online dating

[kimmy]

i was thinking about our culture and how normal and common online dating has become for such a wide range of people. i've never really taken time to think about online dating (and still won't now) but it seems to be a pretty big deal that won't be loosing steam anytime soon. what are your thoughts on online dating?

 

[jmj2k]

After my ex husband and broke up, (after 22years) I didn't know how to get back into the dating scene. I didn't go to clubs anymore (and really didn't want to) and most of my circle of friends were either married or in relationships. I decided to try online dating. I searched the web for the different sites and found a few good ones. Over 3 years, I met some nice people, went on lots of dates, and finally late last year met my match. (now fiance) So, as long as you are careful and don't fall for any scams, I think online dating is a good thing. It worked for me!

 

[Lexxiii]

I met my boyfriend online as I think you read in my previous thread.

Despite our problems I am very happy with him. I see no problem with online dating, why should you be limited to the people in your general area or who you already have a network with?

 

[User93]

i see it as a good thing as long as you are careful and it doesnt affect your mind. I see it like that: nowadays life of my friends and mine aswell is so crazy, me have college, classes, work, or just a job which takes all your time. If you weren't lucky to meet your soulmate yet + there is no good guy at work, where can you find one? Too tired to go out sometimes, plus, you can easily "waste" 3 dates with a guy and find out you are too different.

So, internet makes a good sense here. About 10 years ago maybe there were more geeks. Now on dating websites there are people who simply wanna find a good match. Me and my Mom know about 3 pairs who met like that and now are married. You can check the profile, make the first impression, check the interests.

Of course, there stays a chance of not liking each other in the real life, but i think it worths a try anyways. Just be careful. I think chatting in the internet gets you to know the person better.

 

[MACATTAK]

One of my good friends met her match online as well. They are now engaged and planning to get married soon. She had to weed through the bad ones, it wasn't instant. Though I'm single and would like to meet someone, I can't bring myself to do it online yet.

 

[mymakeuproom]

I met my husband online through a dating site. It was just to hard to work 45+ hours and try to find a suitable person worth dating. So I went online and found my match. We would have never met even though we lived really close to each other.

You just have to do what you feel is right for you.

 

[Beauty Mark]

I'm not comfortable most of the time in "date" situations, honestly. I've had my best luck with being friends first with absolutely no expectations of dating in the future.

With that said, I've known many people who have had luck with online dating. You just have to be smart about it.

 

[pink_lily002]

I went back and forth about the whole online dating thing too. Since I was 15, I'd almost always been in some sort of relationship. So after I broke up with a guy in fall of 2006, I was single for close to a whole year. I started talking with one of my old friends from high school, and we dated for a solid two months before he woke up one day and decided that he "didn't want to deal with having a girlfriend anymore." I was devastated, and it took me quite some time to even think about seeing anyone! My best friend mentioned that she was looking at a few online dating sites and convinced me to try one out too. I signed up for Chemistry.com a few days later and was pleasantly surprised.

I went on a bazillion dates, and while there were a few who went on to second and third dates, there were a bunch who didn't make it to a second date. There was even one where I didn't make it through the FIRST date - I snuck out of the movie after the opening credits because the way he treated me and spoke to me at dinner beforehand was just horrendous! It's not an instant thing - you may get along with someone great via email but then in-person, things can totally suck. It requires a bit of work, but you get to meet a lot of people and maybe even experience new things!

For me, my main reason in signing up for online dating was simply that I'm too busy to meet people through my friends. My work schedule is never the same each week, and sometimes my budget is just too tight for me to go out to a bar or club (though I don't feel as though you can really meet your soulmate while out a bar lol). I chose Chemistry.com because they do the work for you. They find potential matches for you and send you five new ones each day. You can decide if you're interested, and if you're not, they just ask that you tell them why so that the matching system can be perfected a little bit for you. Match.com required me to do all the work, something I didn't have time for, and I was getting nothing but "so-and-so likes you!" messages from creepy men in their 40s or 50s (in one case, 70s) who blatantly said on their profile that they were married and looking to mess around, or simply mess around. Don't think so!

Eventually, one of the first guys I was matched with at Chemistry.com became my boyfriend. We're going through a rough patch now and pretty much starting over, which sucks but it seems to really be helping. We're getting there, as I like to put it!

So there, that's my story. Online dating doesn't work for everyone, but it seems to work for a lot of people. My best friend who convinced me to do this with her found her boyfriend via Chemistry.com too. And one of my mom's co-workers met her husband on eHarmony. While initially, I thought online dating was a load of crap, I've come to the realization that it really is something that works.

 

[lustrare]

Removed.

 

[Jaim]

I'm all for it, as long as you're careful. I met my boyfriend online about 7 years ago and we're still together. I think it's just fine as long as you're able to build some degree of trust.

I like the idea because it forces a person to get to know someone on more than a superficial level. When it comes time to meet the person, do so in a group setting for safety reason. Maybe you'll hit it off, maybe not!

 

[MAC_Pixie04]

I'm a big advocate for online dating. I think bars and clubs are the worst places to meet someone to actually date. Most people go to bars and clubs to meet people to fuck--sorry to be so blunt, but that's usually the case. And other people are simply too busy to go out and actively look to meet someone. Online dating allows you to get to know someone just enough to determine whether you'd wanna meet them, and most people tend to be more open about themselves when they talk to someone online, because they're less afraid of being judged, and it's a lot easier to take rejection online, than someone in your face telling you they aren't interested. That way, if something doesn't work out, it's easy to log off their profile and move onto the next lol.

My boyfriend and I didn't meet through online dating, but our first few weeks of chitchat was online. He saw me at a party that a mutual friend was having, but didn't wanna talk to me. He asked the friend if I was on myspace or facebook, and decided to contact me that way first. That way when we first talked on the phone, we had something to talk about, and then after more talking, we finally met, and had even more to talk about. We've been together for nearly 3 years, and I'm very very happy. If he'd come up to me at that party and tried to talk to me, it probably would have been awkward, and I probably wouldn't have wanted to talk to him ever again, therefore, missed the opportunity to get the know the love of my life.

So, I'm all for it. As long as people are safe about it!

 

[kariii]

This is a funny post to me now actually. Where I used to work a couple of years back, I worked with mostly older people and they would always talk about match.com and meeting someone and such and I always thought.. hey that's silly. Who would do that? I was never desperate before to find a boyfriend or anything and have had a fair share of bfs/ people I dated through meeting them at work, mall, clubs, ball games, anywhere u think I met some kind of guy in public but none of them were ever the right one. Randomly one day though, I was sitting at home browsing my space bored out of my mind and looking through the page of this guy I was dating at the time (yes yes, we've all done our fair share of myspace stalking our men, and I am one of them!).. on his top8 friends; there was this gorgeous girl with beautiful make up so I clicked on her profile and before I made it to her pics, THIS SERIOUSLY HANDSOMEST GUY ever was on her top 8( u get where I'm going?) but his page was private and I had to see more. So I msg'd him with "Hey! you're hot!" (<<That was my exact msg)and added him. He approved me and replied "Not bad yourself!" I found myself talking back and forth with him for a month on myspace .. Meeting him had never crossed my mind (He lived in CT, I live in CA) well it went from msg'in back and forth to him calling me and seriously I had never met this guy and I was falling in love with him. It was so weird! I told my best friend finally (I didn't wanna tell anyone because I felt embarrassed I liked a guy online I've never met). Finally I told him my feelings, and it turned out he felt exactly the same and he flew a month later to see me for 3 days. It was the best 3 days of my life and when he left I seriously cried the whole day and knew he was the one and we are still together!

You should try it. You never know who you'll meet.

 

[kariii]

oh BTW, he moved to las vegas which is closer to me (SF is just too expensive!) and I plan on moving with him there once I finish this school year and we make our relationship so far work by seeing each other once a month, whether him fly out here, or me fly to LV. He's coming on Tuesday.. I always get nervous lol