Online Dating - Anyone tried/willing to share experiences and/or tips?

[The Stig]

Put it bluntly I'm getting bored with the people here and I'm looking for a bit of excitement but at the same time somewhat looking to settle down with someone...

Since it's kinda dry here with suitable material and commuting everyday I see these ads for online dating.

Predominantly, aside from the "local" ones (London in my case), one that seems bump into me often is eHarmony, which sounds good according to how it works (they match you up based on your profile) but I'm not sure, wiki says they steal money and stuff...

I guess the usual flow is:
Make profile/register/put up a normal picture
Wait for someone to PM you/search and PM someone
Chat online/webcam
Exchange numbers/set up a small date somewhere
If everything falls into place, keep at it and go with the flow like I would with anyone?

Just my assumption on how it should work, I never really looked into it before. I'm not too picky but I do wonder about the quality of the people online, I don't want to meet someone who will eventually turn freaky/insane or into a lazy bum and leech off me, etc... although in such a case I'm very judgemental and can predict most people after a very short while, so I'm a cautious person...

[wop]

http://beautifulpeople.com/index/en

[wop]

Edit: Nevermind

[The Stig]

Haha, I clicked on that site, but for safety purposes all my images are filtered via browser. I assume that site isn't for "sexy" people only? XD

Otherwise will need to look at it after work =p

EDIT: Also I liked that suggestion. I wanted to avoid the mainstream sites such as match.com or whatever ...

[Ksandra]

I met my fiance online, but through FFXI not an e-dating service. I do know a few people who've tried them, but no luck. The biggest problem with them seems to be most people are just looking for "one night of fun". Which if that's all you want works well, but outside of that my two friends seemed to have very little luck with getting anyone to do anything more than that. (one friend is a girl, another is a guy btw).

[Fievel]

Have a cousin getting married in 2 months, he met his fiance on eharmony. Worth a shot at least? Seems to work for some people.

[Shenrien]

I have plenty of experience!

*takes off my shirt* lol

[SpeckledStoat]

I tried this a year or so ago, not a good experience! Completely bombarded with messages and it was quite confusing. Also one of the guys that got added to my msn asked to webcam with me. Naturally he was sitting there wanking. BEWARE OF SURPRISE PENIS.

My mum uses plentyoffish.com, she says it's good but I can't vouch for it. They do the whole profile-matching thing apparently.

[Dense]

The best sites that I know of are match.com and okcupid.com

Okcupid has a wonderful algorithm that is fairly transparent (in that you answer lifestyle questions that have no right/wrong answer [e.g. do you think gay marriage is acceptable? - would you ever date someone who had an abortion? etc]). I prefer their point system algorithm to match.com's which is also very good, but less transparent.

[Marked]

I met my wife on match.com. I think I had the account all of 1 week when we met (wasted 3 month account...). As far as what happened for me:

posted profile
wait one week
future wife emails
email back/forth 1 week
meet
fall in love
etc

I'm sure these are typical results to be expected.

[Vigilia]

I tried a few back in the day (ehh like over 10 years ago now though), my experiences were pretty much what Ksandra said... the guys that I met were just after a bit of fun. But like with everything in life when you meet new people nothing's ever guaranteed. The way I see it, you have same chances to meeting the love of your life wheter you pick up a new hobby, get a new job or join one of these dating sites. It's just a question of the first encounter, sometimes you get lucky with people you've met online (I met my husband in FFXI too lol... and looking at our friends FFXI has been more successful as a "dating service" than any of the e-romance websites) and sometimes you don't. Just gotta take your chances.

[Woozie]

http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/20...online-dating/

Edit: I personally can't vouch for or against any specific dating websites. I just thought this article was interesting.

[The Stig]

Shenrien: ¬_¬

Have a cousin getting married in 2 months, he met his fiance on eharmony. Worth a shot at least? Seems to work for some people.

Yeh I don't mind laying down £10 ($25?) as an experiment, not saying I'm rich but as in to give it a shot. eHarmony just seems more serious to me than say, match.com? (as ksandra hinted)

I'm not being pressured to do this by the way, but just thinking ahead a bit now that's all.

Thanks Woozie for article, I will give it a quick ready in a moment, although as said I won't mind paying a tiny tiny tiny bit to try, but I won't stick to it long term =)

Vigilia: +1 to what you said, made me rethink 1 thing or so.... I don't play FFXI anymore though and I doubt there's much UK players anyway XD

EDIT: Had a quick brief of the article but closed it down since someone walked by, but although paying seems broken, I think it's the first step in taking some form of commitment. Just a thought ... /shrug

[Komm Suesser Tod]

Not assuming you're a sexual deviant, but it is the internet, so...

If you answer eHarmony's profile questions 100% honestly, and you indicate in any real way that sex is important to you, you'll probably get rejected. Now, I haven't done any real research on the subject, but a few people I know have filled out the profile, and they were all rejected. The common link between them? They answered honestly about how important sex was in a relationship.

Just be wary of the pay sites especially, I'd suggest trying a free one first to get used to it instead of paying money to just fumble around a dating site without knowing how exactly to conduct yourself.

Edit: eHarmony's attitude towards sex could explain why it's seen as a more serious site when it comes to relationships, it weeds out some of the horn dogs.

[arus2001]

When eharmony first started advertising, I did their test thing for the hell of it and pretty much got told I wasn't qualified for their service, despite answering honestly and not passing myself off as some baby-eating serial rapist.

There was another site I tried from there, whose name I can't remember now, but I wound up meeting one girl. We hung out for a couple weeks, but nothing really got past making out and she was all "No sex until marriage!" even though I wasn't quite shooting for that yet. One night she freaked after catching herself taking her shirt off for me, and while I left her dorm without a fuss, that was pretty much the last of our contact.

Since then, I haven't gotten anywhere on any of the random sites I've poked at. Most messages I get are either from site admin pimping deals or like some crazy asian girl looking for rich american man.

[wop]

Haha, I clicked on that site, but for safety purposes all my images are filtered via browser. I assume that site isn't for "sexy" people only? XD

Otherwise will need to look at it after work =p

This website booted over 5000 members after Christmas for putting on the pounds lol.

Nevertheless, here's a pretty good read.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/relations...eople.com.html

Fewer than one in eight British men (12 per cent) and just three in 20 women (15 per cent) who have applied to BeautifulPeople.com have been accepted as members.

Existing members of the website rate how attractive potential members are over a 48 hour provisional period, when applicants upload a recent photograph and a short personal profile.

They are rated by members of the opposite sex, who have four options to describe how attractive they think the hopeful is - 'Yes definitely', 'Hmmm yes, OK', 'Hmmm no, not really' and 'NO definitely NOT'.

Swedish men have proved the most successful applicants, with two-thirds (65 per cent) of those putting themselves forward being accepted.

Norwegian women are considered the most beautiful with more than three-quarters (76 per cent) making the grade.

Since the website was opened to UK members 295,000 people have applied, with only 35,000 being approved.

The website was founded in 2002 in Denmark and since then it has spread to other countries - becoming available in the UK in April 2005.

The 'elite dating site for beautiful people only', went live across the globe on 26 October this year. Over the past two weeks, the site has rejected nearly 1.8 million people from 190 countries.

From the total number of hopefuls, only 360,000 new members have been admitted - meaning five-out of-six applicants (83 per cent) have been turned away.

Sweden, Brazil and Norway are proving to be the most beautiful countries overall, with applicants from Germany and the UK among the least successful.

Beautiful People managing director Greg Hodge said: "Asking why British people are doing so badly is a tough question.

"It hurts me - I'm English.

"I think there is less emphasis on appearance in the UK than overseas.

"If you go to some countries they are very into how they look - very health and body conscious.

"The UK attitude is a bit more about kicking back and relaxing, and having a few drinks in the pub after work."

[Obev]

Edit: eHarmony's attitude towards sex could explain why it's seen as a more serious site when it comes to relationships, it weeds out some of the horn dogs.

Really don't understand how prudishness becomes maturity. Sure, emotional connections, common interests, blah blah, but at some point you're going to want to get naked.

[Mayareira]

When I first moved to the area I put up a profile to meet with people as friends (I included guys too), especially from TN area.

Welp, it was much more active than I thought, even as a guy I got flooded by messages from people ranging from complete losers (uneducated, mother of a mini-chinese army) to pretty hot chicks. No later than a day I couldn't keep up with all the traffic. I looked at other guys' profile and...."I'm a decent country boy looking for a decent girl yada yada~"

Boring stuff, meet up is quite decent if you are looking for friends with similar interests though..

[Corrderio]

I never really tried it mostly since I don't trust people saying they're a woman online (No offense to any actual women) however I don't see a problem with it as long as you're willing to commit to it.

[arus2001]

Maya's kinda reminded me of something I'll admit some interest in, too. For various reasons, my local friend pool is pretty crap at the moment. Some of them have moved (I don't blame them, Ohio sucks). Some I've had falling outs with. This area isn't exactly what I'd call technologically inclined, and to this day I'm still surprised I have cable internet, but the main thing I'm getting at is just finding people I might mesh with.

Admittedly, the sites I'd visited in the past had been more relationship oriented, so maybe there's something a bit more... I dunno, casual (and not in the sex way) out there that might boast at least a few people around I could maybe pick at to see if they'd be cool. Figure if I can work on that, I might be able to get a leg up on a better job or something through word of mouth.

Edit: And while that kinda sounds like I might be looking to use Facebook or something, I can't really say that's the case. Hyper-casual users barely post enough info to such sites, while the addicts have a billion different widgets spamming their postings that I can never seem to disable anymore. I don't really feel like FB attempts to "connect" me with other people, either. I've just gotta wade through shit and hope for a diamond.