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Maes

Thoughts on dating sites

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Has anyone have had any experience with those?

As in, what kind of people usually resort to this kind of service, how many "virtual" encounters turn into actual dates, how many alleged "singles" are actually frauds/professionals in disguise etc.

Without having used one of those, and understanding some of the dangers, I suppose they are as good as any other way of meeting new people (especially if you are stuck with a stale/dead-end social network, in which case new encounters would be random and haphazard anyway, at least this way you can apparently choose when and if to initiate an encounter).

I imagine that there's the added perk(?) that you can dive head-first into a one-on-one meeting with a person that is at least somewhat interested in doing precisely that, with no ambiguities, no need to deal with the usual hindrances of needing to frequent specific places, dealing with inconvenient people around your "target" etc.

Perhaps I'm idealizing them a bit, but I suppose that the very least they can be a no-strings attached way of meeting new people and filling in boring evenings/nights if other methods don't seem to work.

Thoughts?

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A mate of mine used to hit them up in his late teens and early 20s. He'd invariably find girls who where great catches on the surface, but further investigation uncovered one huge "but" which prevented them from being a feasible option for normal people IRL.

More often than not they were just plain insane, though some had some other worrying/amusing secrets or personal issues.

Anyway, given your lack of willingness to put effort into relationships equal or greater to what you get out of them, I'd suggest either not wasting your time or that you are the perfect candidate for meeting a likeminded person.

Give it a go, what have you got to lose? (besides a monthly fee you'd be spending buying girls drinks anyway)

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My sister convinced me to register to one at one time. But after filling in the forms and shit. I never visited again. Wasn't me. But I suppose dating isn't me neither. Usually feels very uncomfortable.

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Super Jamie said:

He'd invariably find girls who where great catches on the surface, but further investigation uncovered one huge "but" which prevented them from being a feasible option for normal people IRL.


I met a LOT of people just like those you described without using dating services, so it would probably be business as usual for me. Of course, I don't wish that anyone -including me- should stumble upon such people no matter how and when they meet them.

Super Jamie said:

given your lack of willingness to put effort into relationships equal or greater to what you get out of them


Heh, quite the opposite. I ended up putting far too much effort in the wrong "relationships", hoping to achieve who knows what . After that it's obvious that one might become far too conservative about using his energy.

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I don't know how to invest effort into this sort of dating without appearing disturbing or deranged.

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Probably by treating the people you will eventually date/meet as you would normally? Just because they were met through a dating service, that doesn't mean there's automatically something wrong with them -or so I like to think. They may be just looking for a shortcut/loophole to having an established "social proof" before being considered "worthy" of dating.

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Sad to say that I have done this type of thing before. Just last summer actually. Needless to say, due to my non-outgoing nature I never actually got anywhere on the site I registered, lest you count the one automated email I got -_-. In all honesty, I've learned not to use them, and as such I'll recommend not to use them, but I've had only one experience with it so feel free to try your luck and prove me wrong

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As I said, it should -ideally- be nothing more than a means to bypass or at least speed up the first awkward/uncertain phases that eventually lead to dating and some of us will never master in their lifetimes, or simply don't have the necessary means to initiate -if you work all day, all those tips about meeting women at new age stores are pretty much useless-. You need something explicit and on-demand here.

In theory, you have a system allowing two consenting adults to meet/date. If you follow through, that is. This is no little thing, IMO, as it eliminates at least the initial uncertainty about interest. At most you'll get a bad date or they won't show up, big deal, that can happen with "normal" dates too, amirite?

Perhaps such services require far more maturity and self-realization than expected to use efficiently, e.g. realize what it can do for you, why you're using it, what its limits are.

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I used to use a free dating service, back when I first moved to this city where I didn't know anyone. So perhaps I can give some insights.

First of all, don't use a dating service to date women. Your objective should be to find people you like and can be friends with. In my case, I was looking for a partner for a dance course I was planning to attend, and someone to watch movies with whenever I felt like it.

If you go into blind dating with that kind of 'objective', it's more easier to be yourself without getting worked-up about it and things between you and your date won't feel forced. In fact, it's better to go into this without any objective at all, and just see where it goes. Trying to woo someone over is only going to feel forced, insecure and even desperate. And you don't want that. The message you need to get accross is that you're a nice guy, got a job and good life, you're moderately happy, you're keeping an eye open for 'the right woman' for the tiny off-chance you will meet her like this, but right now you just want to watch a movie with someone. Or something.

You are probably going to meet a few women who just broke up and are just looking for proof they are ok, or have issues otherwise. This becomes apparant quickly enough, mostly because they will bring it up themselves. Short and quick advice: don't be the in-between guy and no you do not want to solve their problems for them.

Your mileage will vary. Shrug it off if it doesn't work out.

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My oldest brother tried a dating site. He says its bullshit since the only gals he found on their were interested in the relationships where you just pass emails back and forth and tell each other how much you love and miss each other through text instead of actually going out on dates and shit like he was looking for. Usually people get real clingy in those types of relationships anyway.

I used to have trouble meeting new people in my younger days but I've gotten much better at being noticed as i grew older.

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Never used one myself, but some of my fiancée's colleagues have tried out some of the new "highly scientific" ones, such as eHarmony that apparently matches people on dozens of compatibility criteria.

From what they've said, the first contact seems to be pretty much in line with the normal expectations: guys who basically just want to know if they're likely to "get some" if they go on a date.

Still, I guess it beats hanging around in bars...

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kristus said:

My sister convinced me to register to one at one time. But after filling in the forms and shit. I never visited again. Wasn't me. But I suppose dating isn't me neither. Usually feels very uncomfortable.

Same here.

That, and every woman on the site was below my standards. I know I really shouldn't be picky considering my situation, but I am.

It might have to do with getting hit on by supermodel-hot girls all the time, though none of them available. It has probably done terrible things to my ego. :|

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I had this discussion with a group of friends a couple weeks ago. It seems to me like dating sites are kind of lacking for people under the age of 30. If you're younger than that, there are probably more productive means for finding someone of the opposite sex to mingle with, because you can always do plenty of crap for social and group activities. When you start getting older and having more responsibilities, it seems like you get a more reasonable pool of people to choose from who similarly don't have enough time in life to go to the little BS 20 something social activities.

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Signed up for several sites, and I met several women too, though we never have anything in common. Its depressing.

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Kaiser said:

Signed up for several sites, and I met several women too, though we never have anything in common. Its depressing.


I can understand that. Sometimes you just have to play near the thin-lined, triple-point of "nothing", "better than nothing" and "worse than nothing", although I wholeheartedly wish that none of you'll ever have to play on that level.

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Never tried it.

I hear lots of bad things about it. The girls are not in real as they are in the internet. Sometimes, you can get lured to a trap, or something like that.


I always have been curious. Maybe I can give a try someday.

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I met my current girlfriend through Myspace, though not really with the express interest of finding a girlfriend. I've never used a dating site, but I don't think I'd be opposed to using one.

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I got more bangs off Faceparty, a now-virtually-dead precursor of Myspace and Facebook that started in at least 2000, maybe earlier, than i did off dedicated dating (well, swinging) sites such as Eroticy.

As in two vs one.

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As a stat trivia, there are relatively few people using such services around here but it depends a lot on the city and the demographic. Major towns like Athens or Salonika get a lot of action (the second significantly less so), and some boards are flooded with bulgarian/georgian/russian "ladies". Not that I have anything against them, but the chances they're just gold diggers/prostitutes/mafia decoys increases exponentially.

For some reason, the city I'm living in has a lot of single cypriot women.

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Finding any women in my local area to even befriend has been easier said than done for me. I thought about using a dating site, but ultimately decided against it. Just doesn't seem plausible.

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Do anyone want dating site stories from me?

I can fill a book. Hilariously bad and great ones. Which ones do you want to hear?

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Maes said:
mafia decoys
[/B]


Ha!!! There was a story about a witness protection drug deal witness that got killed by his date who was a mafia decoy. Well maybe she didn't kill him, but he's dead.

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footman said:

Finding any women in my local area to even befriend has been easier said than done for me. I thought about using a dating site, but ultimately decided against it. Just doesn't seem plausible.


Well, the biggest difference that occurs to me is via the internet, generally it's much easier to find people with similar interests before having to even meet them which often can eliminate a lot of wasted time meeting people IRL. Hooking up via the internet is probably actually more efficient than a lot of the more conventional methods.

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Online dating is all but useless because attractive and worthwhile women have guys approaching them all the time and so they have no real need to be there in the first place. Of course, this isn't the same for guys because a simple lack of aggression can prevent any guy from having relationships.

Much better to just meet girls IRL by approaching them with superficial compliments. That way they instantly know that you're interested and with either accept you or reject you on that basis. This dramatically reduces the chances of being friend zoned.

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Nomad said:

I met my current girlfriend through Myspace, though not really with the express interest of finding a girlfriend.


I'm fairly certain that people are more likely meet their partners when they're not actively searching for a girlfriend or a boyfriend.

Ask a married couple where and how they met, and in my experience they are unlikely to respond with an anecdote about how they signed up to a dedicated dating website or met one another via one of those 'speed dating' avenues that appear to be popular.

I'm making some generalisations, I know. I'm not going to suggest that dating websites are a waste of time. But I wouldn't approach using them with a great deal of optimism, either.

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AndrewB said:

This dramatically reduces the chances of being friend zoned.


What's the worst that could happen? An insecure single male is frustrated even further? We can live with that.

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I was 100% sure that upon seeing an AndrewB post, someone will use that tagline once again.

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Here's something funny for everyone... I saw on TMZ last year or the year before, that Jeff Goldbloom from Jurassic Park uses dating sites. TMZ even followed him on a date he found online, they asked the girl afterward where they met and she said a specific dating site. She was like 18 and he was grey haired.

I even heard that Andrea Yates (woman that killed her 4 kids) used an online dating site in prison. It was confirmed that it was her, not a prankster.

I'm sure Octomom is on a dating site somewhere.

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AndrewB said:

Online dating is all but useless because attractive and worthwhile women have guys approaching them all the time and so they have no real need to be there in the first place.


Maybe the women that you find attractive and worthwhile. Most of the women considered conventionally beautiful, I find to be superficial whores with paper thin personality. I'm perfectly content knowing they're not on dating sites because I'm not even interested in the first place.

Would I fuck one of them if I had the chance, though? Probably. But that's not the most important thing to me.

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There are plenty of uber attractive, unapproachable women on there. Some strippers, some models and out of those most are real (surprisingly), some are ex-trophy wives back on the market, some have an annoying quirk that prevents them from getting someone (like a horrible laugh or a terrible voice, or a jittery shake, or they're an alcoholic) and some are of course gold diggers.

Some are Internet porn stars looking for people to have sex with on camera for their website. Don't expect that in their profile, they just drop it on you at the end of a good date.

I've read dating site forums and heard about hookers and traps. Like one woman charges for the second date.

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