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.
