MCCLATCHY NEWSPAPERS — July 16 — Seniors today are the fastest-growing users of Internet dating services and the fastest growing group of cohabiters. Longer healthy life expectancy is part of the explanation. According to Mark Brooks, a consultant who tracks the Internet-dating industry, the number of seniors joining online dating services has risen at double-digit rates annually since 2003, the most of any age group. But attitude changes are probably the biggest factor in the expanding social lives of seniors. Falling in love at an elderly age was seen as somewhere between unwise and dementia.
Month: July 2008
Ten Years For WebBilling.com
PRESS RELEASE — July 16 — WebBilling.com celebrates ten years of continuous service to the online commerce community. Webbilling.com specializes in providing features not generally associated with available 'direct debit' solutions, including capability for immediate access, recurring billing, trials, crosssales, upsells, escalating security levels, pay-per-view, pay-per-download, pay-per-package, one-time and hard goods sales and one-click sales.
Are You Interested Surpasses 10 Million Users On Facebook
PRESS RELEASE — July 15 — SNAP's largest application, 'Are You Interested' which was launched on August 14, 2007 has over 10m installations as of July 7th, 2008, compared to over 6,000,000 installations on December 31, 2007. SNAP's second application, 'Meet New People' has over 3.3m installations as compared to approximately 800,000 as of December 31, 2007.
The full article was originally published at CNN Money, but is no longer available.
June Hitwise Rankings
OPW — July 14 — We have just updated Hitwise US internet dating rankings. Singlesnet,
Plentyoffish and Yahoo! Personals maintained their 1st, 2nd and 3rd
position respectively. Match.com ousts TRUE.com from its 4th spot to
#7. Adam4Adam and DateHookup.com moved up to #5 and #6. BlackPeopleMeet
moved up from #11 to #10. Mate1 slides off the top 15 to #17. – Mark
Brooks
Extreme Fitness And FastLife Team Up
PRESS RELEASE — July 11 — Extreme Fitness, a fitness club operator in the Greater Toronto Area, has teamed up with FastLife, the speed dating and singles event service, to introduce Fit2SpeedDate, a group fitness fusion class that combines circuit training with speed dating.
The full article was originally published at PR Inside, but is no longer available.
eHarmony Marries 236 People A Day
CNN — July 11 — Greg Waldorf never imagined he would be running an Internet dating service. As a young boy it was technology that fascinated him. eHarmony uses advanced technology to create personality profiles to match prospective couples, and it was that element that convinced Waldorf to become an early investor. eHarmony says its goal is not just to find users dates — It wants them to get married. In fact, the company claims that 236 people a day in the U.S. are married as a result of meeting through their site. The company was sued in California for excluding gays. Waldorf said that in the future the company may look into providing different services, including same-sex, but that at the moment their research was designed specifically for heterosexual couples looking for marriage. FULL ARTICLE @ CNN
See all posts on eHarmony
BeautifulPeople.com Puts Beauty In The Eye Of The Beholder
VANCOUVER 24 HOURS — July 11 — Ugly folk need not apply. Well, they can, but good luck getting past the judges. That's the goal of the dating website Beautifulpeople.com. The controversial concept, which first hit cyberspace in 2004, has had its share of critics. And since its recent Canadian launch, it's facing backlash once again, including a Toronto Sun poll in which 66% of those surveyed found it offensive. So far, more than 5,000 people have signed on. But only one in 10 applicants gets past the heavily guarded gates. "What we realize is that looks and the way we present ourselves matters a lot", said BeautifulPeople founder Robert Hintze. He has a point. Numerous studies have shown that attractive folk get a leg up over the more average-looking set. They get paid up to 25% more and, statistically, taller men garner higher wages than their shorter counterparts.
The full article was originally published at Vancouver 24 hours, but is no longer available.
SpeedDate: Another Facebook App Bites The Dust
TECH CRUNCH — July 9 — The most recent victim of the Facebook vs. annoying application war is SpeedDate. SpeedDate has disappeared from the application list, and the link to the application leads to the Facebook homepage. SpeedDate is a web-based speed dating service that also offers a Meebo application and, until recently, a Facebook application. Other speed dating applications (from Desidate.tv and Randomate) on Facebook remained untouched. FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH
Orange Opens Up Mobile Social Net Service
GUARDIAN.CO.UK — July 9 — Orange has launched a major push for mobile social networking in the UK today, introducing a service which aggregates users' accounts across the major social networks. Launched as a trial in France last month under the name MySocialPlace, Orange has now partnered with the biggest social networks – Facebook, MySpace and Bebo – to introduce the service in the UK under the Orange World branded website. UK users can also access the chat service Flirtomatic and the photo-sharing site Pikeo, while Orange customers in France can use the Skyrock community, DailyMotion video site and dating service Meetic. Data from Nielsen Mobile in May showed that 44% of UK mobile phone users have registered with a social networks, and estimated that 1.7% of users, or 812,000 people, had accessed those services from their mobile. Facebook had been accessed by 9% of all mobile web users, MySpace by 3.4% and Bebo by 2.6%. FULL ARTICLE @ GUARDIAN.CO.UK
BeNaughty.com Survey Exposes Britain’s Top Fibs
BUSINESS WIRE — July 8 — The Truth Be Told survey, commissioned by online dating site www.benaughty.com, revealed that nearly a third (29%) of the 1,028 people between 16 and 64 that were interviewed said they lied about how much money they owe. Britain's top fibs exposed in BeNaughty.com survey:
1. Debt (29%)
2. Smoking/drinking (28%)
3. Weight (24%)
4. Number of sexual partners (14%)
5. Age (13%)
6. Salary (11%)
7. Fidelity (9%)
8. Hobbies (8%)
9. Job/employment (8%)
10. Education/qualifications (7%)
11. Travel experience (5%)
12. Height (5%)
13. Where you live (5%)
14. Physical endowments (4%)
BeNaughty is one of seven dating websites operated by EasyDate, the UK online dating company.
FULL ARTICLE @ BUSINESS WIRE