any remotely cordial message that shows some legitimate interest in the profile will typically get a response.
Online dating can be a lot of fun, especially for people like us who are stuck in male dominated professions. But there's a big gap between people who use online dating because they can't meet anyone, and people who need online dating because they lack any social graces. Unfortunately, it's hard to tell the difference until you meet someone. I've got some pretty awful stories. Also I found the biggest lie people tell is in the pictures they choose. If you're thinking about doing online dating, Skype with the girl first to avoid wasting your time.
You forgot the "Welcome to Costco" part.
Eloi are stupid, throw morlocks at them!
... and I start all my messages the same way: "I put on my robe and wizard hat..."
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
I'm not affiliated with any dating site. I hate most of them. But OKC deserves a shout-out.
I was a member of OKC back before they had any dating functions. I filled out tests and questions mostly out of a random way to log my psyche.
After they started the dating functions I met 2 long-term dating partners from OKC over the years. Eventually I found myself single and got back on the site. Within a few months I was seeing to wonderful chick who a year later I would marry. That was a year ago.
I know of at least 3 other successful match ups on OKC (not all married, not all should).
Changing yourself to find someone is DESTINED to fail. That's why OKC seems to work well ... as long as you "be yourself" you find someone similar. It also seems to do a better job of pulling descriptions out of otherwise introverted people.
I think OKC may work better in SMALLER communities where sites like Match.com just don't work. Match.com, Eharmony and others seem to work based on critical mass where you date scattershot until you find someone that actually is who they said they were online.Their personality profiles and other things just aren't detailed enough.
Someone who has answered 500+ questions on OKC is likely NOT modifying their answers. Someone who has no questions (or very few) answered and no significant profile is probably just looking for someone and likely is biasing their profile significantly. Those are things that are MUCH harder to judge on other sites. Do people scan over others based on personal judgements? Sure. That's going to happen EVERYWHERE. It's called life.
PS. OKC working for me, even in smaller cities, doesn't mean I was lucky or a catch. I'm 40 now, overweight, and have as much personal baggage as anyone else. But it let me point out my good points while realistically acknowledging my faults. Honestly ... it is the best mix I've seen yet for any site like this.
I
It is more productive to voice thoughtful opinions (reply) than to judge (moderate) others.
Not near. In. IN the city. I live "Near" New York but I might as well be on another planet. Granted I'm not sure I'd be up to maintaining a commuting relationship into New York, but I'll never know because New Yorkers won't give you the time of day if you're more than two transfers away. Heck, some say in their profiles don't bother if you live in the Bronx or Staten Island.
It's inconvenient for both parties, I get that, but I assume it's also a matter of statistics and probability: There are a lot of people in New York, and statistically, there's probably at least 2.35 people more or less like me in New York (I'm guessing in Park Slope and the UES), so why bother with the version of me that lives 45 minutes away? You've got 2.35 reasonable facimiies not more than two subway transfers away! Besides if you were that cool, you'd live in the city, not near it, obviously.
No, not bitter, why do you ask?
"These people look deep within my soul and assign me a number based on the order in which I joined" --Homer re:
For those who do not wish to breed, life is a whole lot simpler (and more interesting), if you stay single.
Seriously, if you don't spend the greater portion of your free time obsessing over someone else, you can instead study a wide variety of topics, exercise and train in a variety of physical disciplines, do a lot more hobby programming (or other creative hobby), watch more movies/shows, devote more time to your spiritual practices, and so on.
Basically, the whole world opens up. Sure, you can do any of that while dating, but not nearly as much. You wind up spending significant amounts of time and money doing stuff for/with the other person that normally you wouldn't care about at all. The best part: if you stay single, you can *still* get laid. Prostitution is actually the safest sex you can have if you are doing it in a state where it is legal and properly regulated. And, depending on your frequency of indulgence, it can be cheaper than dating too. Also, if you have the cash (which you likely will since you have more time to devote to money-making), you can have sex with much hotter women than would normally date you. It is a win all-around.
So why are people so insistent on dating? Partly because of social pressure, and partly because people have bought into the lie that they cannot possibly be emotionally self-fulfilling. People believe that they *need* someone else in order to be complete. But remember, every emotional experience you have ever had was created by your own brain.
As the 14th dalai lama so elegantly put it, "when you make someone else responsible for your own happiness, you set yourself up for suffering."
Own your soul.
It is ok to be single.
Do be employed, don't live at home.
Ugh. I'm responding to this just because I've had this exact discussion with my girlfriend (full disclosure - I met her on a dating site). My question always is: I've been unemployed in the past. Sometimes for more than a few months. I've had shitty night-shift jobs to cover living expenses. Yet I'm apparently awesome enough that she sticks around. So why let a temporary situation that has nothing to do with who I am dictate whether to get to know me? The answer I got back was the same as yours - that the quality of the nest is an important part of women being attracted to men. Well, fine, but then don't go bitch to me about how there are no good men around. You're artificially reducing the pool of available men based on a criteria that is utterly temporary and is only marginally related to who that person is.
Furthermore, why stop at a man being unemployed? Why not just flat out say "He has to make at least 50K a year and own at least 800 square feet of home? Why not 100k? Why not a 2000 square foot home? Because those are just material things that are not important to a person? Yeah.... if that's your response, you're just papering over the fact that you have decided that someone like that is probably out of your league. You decided your price was employment and their own place, others decided that their price was 100k and 2000 square feet.
I'm not going to date an out-of-work guy and I think he probably shouldn't be dating either as he has bigger problems to work on than being dateless.
Really? The only thing he should be doing is to find a job? No social life, no meeting new people, no going out on a date in the park? You do realize that the only people who work like that are people who don't socialize to begin with, right? Not to mention that the social network is what keeps people going in tough times? And don't feed me the line that dating is different from socializing. Dating is just socializing with a different end-goal in mind.
The point of my post, and the larger point of TFA, is that without getting past that first part you can't get to the part that involves timing, spark or luck.
And my point to you is that I'm tired of hearing women complain about the lack of men, when their selection criteria contain items that have nothing to do with what makes a relationship successful. Unless, of course, your measurement of a successful relationship is the number of digits in your bank account.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
....I first met my wife in about 2000 playing a MUD called Dragonstone.
I was in the middle of a nasty break-up with the mother of my son, and really wasn't looking to date anyone for a bit. Our relationship just evolved over the years that we played together, and when we both became administration for the game, we ended up getting married, as it was pretty obvious by then that we should be together.
I asked her what attracted her to me. She loved my RP style, and the fact that I always took the time to make her laugh. Giggity.
Good luck to you guys in your online search :)
@Mindless Drivel: 100% of Twitter posts ever Tweeted.
I am wont to wantonly eat wontons, but it's probably a bad idea to say so on a dating site.
Try not to take me more seriously than I take myself.
I find it amusing that these stats are coming out right before PAX Prime...
I didn't realize /. was giving PUA advice now. ;)
MATT DAMON!!
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." ~Thomas Jefferson
Just don't get one OK Cupid. If you don't like it, choose match.com or eharmony.com. If you have a hobby or two offline, it might even be possible to meet someone you like through that! There are always exceptions to the rule, but it shouldn't be too hard to find someone to date if you go out in the world with reasonable expectations.
No, it means that you shouldn't brag about how awesome and amazing you are. If you have to say "I am an amazing person" then that likely means, at least the way I'd think about it, that you have to say it because you can't show it.
So True.
Dating and interviewing are similar types of activities, and it's often said that when you desire to impress someone, you should demonstrate, and not declare... it's easier said than done, especially on a job/dating site, but the idea is that once you get a chance to engage, every action/word should be focused on emphasizing those strengths that you're not exactly declaring.
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
I would never suggest to anyone to change who they are just to find a date. That would be losing all integrity, and that's not someone I would choose to date.
It's not changing who you are, it's changing how you present yourself. Writing like you're an illiterate buffoon is the online equivalent of not bathing or changing your clothes for a few weeks.
Well, before you introduce yourself to a potential romantic partner, I recommend that you take a shower, change your clothes, and/or run spell check. Whichever is appropriate to your surroundings. You'll enjoy much more success that way.
They don't grade fathers, but if your daughter's a stripper, you fucked up. --Chris Rock
I'm sure there's some kind of tipping point for female interest as well -- you didn't say, but how many of the women you are getting interest from are much younger than you?
I strongly think that women in their twenties are really operating in something combining Cinderella fantasy with something approaching an instinctive search for economic support; it might be because like everyone else in their 20s, they are struggling economically and a man to support them seems like an easy and familiar way out.
Unfortunately, men in their 20s are just as bad off and even if they have that first cube job, they aren't seen as a good source of support. "Older" men, even slightly older, may give off some kind of aura of economic security (slightly better car, apartment, clothes) that appeals to them.
Because women are there for attention.
You think it's about numbers, it's not.
Having a job vs. not having a job is a phase change. Making 35k vs. making 350k is, to me at least, not relevant.
I've dated men who were poor - my most was a social worker who made 25k a year. To me, what's important is that they have SOMETHING gainful to do in their lives, and by "gainful" I mean useful, important, purposeful going on. Employment status is often - not always - but often - a good gauge of whether someone is an adult and whether they are the kind of person I, personally, am interested (read: motivated, adult, capable of supporting themselves). The level they can support themselves at isn't relevant to me, but rather that they are capable of it and that they are driven to do it.
I don't know about you, but I think someone's ability to function as an adult in modern society is an INCREDIBLY important aspect of a relationship with them, and like I said, employment status is not that bad a metric for determining that when one is faced with the prospect of hundreds or thousands of options.
And no, an out of work guy should focus on whatever else he wants to focus on - but *I* personally, am not going to be interested in dating him for the reasons I explained above.
tl;dr version: I would date a man who was employed flipping burgers rather than a man who is unemployed because to me, that says quite a bit about the person's character in most circumstances.
Since I can't tell them apart, I treat all ACs as the same person.
Wanting a partner who is employed and capable of supporting himself is not the same as wanting some guy to leech off of. I'm well aware that there are many gold diggers out there (of both genders, btw), but when you use blanket statements as you did you give the impression that you believe that about ALL women.
If you honestly believe what you wrote, you have issues that have nothing to do with "women now adays" and everything to do with you.
Since I can't tell them apart, I treat all ACs as the same person.
Actually, let me respond again: Did you not read anything else in the first line you quoted?
I made the point that I emphatically don't expect or want to be supported by a man but you conveniently skipped that to go on your rant.
So, let me add another line:
- Possess reading comprehension and the ability to follow a line of reasoning.
Since I can't tell them apart, I treat all ACs as the same person.
Being overly focussed on things you wished you had but cannot offer (personality, looks, money, status, banana's, ..)
SWM 29, owns massive banana farm in upstate new york. Called 'Banana King' by fortune magazine in 2009. Currently building a summer mansion out of frieze dried bananas in baja, California. I have donated several million bananas to various charitable institutions for wayward primates. looking for a girl to share life with. no freaks, plz.
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
On average, there are somewhat more men than women but it varies a great deal from region to region. In the Northeast, there are more single women than men. In Nothern California, there are far more single men than women. Back when I bothered with online dating, I found ratios in the Bay Area to be between 1:3 and 1:7. It is trivially easy to check for yourself if you have an account on one of these sites. Just search for single women, note the total, and then search for single men given the same parameters.
Quit trying to make it sound pretty, because it isn't. There are plenty of men who can support themselves on OKC. A whole lot of them make between 40k to 70k a year. Why are they still single? If you actually looked at the OKC research, you'd see how much of a jump stats show between men who make between 80 to 100k and those who make less than that. Yes, it is a blanket statement backed by research and statistics.
Where is the "Ignorant" mod tag?
And so you think that means women are "bitches and whores" - your words.
You want to go on a misogynistic rant, that's perfectly fine, but you should know that it makes you sound like a truly awful person.
Let me ask you this: What kind of women do you think those men who include their income information in their OKC profile are trying to attract? If that information is supposed to be irrelevant as you're trying to argue, then why would a man include it? If a man doesn't want to attract women who are interested in his income over his personality, why include it?
I don't post my measurements or any stats about my weight or height (though I do include adjectives like "tall" and "active") in my profile because I don't want to attract men who are superficial - they don't interest me. So if men are uninterested in the gold-diggers, why include the information that attracts them?
It takes two to tango, and by posting their income levels those men are emphatically inviting gold-diggers to the dance.
Since I can't tell them apart, I treat all ACs as the same person.
Wrong chain .... unless you met Slashdot on OKC.
"The greatest lesson in life is to know that even fools are right sometimes" - Winston Churchill
A friend of mine from my bar days was (probably still is wherever he may be) a dispassionate, almost woman-hating pickup artist and he explained the secret like this. You've probably figured it out from the nature of all the posts here. Most women in bars are basically waiting for Brad Pitt to walk in trailing a fluttering path of $100 bills, give them the funniest, romantic, enticing sales pitch they've ever heard, then whisk them off for the night in his stretch limo. And, most will sit around all night waiting for it to happen. His approach was basically to go up to any woman he found attractive, drop his pitch with zero expectations, rinse/lather/repeat, then later in the night when they all start to figure out that Brad Pitt isn't showing up, they'd start trickling back over to him.
I guess the point is, there is no "The One For Me" when you're out on the town, just a whole bunch of prospects. Don't get offended by rejection because the expectations of most of the women you'd be interested in are unrealistic anyway. Oh, and either be confident or fake it. Get your pitch together and treat the pick-up game like a training exercise that takes lots of practice. Sure, there are *some* women out there above these frivolities, but they're few and far between and landing one isn't some sort of panacea. Play the odds.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
The "bad boy" gambit is also a good way to end up with a married or taken woman. If you play that game, pay a little extra attention to that.
I understand that. All of it. I really do. I want the absolute best (per my criteria) female partner I can get too. I wouldn't be completely opposed to children as some point myself. I just get shunted into "cynical mode" when I talk to these 24-26 year olds and read their profiles and realize that they're not looking for a boyfriend/husband/father and they're just looking for the sperm with which to generate their children and the paycheck with which to feed them. I mean, sure, that's biology, but I think there's supposed to be some illusion of, well, personality or something on top of that.
Support the EFF and Creative Commons. The war is coming, and they're supporting you...
Now you are just taking what i wrote out of context and smear my integrity with it, not unlike what most politicians do. Spin it all you like, but If you actually read what i wrote, you'd find: No, women are not "bitches and whores"; women who choose mate based on current income are "bitches and whores". Maybe you should learn how to read before jumping into conclusions, or are you affiliated with FOX news? And why do you think men post income? Obviously there isn't a demand from average women, that would just be too logical. There must be a giant male only conspiracy going on to foster the "gold digger" class and screw everyone else. It's time to pull your head out of your ass and smell the battle field of the sexes.
Where is the "Ignorant" mod tag?
...not online. Not an agency or just through friends. I turned around to ask a girl if she knew of a cigarette machine and 2 hours later, we were still talking. 4 hours later, we were weaving our way up Camden Street groping each other and giving tongue.
3 months later, I still love this gal. Our texts to each other are like this:
Me: Hey, how was your day in the foreign intelligence agency? I'm going to pick you up outside the embassy (when are you going to tell me what you really do there? :) ) and take you to a nice restaurant. Sorry, I'll be wearing an expensive suit and tie again (had another presentation - work's a bitch, eh?) but I don't care how you are. I'm sure you'll be fabulous. Later on let's walk along the beach. It's a full moon tonight! I love you.
Her: Ya had nice day all went well wit sbjct X actualy hav evening 2 mself, tidying! lol. Hav 2 meet boss contct 2m so hav 2 prtend am tidy no strngs etc. PsykWrfr101. Will B @ rndvu usual plce. XXX
Guys (and girls), how could I resist a woman with such sweet charms? She texts like a poetess. Should I ask her to marry me now or when we meet her parents in Tel Aviv?
Appear to be the perfect conversation topic. That's awesome.
You don't have any integrity. You called women "bitches and whores" and you attempted to generalize an entire group of people based on your own misogynistic beliefs.
Then, when you get called on it, you play the victim card and accuse me of trying to spin it. Then you play the victim card and blame women again for the whole income issue on some stupid website because hey, men are *powerless* to not post their income.
And, you also missed the entirety of my point. Which I will restate for you because you are clearly not smart enough to get it:
By posting your income you are only increasing the number of women who are gold-diggers who will respond to your profile. Sure, it makes you more "competitive" but why would you want to be more competitive for women who you obviously loathe?
Like I said, I don't post my measurements or random superficial shit like that because - wait for it - I don't want men who are interested in that over the stuff I consider important. Do I get fewer responses than women who do post those things? I'm sure I do. But I don't get a lot of guys who can only talk about meaningless (to me) physical attributes. It's amazing how that works!
It's really not that hard. Stop playing the victim, stop trying to blame everyone else when you are complicit in the very behavior you decry.
I don't really know any other way to say it - if you can't get it past this point, all I can say is good day and good luck.
Since I can't tell them apart, I treat all ACs as the same person.
Employment status is often - not always - but often - a good gauge of whether someone is an adult and whether they are the kind of person I, personally, am interested (read: motivated, adult, capable of supporting themselves). The level they can support themselves at isn't relevant to me, but rather that they are capable of it and that they are driven to do it.
My wife is currently unemployed. Is she not an adult, or is your standard different because she is female?
They don't grade fathers, but if your daughter's a stripper, you fucked up. --Chris Rock
And my point to you is that I'm tired of hearing women complain about the lack of men, when their selection criteria contain items that have nothing to do with what makes a relationship successful. Unless, of course, your measurement of a successful relationship is the number of digits in your bank account.
There is a lot of truth to this. Most women will not "date down" socioeconomically, and then they complain about the lack of quality men. Even women who make in the top 10% of US incomes whine that they can't find good looking men who make more than them who are their same age. I guess they give no consideration to the statistical unlikelihood of there being a glut of such men banging down her door competing for her attention.
If I were single, I wouldn't mind dating a woman who was unemployed if she was fun and kind and caring and treated me right. These are the types of things that I value in a woman. I could give a shit how much money she makes.
They don't grade fathers, but if your daughter's a stripper, you fucked up. --Chris Rock
Actually, they do have a mechanism to measure the other outcomes. If you remove your account (or just temporarily disable it), they ask you very nicely if you could tell them why - giving examples like "Are you in a relationship now? Are you getting married? Was it someone you met on OK Cupid?"
They really want to know these things, and apparently a lot of people do bother to provide an answer. They used these responses in their analysis to determine what works, the stats were not just based on what got a response (they have done more than one post about this stuff so it may have been in a different one).
Next time you're out at a bar, hopefully a social dancing type place, do this. Go up and talk to at least 10 girls. Don't stalk, don't wait to check for boyfriends or openings, don't take your buddy over with you. Just any time you see an attractive girl (stay away from the models) go up *IMMEDIATELY* and talk to her. And, LISTEN to her. Don't use a pick up line, but you might want to have a polite simple intro and few questions.
Second, cut down your conversations to no more than 5 minutes. Regardless of how well things are going, cut off the conversation (or if she does that's just as well) and abandon all contact with each one (unless they reinitiate with you). Don't stare to see what the last girl is up to. Move on to the next one and forget about the previous conversation.
If you're getting stuck, watch for another guy trying to initiate a conversation with a girl and listen to the kinds of things he says.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
Employment status is often - not always - but often - a good gauge of whether someone is an adult and whether they are the kind of person I, personally, am interested (read: motivated, adult, capable of supporting themselves)
Ok, so now we're in the details. How often is often? 51%? 99% Why?
But here's the more important question: Border's laid off pretty much its entire work force. Cape Canaveral is going to see a massive exodus of engineers. Lockheed Martin lost a good chunk of its workers. Do these people undergo a phase change from being a motivated adult, capable of supporting themselves to leeches on society? Yes? No? Why? Focus on how their personality changes. Show your work. Also include how many people are unemployed because of a company lay-off versus because they'd rather not work than work.
The more you post, and the more I'm convinced that the value you're assigning to employment is as asinine as the one of Gold diggers. And at least, Gold diggers are straight forward in their assessment: money is more important than personality. You, on the other hand, use a proxy for personality that is at best very weakly correlated with it. I wish you best of luck in your endeavors, but I'll have very little understanding or compassion if your search fails.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
"Our negative correlation list is a fool's lexicon: ur, u, wat, wont, and so on." I do use 'wont' occasionally, but with its correct meaning. *ahem* It is my wont to use the word when I want.
This is the real signature
(Beats those shadows on the cave wall, don't it?)
I have more integrity than someone who literally proves my statement is true. You are like the kettle that cries the pot black. No, men are not powerless to not post their income, but apparently you are too stupid to understand basic economy with supply and demand. Come back after you read econ 101 texts and look up prisoner's dilemma on wikipedia. It seems you only argue based on obvious and personal observations on the surface without even understanding what's the driving force behind why things happen. Just because you, yourself don't post your measurements doesn't matter on the grand scheme of things. Get it in your head: you, as an individual, does not matter. It only starts to matter when a critical mass of people starting to do the same thing. Not posting income for men is in the same class as not posting a picture as a woman on dating sites. Statistics speaks so loudly that your angry reaction cannot cover it. Understand it, accept it, and breathe it.
Where is the "Ignorant" mod tag?
I met (and dated) the (unquestionably) hottest girl I ever have while I was unemployed and living at home in my 30's.
I think it happened because I was relaxed and open to new things at the time. When I am working I'm very focussed, and work takes priority. I'm no fun. The most important thing is to BE A FUN PERSON and then people will want to be around you.
"I have 500 men admiring me on my profile and trying to get my number or a date. I have no time for your tears."
I'm sorry to correct you, but I believe you meant "ur tears" or "ur tearz". :>