Month: May 2010

Religious CEOs: eHarmony Founder, Neil Clark Warren

Posted on May 19, 2010

Neil-warren-deMINYANVILLE – May 19 – It's been stated that faith and rationality are
two models of belief that are resolutely incompatible. Marrying faith
and rationality is not only spiritually beneficial, but can be
profitable as well. Just ask psychologist and eHarmony founder, Neil
Clark Warren, a man who has effectively integrated moral elements of
his evangelistic religion with practical constituents of business
management to create the most popular dating site. After appearing on
Dobson’s radio show in August 2001, eHarmony received 90,000 new
referrals. However, in 2005, Warren began to distance the company from
the conservative Christian community to try and achieve greater
mainstream involvement. This decision — while profitable for the
company — caused grievances on both ends. Running on a platform open
to only heterosexual applicants, eHarmony suffered an inevitable fate
when a New Jersey man complained to New Jersey’s Division on Civil
Rights that his registration to eHarmony was rejected due to his
homosexual classification. The company settled the suit, created a
satellite site Compatiblepartners.net, and offered the first 10,000
same-sex registrants a free six-month subscription. Many evangelists
felt that eHarmony should have gone down fighting, and even argued that
allowing a same-sex service was a betrayal to the Christian community. FULL ARTICLE @ MINYANVILLE

Mark Brooks: eHarmony raised $110 million in June 2004. Neil Clark Warrens stake and control was diminished at that point. As much as he may object to having a same sex dating site under eHarmony's wing, its the right thing to do and a good and appropriate extension of the eHarmony service. Power to eHarmony for doing the right thing, and settling in this manner. Here's OPW's comparison of eHarmony vs Compatible Partners from September 2009.

See all posts on eHarmony
See all posts on Compatible Partners

Quepasa Partners With Zoosk

Posted on May 19, 2010

Zoosk quepasa loga MARKET WATCH – May 18 – Quepasa.com, a social network targeting the Latino community, signed an agreement to make the Zoosk online dating service available to Quepasa's registered user base of over 13M Latinos. The objective of the agreement is to extend the Zoosk community across the countries of Latin America by promoting and monetizing the Zoosk offering to the users of Quepasa.com. The service is expected to go live on Quepasa.com before the end of May.

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

See all posts on Zoosk

This post also appears on SocialNetworkingWatch.

Catholic Online Dating

Posted on May 19, 2010

Catholic online dating AMERICA MAGAZINE – May 24 – Online dating is not new. Match.com, one of
the largest dating sites, was launched in 1995. Catholics joined the
action in 1997 with the site
CatholicSingles.com. Today it is one of three major Internet sites
about holy union, including AveMariaSingles.com and CatholicMatch.com. CatholicMatch.com began in 1999 as St.Raphael.net. Most of the
required information is like what you are asked on a first date or what
is revealed on a Facebook profile—until you arrive at the Catholic
faith/doctrine section. There users confront seven topics: Eucharist,
contraception, sanctity of life, papal infallibility, premarital sex,
Immaculate Conception and holy orders. Brian Barcaro, one of the founders of CatholicMatch.com, said that
the seven faith questions are difficult and often controversial by
design, but that asking these questions is critical to a successful
Catholic relationship. FULL ARTICLE @ AMERICA MAGAZINE

See all posts on Match.com
See all posts on CatholicSingles
See all posts on AveMariaSingles
See all posts on CatholicMatch

SNAP Interactive Releases Q1 2010 Operating Results

Posted on May 18, 2010

Snapinteractive logo MARKET WIRE – May 18 – Snap's revenue increased 20% from $768,972 for Q1'09 to $927,436 for Q1 '10. The revenues generated during 2009 were primarily from advertising. 2010 revenue is primarily generated from premium features placed on various apps as well as subscription fees from AreYouInterested? app on Facebook.

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

See all posts on SNAP Interactive
See all posts on AreYouInterested

Got A Dollar? Sign Up For BuckMatch.com

Posted on May 18, 2010

Buckmatch-logo PRESS RELEASE – May 18 - BuckMatch.com, a new dating site, provides premium online dating services for $1/month. The site started by Saul Waizer in 2009 and officially launched in the US in 2010. The site also features PayByMobile technology, enabling users to pay using any cell phone without the need to disclose any personal information.

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

China Smitten By TV dating

Posted on May 18, 2010

Baihe logo USA TODAY – May 18 – You Are the One and Take Me Out are China's top-rated TV entertainment shows. The programs, which both first aired in January, have generated discussion about money worship among China's younger generation. They also highlight how a perpetual human struggle, finding the right mate, presses harder than ever in the world's most populous nation. The shows' popularity is easy to explain, says Tian Fanjiang, CEO of baihe.com, a matchmaking website. "There are 180M single people in China," Tian says. "They and their parents are all worried about the marriage problem." "The Chinese family is unique in the world, as we have a one-child policy," says Take Me Out producer Liu Lei, "but parents attach great importance to carrying on the family name, so marriage is a big issue." Liu insists that the money-worship of some contestants does not reflect mainstream Chinese society, but she concedes, "Many girls really love rich men." 15 000 women applied for a chance to date a wealthy man at an event May 1 organized by matchmaking website jiayuan.com, says Zhang Guoyu, director of the company's Southwest China branch. In June, 50 of them will meet the men who paid $14,650 for the service. FULL ARTICLE @ USA TODAY

See all posts on Baihe
See all posts on Jiayuan

Android Sales Surge Past iPhone

Posted on May 18, 2010

Android phone PC PRO – May 18 – According to research from firm NPD, US sales of Android devices passed
those of the iPhone in the first quarter of this year. Android-powered
smartphones accounted for 28% of US consumer sales in Q1 compared with
21% for the iPhone. Smartphone sales at AT&T comprised 32% of the
smartphone market, followed by Verizon Wireless (30%), T-Mobile (17%)
and Sprint (15%). FULL ARTICLE @ PC PRO

Mark Brooks: The real story here is the continued dominance of RIM.
There will be a real battle between the top three vendors over the next
12 months, and this makes it challenging for dating sites to identify a
way through the rapidly changing mobile landscape. Courtland Brooks
has recently produced a white paper that outlines the strategic issues
for dating sites when considering mobile dating options. It goes live
on Thursday 17th June, but we’re looking for early feedback on the
whitepaper. So please email me at mark@courtlandbrooks.com if you’d like an early peak at it.

This post also appears on SocialNetworkingWatch.

Marrying A Younger Man Increases A Woman’s Mortality Rate

Posted on May 18, 2010

Holdinghands460 GUARDIAN.CO.UK – May 12 – Women who are seven to nine years older than their husbands
have a 20% higher mortality rate than if they were the same
age. Marrying an older man shortens a woman's lifespan, but having a
younger husband reduces it even more, the study found. A study by Sven
Drefahl at the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in
Rosktock, Germany, shows that the greater the age gap between a woman
and her husband, the shorter her life expectancy, regardless of whether
he is older or younger. While the study shows that women on average die
younger if there is a large age gap in their relationship, married men
and women both tend to live longer than unmarried individuals. FULL ARTICLE @ GUARDI

How To Name Your iDating Site

Posted on May 17, 2010

OPW – May 17 – We're going through a naming project for a client right now. Apparently the perfect brand name is 4 letters, 2 syllables and doesn't mean anything to start with. Plentyoffish and OnlineBootyCall don't quite fit those ideals. This video makes fun of the names being used in the social-networking-sphere.

Meanwhile, you might want to check in on some of the domains being sold on Moniker's latest auction. There's quite a few idating domains. Here's a few of them along with their minimum bids.

  • idates.com – $247k
  • datingonline.com – $88k
  • marriages.com – $37k
  • 1date.com – $23k
  • erelationship.com – $20k
  • cupidsearch.com – $17k
  • datingoffline.com – $11k
  • floridapersonals.com – $9k
  • masquerades.com – $6k
  • livelounge.com – $6k
  • romanticnovelties.com – $6k
 

TangoWire Announces Second Free Virtual Dating Day

Posted on May 17, 2010

Tangowire logo PRESS RELEASE – May 17 – The success of their first Free Virtual Dating
Day has prompted TangoWire, a community of online dating sites, to
repeat the offer of free Virtual Dating on their network this Thursday,
May 20th. The first Free vDate Day resulted in 40 times more virtual
dates than normal. TangoWire is an online dating network of over 3,700
sites including BBWDateFinder.com, USMilitarySingles.com,
LesbianPersonalsOnline.com, GaySingles.com, ArmySingles.com,
SingleParentMatcher.com and more. FULL ARTICLE @ 24-7 PRESS RELEASE

See all posts on Tangowire