Category: All UK & Europe

BALTIMORE SUN — Dec 13 — BeautifulPeople.net is an exclusive networking site whose members vote in only attractive people. The site – which has its roots in Europe but started up in the United States five months ago – took a look recently at the distribution of its 8,000-plus members and decided that Maryland ranks 31st and Washington D.C. is at 40th place in the nation.  New York topped the list of beautiful singles, with 25.8% of applicants being good-looking enough to get in. North Dakota came in last.  More than 38,000 people who have applied to the site have been rejected, more than one out of five.

Mark Brooks: I doubt Beautful People has to do anything in the way of advertising.  People will talk about the site because they got in. 

MIDDLE EAST TIMES — Dec 7 — ITV, Britain's biggest commercial TV network, on Tuesday snapped up Friends Reunited for 175 million pounds Sterling (€258 million, $304 million).  The purchase of Friends Reunited, which allows users to locate old school friends, will make ITV.com the eighth largest Website in Britain in terms of people logging on. The site has expanded rapidly and now has 15 million members – some 50% of the adult population with access to the Internet – after moving into areas such as Genes Reunited, a site that allows people to trace their family tree. Other Websites include Friends Reunited Dating, Friends Reunited Jobs and social networking site Friends Reunited Connections. 1 million paying subscribers, 12.4 million pounds this year, earnings before interest and tax of 6.6 million pounds.  Next year, sales are predicted to rises to 18.7 million pounds.

The full article was originally published at Middle East Times, but is no longer available.

Mark Brooks: I'm British, I used Friends Reunited to get in contact with my school friends in UK. It's a very simple site that is very well populated…and effective.  Membership is a pittance at just a few 'quid' a year.

INDEPENDENT ONLINE — Nov 8 — Debating societies, art classes and poetry readings, all are thriving in the British capital as dating turns cerebral.  Debates and poetry readings are fast becoming London's most romantic nights out.  One entrepreneur acting on the trend is Ginny Greenwood, whose Futures Squared club aims at cash-rich, time-poor singles.  Intelligence Squared was set up to make debating sexy. So far every debate they have organised, at the Royal Geographical Society, has sold out in advance.  So cerebral daters out for rarefied seduction are treated to mind-stretching debates like "Better rough justice than another 9/11" and "The rise of China spells the decline of the West." 

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

Mark Brooks: PlanetOut, Nerve, Community Connect's Blackplanet/AsianAvenue/Migente all include content which helps to fire up neurons and cerebral connections.

EMARKETER — Oct 13 — The UK online ad sector topped radio last year and is overtaking the outdoor market this year. According to the bi-annual advertising spend study issued by the UK Internet Advertising Bureau and PricewaterhouseCoopers, Internet advertising expenditures in the UK for the first half of 2005 reached £490.8 million and will go over the £1 billion mark by the end of the year.

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