Month: May 2006

Friendster Finds No Love

Posted on May 5, 2006

Friendster_10THE DEAL — May 4 — Several companies that initially expressed interest in buying Friendster were reluctant to take on the company’s ~$6 million debt and balked at the modest $10 million asking price.  ‘Friendster unfortunately was losing money and losing market share, and that’s not a great dynamic.’  In September Friendster 2.0 launched, emulating features offered by competitors.  The upgrade stanched the bleeding. As of March, Friendster had 1.1 million U.S. uniques, up 9% from 975,000 visitors in March 2005. MySpace had 41.9 million unique users, and Facebook had 12.9 million uniques.

Uniques (millions) to selected social networking sites, March 2006 (comScore Media Metrix) – MYSPACE.COM 42,  FACEBOOK.COM 13,  XANGA.COM 7, LIVEJOURNAL.COM 4,  Yahoo! 360° 4,  MYYEARBOOK.COM 4,  HI5.COM 3, TAGWORLD.COM 2,  TAGGED.COM 2,  BEBO.COM 1,  FRIENDSTER.COM 1,  Tribe Networks .9, 43THINGS.COM .7,  SCONEX.COM .4,  Total Internet audience: 171 million.  FULL ARTICLE @ THE DEAL

Mark Brooks: Jonathan Abrams knew Friendster would do well.  He just didn’t quite expect its growth to be meteoric.  It was a victim of its own success and deserves a second chance.  Friendster 2.0 is delightfully feature rich but the GUI needs a revamp. 

Singles Give Meet Market a try

Posted on May 4, 2006

Cupidcom_6THE NEWS TIMES LIVE — May 3 — More than a year ago, Cupid.com merged with PreDating, speed-dating events, so people could get a live face-to-face spin on internet dating. Cupid.com/PreDating officials say recent research shows the "chemistry" between two people occurs within minutes of meeting.  About 60% who attend these events are speed-dating for the first time. Another 20% speed-date regularly. Many of them don't usually go to bars.  FULL ARTICLE @ THE NEWS TIMES LIVE

Mark Brooks: I was dismayed but not too surprised when Match shuttered Matchlive.com in 2004.  Events are tough, but can have huge rewards.  Cupid knows radio, radio loves events.  I joined Cupid.com in 2004 as VP to guide the acquisition of Predating.com and revamp the Cupid.com service.  Now, members can peruse profiles and preferences on Cupid, communicate with compatibles, then meet and see if they have chemistry.  Or, they can follow that routine in reverse with the speed dating option.  They can get out and meet ~12 singles and see if they have chemistry, then go online and communicate with them on Cupid.com and peruse their profiles and preferences to see if they are compatible (e.g. do they want kids).  Cupid is now unique in the market, and a great acquisition target. 

Spark Chooses Winstar for Ad Sales

Posted on May 4, 2006

Spark_networks_2PR NEWSWIRE — May 3 — Spark Networks has selected Winstar, the largest US independent online ad sales company, to help support the sale of online advertising for selected Spark communities, including JDate, AmericanSingles and CollegeLuv.

The full article was originally published at PR Newswire, but is no longer available.

Mark Brooks: So advertisers will be able to reach premium niche audiences through Sparks new sites.  Black, Christian, Jewish…  Nice move.  Winstar will do the heavy lifting to build Sparks repute as a place to advertise.

IAC Reports Q1 Results

Posted on May 4, 2006

IacINTERACTIVE CORP — May 2 — IAC has 35% growth in revenue. Personals (Match, Kiss, Udate, Chemistry) revenue grew 23% worldwide.  International paid subscribers grew 20%; with notable growth in Scandinavia and Spain. Profit margin declines reflect higher marketing spending and operating costs related to Chemistry.com, which launched Q1.  RELEASE @ INTERACTIVE CORP.

Mark Brooks: Europe is hallowed ground, virgin territory, which is why I’m basing myself out of Europe for a while.  I’m in Krakow, Poland this week. Programmers are ~$800 a month here.  180,000 students out of a population of 750,000.  …the weather’s great in summer, the people are friendly and the castles and old square are dreamstate.

Ultimate List of Dating Industry Jobs

Posted on May 4, 2006

May 4 — I'm rolling the list of internet dating, social networking and business networking industry jobs links into a handy little list.  Please let me know if you have any new links for the list by emailing me at mark@onlinepersonalswatch.com.  Thanks.  – Mark

CommunityConnect
Cupid
Friendfinder
Friendster
Hi5
Lavalife
Match
Mate1
Meetup
MySpace
PerfectMatch
PlanetOut/Gay
Shaadi
Spark Networks
Webdate
Yahoo Personals

Ultimate List of Relationship Psychologists

Posted on May 4, 2006

May 4 — OPW — I'm starting a list of notable relationship/online dating psychologists.  Who am I missing?  Look on the left bar for other handy little lists.

  • Prof. Hans Eysenck Breathed life into the study of the genetics of personality.
  • Dr Glenn Wilson The “father of compatibility testing.” Mentored by Prof. Eysenck.
  • Dr Mark Thompson Social psychologist, statistician. Created Y! Personals test.
  • Dr Jim Houran Former TRUE Chief Psychologist.
  • Dr Pepper Schwartz PerfectMatch.com relationship expert. Yale Sociology PhD. University of Washington Professor.
  • Dr Neil Clark Warren eHarmony founder. Clinical psych PhD from University of Chicago. Masters of Divinity from Princeton Theological Seminary.
  • Dr Jeff Gavin Bath University psychology professor. Multiple studies of online personals sites and relationships.

Helio Launches New Cell Service

Posted on May 4, 2006

Helio_1MEDIA POST — May 3 — Helio, a joint venture of EarthLink and South Korean carrier SK Telecom, launched a new cell phone service.  It runs on rented space on the Sprint Nextel network and offers a mobile version of MySpace. 

The full article was originally published at Media Post, but is no longer available.

Mark Brooks: Two phones are offered, Hero and Kickflip with photo blogging linked to Myspace.  Very cool.  The Myspace audience will eat this up. 

Romancing by Phone to Become the New Dating Trend

Posted on May 4, 2006

Matchcom_18PRESS ZOOM — May 4 — Match.com offers wireless dating in the US and Japan and plans to launch in the UK by the end of this year. The American service launched in 2003 and has 120,000 subscribers who pay $5 to add it to their existing online service. Users access the site via WAP and search for matches as they would from the desktop – by sending them messages via SMS.  Snog London will offer mini-profiles featuring a photograph alongside four "personality" questions. Match.com's European director Kevin Cornils stated, "nearly half the daters signed up for match mobile are under 25 – considerably younger than the average age on the website."  Three-quarters of Match's wireless daters are male.  Technology exists for dating sites to send you an SMS when a suitable match walks into the same bar. It could even alert you by flashing their photo to your phone.

The full article was originally published at Press Zoom, but is no longer available.

Mark Brooks: Location based dating is coming.  It will be skewed young, and casual, to start with.  Mobile dating will eventually dwarf online dating. I was surprised that few others seemed to agree with this at the mobile dating convention last year.  But, we'll eventually all go 'star trek' with truly mobile computing 'pads.'  One needs only to follow the wifi adoption curve to extrapolate this trend out.  WiMax, Evdo…  I'm using Nokia 9500 now.  It sucks (slow, bad video, incompatible files, patchy connection, poor email), but eventually the likes of Nokia, Intel, Apple, RIM, Verizon, Docomo etc will get this convergence right and we'll move from our laptops to truly mobile devices.  I look forward to the day.    

ThomasKnowsPeople.com Features Compatibility Reporting

Posted on May 4, 2006

THOMAS TECHNOLOGIES — May 1 — Thomas Technologies, a leader in private-label behavioral assessment software and related reporting, unveiled its new site ThomasKnowsPeople.com. The new site offers a variety of information including Thomas' personality assessment solutions for members and subscribers of web dating and career sites. For 30 years Thomas has assisted a wide range of partners including web-dating and career sites with assessment technology in 50+ countries and 22 languages.

The full article was originally published at Thomas Technologies, but is no longer available.

Romancing by Phone to Become the New Dating Trend

Posted on May 4, 2006

Matchcom_18PRESS ZOOM — May 4 — Match.com offers wireless dating in the US and Japan and plans to launch in the UK by the end of this year. The American service launched in 2003 and has 120,000 subscribers who pay $5 to add it to their existing online service. Users access the site via WAP and search for matches as they would from the desktop – by sending them messages via SMS.  Snog London will offer mini-profiles featuring a photograph alongside four "personality" questions. Match.com's European director Kevin Cornils stated, "nearly half the daters signed up for match mobile are under 25 – considerably younger than the average age on the website."  Three-quarters of Match's wireless daters are male.  Technology exists for dating sites to send you an SMS when a suitable match walks into the same bar. It could even alert you by flashing their photo to your phone.

The full article was originally published at Press Zoom, but is no longer available.

Mark Brooks: Location based dating is coming. It will be skewed young, and casual, to start with. Mobile dating will eventually dwarf online dating. I was surprised that few others seemed to agree with this at the mobile dating convention last year. But, we'll eventually all go 'star trek' with truly mobile computing 'pads.' One needs only to follow the wifi adoption curve to extrapolate this trend out. WiMax, Evdo…  I'm using Nokia 9500 now. It sucks (slow, bad video, incompatible files, patchy connection, poor email), but eventually the likes of Nokia, Intel, Apple, RIM, Verizon, Docomo etc will get this convergence right and we'll move from our laptops to truly mobile devices. I look forward to the day.