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I know more people who have tried or are trying online dating and have not had it lead to a relationship than I know were it has. Same for speed dating. Seems people get matches from it but either never hear from them or at most they go on a date or two and that's it.
Some people also go out to bars, clubs, etc. and see lot of people there, but don't get asked out by many (or, well, any) of them and /or have those excursions lead to LTRs and marriage. It's the nature of dating, whether online or off. They might flirt with somebody for the night, get or give a phone number, have a one-night stand, etc. and nothing more comes of it. With dating, both online and off, you gain exposure to a group of people. Whether or not anything comes of that exposure is subject to any number of variables and there are no guarantees.
Finding a good match is largely a matter of trial and error, no matter how you go about doing it.
I count five relationships that started online. Actually, every guy I have met/dated I met online.
High school boyfriend - AOL chat room
First husband - AOL
Followed by three relationships as a result of meeting on OKC
I can count seven other men I dated for a very brief period of time that I met through either OKC or PoF.
High school boyfriends were before AOL chat rooms and OLD existed.
Didn't date in college, and went on a couple of 1st dates with men I "met" through a local AOL chatroom.
Dated a guy for a few months I met at a bar. Met my late hubby at work. Dated a guy off and on for about 6 months that I met at a bar though that was through Meetup. Haven't dated anyone else in almost 4 years, which includes several stints on eH, OKC, and Match. And a couple of attempts at speed dating. For me, the men I've dated came about when I wasn't looking. When I met the second bar guy I so didn't want to go out that night I didn't even bother to brush my hair!
Not to say there aren't plenty of 20 something bike techs and brewers playing in bands too, of course there are.
Where I am now, though, Boston is more prone to that due to expenses. Providence has more of a blue collar scene, it's cheaper. The artists can still afford to live there, while in Boston you really can't.
Portland is more fragmented due to the fact that there's a lot more people involved in the art and music scenes there. It's a lot easier to find yourself in a clique thete. I don't know much about the hardcore scene there other than it seemed to be an aging scene and people would talk of it's glory days. Hardcore can mean a lot of things, though. I crossed paths with a few with crustgrind leanings, and noisier Converge-like bands. Sing-songy punk didn't seem to be all that prevalent.
Phoenix, on the other hand, has always been weak in the arts department so there's just less people interested in participating, and the sprawl of the city forces more congregation in fewer places... but, by way of that, it's a lot less cliquey... which is great. We never hung out with the bands we were most musically similar to, we hung out with the bands we got along with. It's always more about having fun to me. Heck, half of what I listen to these days is underground hip hop. I get in more conversions based on those shirts than anything.
OKCupid has systems that I would bet anything are bogus.
I don't know if they still have the system where you match your picture against a different random person for each woman to choose and you see how many women would choose to date you or the other guy. Ok, I'm no great looker and I used to get maybe 5 out of 30 on a good day picking me but I ran tests using womens pictures and many of the results were unbelievable........
I have to wonder if and why the results were changed re womens pictures.
Some of or many of those women who rated very highly with me had profiles which showed me no difference in compatibility with me than the women who scored much lower as matches or friends and much higher as enemies nor was there any difference in amount of matching answers.
Anybody else notice?
[back on topic]:
Yes, excellent point. Exactly what I was saying. My experience is that nothing but polar opposites are finding their way to my profile (and presumably surfing quickly back off about half a paragraph in).
Me: Child free
Them: Have kids
Me: A new soul / futurist
Them: Old souls / out-of-touch / painfully nostalgic
Me: Fit, go to the gym, put effort into my appearance
Them: Obese, frumpy, no makeup, sun damaged
Me: Atheistic, skeptic
Them: J.C. superfan (this happens A LOT!)
Me: A freak
Them: Sexually close minded / just plain antisexual
Me: Dog person
Them: Cat person
(LOL... dunno how much water that last one holds, but it seems true)
The list goes on. I'm half inclined to think that that IAC reversed the algorithm to make it the most frustrating experience possible and drive people to their pay sites.
Yes, excellent point. Exactly what I was saying. My experience is that nothing but polar opposites are finding their way to my profile (and presumably surfing quickly back off about half a paragraph in).
Me: Child free
Them: Have kids
The list goes on. I'm half inclined to think that that IAC reversed the algorithm to make it the most frustrating experience possible and drive people to their pay sites.
Pretty much all of my matches have kids. Maybe I'll experiment and change mine from "doesn't have/doesn't want" to "doesn't have" and see if that has any effect on the number of messages I receive.
I find it interesting that there are ads for Zoosk at the top of OKC.
It could be just my area but OKC has the following 1) Single Moms 2) Obese 3) "Elitist" nerd types. I live in somewhat of a rural era so the quality isn't there. I would imagine it would be better in a more affluent metro area.
Got responses to your messages? Yes.
Got messages that turned into actual dates? Yes.
Dates turned into actual relationships? Haven't been on enough dates yet.
Relationships turned into marriage? Haven't gotten that far.
Yes, excellent point. Exactly what I was saying. My experience is that nothing but polar opposites are finding their way to my profile (and presumably surfing quickly back off about half a paragraph in).
Me: Child free
Them: Have kids
Me: A new soul / futurist
Them: Old souls / out-of-touch / painfully nostalgic
Me: Fit, go to the gym, put effort into my appearance
Them: Obese, frumpy, no makeup, sun damaged
Me: Atheistic, skeptic
Them: J.C. superfan (this happens A LOT!)
Me: A freak
Them: Sexually close minded / just plain antisexual
Me: Dog person
Them: Cat person
(LOL... dunno how much water that last one holds, but it seems true)
The list goes on. I'm half inclined to think that that IAC reversed the algorithm to make it the most frustrating experience possible and drive people to their pay sites.
I just recently threw up an experimental profile on POF, and I'm noticing something similar. The few messages I've gotten in my inbox as well as a couple of women that have favorited me mention how much they like motorcycles. They want a riding partner. Nowhere in my profile did I say I have a motorcycle, or even like them.
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