NEWS.COM.AU — Feb 7 — eHarmony, which uses a patented Compatibility Matching System to find members suitable partners from their psychological profiles officially launched in Australia. Oxford University researchers studied more than 700 Australian married couples to develop a country-specific matchmaking formula for website eHarmony.com.au.
The full article was originally published at eHarmony blog, but is no longer available.
OPW — Feb 8 — LoveDetect.com, by TelTech, is an irresistible novelty. I picked up a $10 phone card from the site and tried it out on my best (male) friend, and my fiance. The service 'instantly reveals how your date or lover feels about you' from their voice on a phone call. First I called my best friend whom I've known for 8 years. I called an access number, entered my pin, and then the service requested that I indicate the length of my relationship with them. Had I known them for a short time, a long time, or was I married to them. I hit '2', for a long time, and proceeded to dial their number.
I call my friend and we talk. I nearly crack up when I hear the soft voice whispering messages to me from LoveDetect. 'Truuuthful', 'anticipating', 'excited.' Still, I appreciate the feedback on the call. Two minutes go by and I jump off the call and call him back. He finds it highly amusing that I'm checking his love levels. Overall my best friend scored 3 out of 10 on the Love Score. Hmm. I was hoping for higher, but oh well. That's a respectable level. What is more unusual and amusing is that his embarrassment level was a 10. Glenn then revealed something to me that he wouldn't normally reveal. He was actually taking a dump while talking to me on the phone. Ick! Anyway that explains his high level of embarrassment. I guess that part of Love Detect works.
I call my fiance, and we talk. She's definitely not taking a dump but she still scores 7.5 for embarrassment, 7.5 for concentration, 5 for anticipation and a lowly 3 for The Final Love Report. Hmm. She then calls me back using the Love Detect number, and she tests me out. I score 10 for embarrassment, 5 for concentration, 5 for anticipation and 5 out of 10 for the Love Score. I had to ham it up a bit to get the 5 out of 10. I wonder how someone scores more than 5? Anyway, LoveDetect.com is an irresistible novelty that could earn you a few extra bucks in CPA commissions, and more importantly, get people talking about your dating service.
OPW — Feb 8 — Manhunt.net, the
word’s largest all male dating site, has just won the Cybersocket Web
award for Best Adult Hook Up Site, The Weho Award for Outstanding Adult
Website, and the highly respected Netizen award for Manhunt and
Jonathan Crutchley from the Free Speech Coalition. The Cybersocket
award, which weighed a whopping 20 lbs, was in the Surfer’s choice
category, naming them as the people’s favorite online hook up
destination. WeHo went one step farther, (and another 20 lb trophy)
naming them the best overall Adult Website. But, it was the Free Speech
Coalition that highlighted Manhunt’s mission to give back to the
industry and the community by awarding Manhunt and Jonathan Crutchley
with the Netizen Award, given to the company and individual who has
done the most and been the best citizen for the industry through the
internet.
Mark Brooks: Manhunt.net
is growing gangbusters and is now the category leader for gay dating
sites. They charge $12 a month. Here’s how they stack up against Gay.com and Adam4Adam on Alexa. (Full Disclosure: Manhunt is a client of Courtland Brooks).
MAD.CO.UK — Feb 7 — Gaydar.co.uk is set to launch a £500k multimedia campaign to promote its service. The campaign will include online and print ads in both the gay and non-gay media, initially in Australia next month before being rolled out to the UK in May to coincide with the UK Pride season. The site will also be sponsoring various Pride events in the UK this summer.
The full article was originally published at Mad.co.uk, but is no longer available.
NEWTEEVE — Feb 7 — Online speed dating site WooMe received a $3 million bridge round of financing led by Mangrove, along with previous investors Atomico, Klaus Hammels and newcomer Oliver Jung. This builds on the initial $1.9 million in seed funding WooMe previously raised. The service launched 10 weeks ago and according to Co-founder and CEO, Stephen Stokols, WooMe has facilitated more than 35,000 sessions so far.
The full article was originally published at NewTeeve, but is no longer available.
PR NEWSWIRE — Feb 6 — Casual dating website OnlineBootyCall.com created an online poll to let their members decide which Presidential candidate and spouse had the assets to be deemed "Booty Call Material." In the provocative poll, an interactive flash game titled BootyCall Decision 2008, Hillary Clinton defeated Obama with 55% of the vote, while 70% of voters ranked Elizabeth Edwards as the top presidential candidate spouse. "Over 300,000 booty call connections are made every week on OBC, our members know who is worthy of a booty call and who isn't," said OnlineBootyCall.com's founder Moses (Mo) Brown.
The full article was originally published at Fox Business, but is no longer available.
CHRISTIANITY — Feb 6 — The online dating industry generated revenues of $500 million in 2004, in North America alone. That total was projected to climb to $623 million by 2009. Topping is one of millions of Christians who have collectively spent millions of dollars searching for that special someone on the Internet. Should they sign onto the bigger sites, or go to the Christian ones? "I always tell people they should consider what their preferences are," says Mark Brooks, editor of Online Personals Watch, a web portal which tracks the Internet dating industry. "If you really want to meet someone who is Christian, you can go on Match and Yahoo and say 'I'm a Christian and I want to meet a Christian." However, he cautions, "They'll send you a whole bunch of people who are interested in you – but are not Christian. So if you're open to receiving communications from people who aren't Christian, then by all means" use a general site. In other words, despite filters and preferences, it's still difficult to instruct most sites to tease out no Christians, according to Brooks. "The market is simply oversaturated," says Sam Moorcroft, founder and president of ChristianCafe.com. "This is a very 'sexy' business," says Brooks of Online Personals Watch. "It's like opening a restaurant. Everybody wants to do it. It's very appealing, like you're doing humanity a great service — but it's tougher than it looks." Today, Moorcroft proudly notes that Christian Cafe is the largest exclusively Christian singles site in the world.
The full article was originally published at Christianity, but is no longer available.
OPW — Feb 6 — YesnomayB, the online dating site, launched YesnomayB application on Facebook platform. The application allows users to create a secret little blackbook of their single facebook friends and send it to their buddies. They then can say yes, no or mayB to meeting each person. The introduction is made by a trusted source and beats sending a stranger a poke!
PRESS RELEASE — Feb 6 — Consim, formerly known as BharatMatrimony, has closed its second round of investment of USD $ 11.75 million led by Mayfield Fund and participation from existing investors, Yahoo! and Canaan Partners. Murugavel Janakiraman, Founder & CEO, Consim Info, said, "We plan to leverage this fund to expand our matrimony business in the international markets and to strengthen our other classifieds offerings. We believe that the global knowledge and experience of our investors will help us scale our business strategically."
The full article was originally published at Tech Whack, but is no longer available.
Mark Brooks: BharatMatrimony competes head on with Shaadi in India for matrimonials dating.
INTERNATIONAL HERALD TRIBUNE — Feb 6 — Worldwide, 97 million people visited Web sites devoted to matchmaking in December, according to figures from ComScore. That number is a 10% drop from a year earlier, perhaps a sign that free sites like Facebook, Bebo, MySpace and others – where socializing, rather than romance, is the stated priority – are having an impact. Match.com, is renewing its vows to stay competitive in places where it is already the front-runner, like Japan and the United States, and in individual markets where it lags, like France and Germany. Match.com operates in 18 languages in 37 markets. "The U.S. has 92 million single people, and only 3 million now pay for an online dating service – and the U.S. is the most advanced market. In Japan, it's one-tenth of that penetration. So there is room to grow", said Thomas Enraght-Moony, chief executive of Match.com. Whether social-networking sites hurt business for dating services in the long run is yet to be known. But Enraght-Moony says he believes that they are no threat for now.
The full article was originally published at IHT, but is no longer available.