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Online dating sites. Useful tool to meet someone or just creepy?
noir_blood
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
So the other day I was browing PVP and the Scott Kurtz mention that his friend had created a new dating site for geeks, which got me thinking about online dating sites in general, and if they are ever used(I mean, they have considering they are up), and if anyone here has actually found anyone there.
Personally I never used the sites, but I have tried craigslist a couple of times. Every time has been the same, some back and forth emails that peter out, or a couple of face to face meetings that go nowhere. How has it been for you all?
Personally I never used the sites, but I have tried craigslist a couple of times. Every time has been the same, some back and forth emails that peter out, or a couple of face to face meetings that go nowhere. How has it been for you all?
noir_blood on
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I'll probably sign up to a dating site after I move in a few months. I won't do it now because there's no point when I don't even know where I'll be moving to. But the way I see it, there's no reason to turn down a chance to meet women, no matter how small a chance it is.
See, maybe it's just me, but I don't find myspace/facebook that great to meet people. Well, you can meet people that you're friend knows, but I don't know anyone that has actually met someone brand spanking new off myspace and the like. Probably has EVERYONE has a profile at this point, and unlike dating sites, people go to social networking sites for many reasons.
I don't put a lot of stock in the matching sites' claims either, and like I said I can't put any stock in OkCupid's matching even because it relies entirely on the user's perception of what their ideal match is-- literally, as you answer hundreds and hundreds of questions, you select also what your ideal match's answer would be,
and it builds the matches off of that.
Now, I know that I don't know what I want, and I don't trust that anyone else on the Internet using a dating website does. So.
I guess it's a good time-killer?
This.
I've tried a few of them on occasion and so far I'm not impressed with much about them. I've found that most of the time it seems to be filled with the kinds of people I was trying to avoid via "typical" dating methods as well. Filled with girls talking about all the "hot doodz" and not really looking for anything serious, etc etc. Or filled with profiles that have literal laundry lists of "requirements" that people should meet before they deem you "worthy" of a reply.
I've had a couple dates based on them, but mostly it will wind up being an e-mail or two thrown back and forth if they even reply.
Really they would be a bit better if there wasn't so much emphasis on "fill in this template and pray". Likewise all the "match systems" they use and gimmicks never seem to do much.
I dunno, I don't think they are either creepy or that useful... just another area to look into, but not a place to plant and stop looking elsewhere.
CREEPY.
Yeah, if it worked for you (especially with little to no freak factor) I don't see why you wouldn't. But I think a lot of it simply has to do with who is on it in your area.
Like, it gives me a very easy way to pick out of the crowd the people who are actively looking for transpeople-- what I unfortunately discovered is that all of those people, like anyone actively looking for a 'type' of person, are just creepy perverts.
Oh well.
They were good at serving that purpose, though-- I guess the fact the people were creepy doesn't diminish the website's ability to bring together otherwise unlikely-to-intersect individuals.
Same.
My sister met her fiance through Lavalife. She was in a new city, had just graduated from university, didn't know anyone... and there he was. They dated for a few months, moved in together after that, got engaged a few months ago, and they'll be married next August.
The thing about dating sites or with meeting people online in general - blessing or curse - is that you tend to end up with people you wouldn't even have considered in meatspace. My sister is a big nervous food-loving woman who comes from a fairly culturally refined background and has a Master's degree in health sciences; her fiance is a rail-skinny laid-back guy from the east coast who got his degree in business agriculture and currently works in a feed mill. He's a gamer who loves sitting at home reading sci-fi books, she likes going out to the theatre and shopping. But they're amazingly happy together, because despite their differences, they want the same things from life.
I didn't meet my boyfriend through a dating site, but the same thing happened with us. We're opposites in almost every way as far as our tastes and social lives and backgrounds go, but we share the same dream of where we want to be five, ten, and fifty years from now. If I had met him in a traditional way - if he had been in one of my classes, say - I would have thought he was a pretentious Chuck-wearing indie boy, and he would have thought I was a broodingly shy antisocial girl with extremely narrow taste in music. And we never would have exchanged more than two words to each other. But through a shared interest online, we got to know each other, and hey, we discovered that we were absolutely compatible in every way. (I even like his music now).
Online dating isn't for everyone. There are creeps and stalkers, sure. But it's certainly no worse than the bar scene, and really, where the fuck *else* do you meet people these days?
Of course, in response to that somebody showed me OKCupid, which does seem to suck a lot less than other dating sites, but I haven't had much of a chance to try it out yet.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
what other dating site can guarantee that? :winky:
Perth being a relatively small place, degrees of separation apply when meeting new people, and almost without fail I found that the girls I met either knew someone who I knew, or they knew someone who knew someone I knew. Two degrees of separation at most.
The dating sites are pretty bad places to meet people, because people tend to represent themselves in a way thats biased towards dating, whereas on Myspace, people just portray themselves in a fairly normal way. A very positive light, usually, but in a very general way.
The bus.
Seriously.
I met a beautiful girl on the bus every day this week except Wednesday, and I'm using this long weekend to meet up with all of them. They all seem to share the same interests as me (half an hour bus trip conversation FTW) so we'll see where things go from here. Although, I'm not looking to go out with them as dates, rather just as networking. There is nothing quite like having a lot of female friends when a relationship ends (which I think mine is on the verge of doing), they really do make you feel better about yourself, because they know the right things to say.
After going through the process and answering all the questions...well...
It told me it wasn't confident it could match me with anyone and wouldn't allow me to join.
Aside from making myself a "I must be an axe murderer" trophy I did note that the site must not be total bullshit to turn down a member rather than accept them and pair them up with crap.
Oh, and I lost the bet.
No homosexuals
No married folks
Noone whos been married more than, like, 3 times i think
Noone under the age of 25 I think.
ones married now, ones engaged
both are the finest sort of ladies
that's the way it was with me at least. my friend's wife, who he met online, is really cool.
First off, I thought I saw an interracial couple.
Second, even if not, what are you trying to get at? Oh noes, an uncommon occurrence in society isnt reflected in the small sample of examples of a dating sight. THEY MUST BE RACIST!!!
I keed!
God I hate dating, I really do.
Enlist in Star Citizen! Citizenship must be earned!
"Hey, do you like oral sex?"
Maybe there are a lot of creeps who use those sites, I dunno, but I know for certain that there are some real catches who use them too.
Once I even found an old college associate on there, who I would have asked out at some point if I hadn't gone and graduated. Alas, she started seeing someone like a week after I found her. :P
But generally speaking, I'd say that rather than dating-specific sites... sites geared towards your demographic itself, that happen to be open enough for real life to be known and flirting to be possible.
Then it's just a matter of distance.
Mostly I just start spending more and more time with a girl. One time, we just spent the entire day together, just chilling around town. At night, we ended up sitting around a park, and we just ended up running out of things to talk about. There was an an awkward silence for like, five minutes, and then I just said, "Kiss?" and she said, "Yeah."
And that pretty much started it.
Also, getting trashed sometimes (often) leads to that sort of thing.
Man, if I started asking out people on the bus my long weekend would consist of three dates with old women one with a guy who can't speak English and has more hair coming out of his nostrils than on his head and a beautiful twenty something women who wants to know why I'm not spending more time telling the world about the inevitable coming of the Lord. I hate your bus.
If by world, you mean her, and by coming, you mean coming, and by Lord, you mean me.
:winky:
Usually I just say "hey, would you like to kiss me?"
if they say yes, we go. if they say maybe, "lets find out" and we go.
if they say no, "I didn't say you could. you just looked like you were thinking about something"
Certainly. I've had two successful hookups from these sites (one that actually lasted longer than a week!) - first was from Plentyoffish and the other from OKCupid.