On registering at PlentyofFish.com, users are asked a series of questions that determine whether they should be placed in a "commitment material" bucket or a “casual dater” bucket. Then the match pools are narrowed down to "people you aren’t likely to hate". From there, "every user affects another user’s behaviour."
by Maryam Sanati
The full article was originally published at Globe and Mail, but is no longer available.
PAID CONTENT – Aug 5 - Facebook really doesn’t like websites that have names sounding similar its own. Facebook has gone after Teachbook, and FacebookOfSex.com run by FriendFinder Networks. Facebook moved to stop a U.K. dating site called Shagbook from registering a trademark under that name. Now Shagbook is pushing back with a novel claim, saying that the term “facebook” itself is generic and not worthy of a trademark. Mark Brooks said that the founder of Shagbook is an American who has spent many years living in the U.K. The founder has been using the term “Shagbook” in his personal life since the year 2000, and created the Shagbook website as a casual dating site in the U.K. back in 2006, before Facebook was popular. “He very innocently created the name ‘Shagbook,’ using it to refer to his version of the ‘little black book,’” said Brooks, an online-dating industry consultant who blogs at Online Personals Watch.
by Joe Mullin
The full article was originally published at Paid Content, but is no longer available.
Also see Mashable, TechDirt, ZDNet, TG Daily
This post also appears on SocialNetworkingWatch.
THE NEXT WEB – Aug 4 – People usually have a particular thing that is really important to them. So niche dating sites have sprung up to serve these interests and commonalities. "People bond best when they share something in common. So this acts as a means of conversation and connection," says Mark Brooks, an Analyst and Consultant in the online dating world. Love Horse is a dating site for horse lovers. Yes! Mrs. Robinson is dedicated to pairing cougars with older women. For another cougar toy boy website, check out Toy Boy. On Brainiac Dating members earn badges for solving puzzles and playing games. For another geeky dating site, check out Seek a Geek. Cuddly Lover is for all the chubby chasers out there. Savage Hearts is a fiend finder service, for those proud to be a little different – Pin-up pretties, tattooed temptresses, gorgeous geeks or fruity fetishists. DateGinger is a dating site for people with red hair. For similar sites, there’s also Redhead Passions and Redhead World.
by Courtney Boyd Myers
See full article at The Next Web
Mark Brooks: Most of these are White Label Dating dating sites, btw. (Full Disclosure: White Label Dating is a client of Courtland Brooks)
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LAW 360 – July 28 - Shagbook fired back Monday against an attempt by Facebook to block the online dating site from trademarking its name, claiming that Facebook's own mark is invalid and should be canceled. Shagbook argued that "facebook" is a generic term, and said any U.S. registrations for the Facebook mark should be ruled invalid. "The term was in common use in the English language well before [Facebook] began using the term in connection with its services. The similarity of the Shagbook mark creates a false impression that there is some sort of affiliation between Shagbook and Facebook, Facebook argued.
by Jacqueline Bell
See full article at Law 360
OPW – July 18 – I caught Ross and Max for a few minutes at iDate after we saw a presentation on background checks legislation. Here's what they had to say on the topic of background checks. – Mark Brooks
Mark: We have Ross Williams here from White Label Dating and Max who runs Red Hot Pie out of Australia. Gentlemen, we just saw a session on background checks. What is your opinion on how the industry should proceed with background checks?
Ross: The thing that absolutely spooks me is that there is no international body for online dating. The people who make the legislation have no one to talk to. There is no lobbying group. These people will make the legislation regardless.
So if we want to make sure the legislation works with the industry rather than against the industry there needs to be an association that can help lobby in the best interests of the industry and the best long-term interests of consumers.
Max: Even though the background checks are trying to be protective they lead people into a false sense of security. I think that's the real danger. I’m a big believer that people need to take responsibility of their own actions and their own safety and security.
Mark: In April, Match.com said within 90 days they were going to launch sex offender checks. So they are going to check against the National Sex Offender Registry. What do you think will be the effect on the industry when they do that?
Ross: There is no guarantee to the consumer of the safety of their database. It is a positive step, in certain ways. But actually I think [background checks] even give a false sense of security, as Max says, because people lie. If I was in the Sex Offender Registry and I knew that Match checked that, would I use my details? Probably not. Would I use fake details with a prepaid MasterCard? Probably yes.
So all it does is put people into hiding. I think the route we must all take within this industry is the education of consumers and providing a safe environment and good customer care and support. In the UK we offer a free phone support for our customers and so if they have questions they can speak to someone.
Mark: If Match is offering sex offender checks do you think sex offenders are going to drift to other dating sites?
Ross: They will go; anyone will go where there is the greatest opportunity. So it is far better to give people the education and teach them how to date in a safe way.
Mark: Max, you specialize in the sexy side of internet dating. What would your members in Australia feel about this?
Max: We haven’t had a criminal offense or an assault or sexual related charge. It's not an issue on our site.
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OC REGISTER – July 18 – In January, Mark Brooks, a national consultant to Internet dating sites, asked executives from many dating sites to talk about the impact they were having on society. Among the conclusions: In 20 years, people will want to go to the Internet to find a permanent partner and not rely on a chance "real meeting." Last year, Brooks estimates that Americans alone spent $1.7B trying to connect.
by Jane Glenn Haas
See full article at OC Register
MCCLATCHY TRIBUNE – July 10 – The internet dating market in the United States is booming: more and more websites are targetting particular social groups, and such specialization brings with it many curiosities. Geek2Geek.com is one of the countless US dating websites aimed at a niche. There is also Ivydate.com, named after the academically elitist Ivy League. At Horseloversconnection.com owning a horse is no must, although profile photos often show one. JDate.com, aimed mainly at the Jewish community, is one of the oldest niche-targetting sites. As of last year, there were "more than 1,500 dating sites" in the country, according to Mark Brooks, an advisor to several such sites. "Many of the new sites are niche dating sites," Brooks says.
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HUFFINGTON POST – June 29 - "Worldwide, ~122M people monthly log into dating sites with 14M people using mobile dating services," said Mark Brooks, publisher of Online Personals Watch. The business of love and these statistics from Comscore were discussed in detail at the Internet Dating Conference recently held in Beverly Hills. Location based or not, everyone needs a mobile dating strategy. "We're seeing 2.5 times more activity on mobile than on the web because it's easy to wink and flirt on the go" said Robinne Burrell, Director of Mobile Products at Match.com. Match reports 10-15% of their new subscribers are coming from mobile with 56% of singles aged 25-54 going mobile.
EXAMINER – June 29 – The most recent iDate was held in Los Angeles at the SLS Hotel. About half of the sessions dealt specifically on mobile dating. The message was clear. You need to have a mobile dating strategy. Match.com’s director of mobile products Robinne Burrell told the group that their subscribers logging on from mobile devices has grown 135% YOY to ~30% of their members. Monica Ohara from Speed Date said their 5-minute online speed dating service reached ~15M members. Unlike Match and Speed Date, Joel Simkhai, founder of the Gay mobile app Grindr, started on mobile. "Two million gay singles have downloaded Grindr's popular location based app", he said.
THE NEW YORKER – July 4 – In 1964, on a visit to the World’s Fair, in Queens, Lewis Altfest, came upon an open-air display called the Parker Pen Pavilion, where a giant computer was selecting foreign pen pals for pavilion visitors. You filled out a questionnaire and received a card with the name and address of a like-minded participant. Altfest and his friend Robert Ross heard about a program called Operation Match, which used a computer to find dates for people. A year later, they had a prototype, which they called Project TACT (Technical Automated Compatibility Testing). Each client paid $5 and answered ~100 questions. TACT transferred the answers onto a computer that spit out your matches.
Online dating sites draw on the premise that there has got to be a better way. They rely on algorithms, some add an extra layer of projection and interpretation. There are thousands of dating sites; the big ones, such as Match.com and eHarmony and PlentyOfFish and OK Cupid (among the free ones). Mark Brooks, the editor of Online Personals Watch, said, “Starting a site is like starting a restaurant. It’s a sexy business, looks like fun, yet it’s hard to make money.”
The dating sites are themselves a little like online-dating-site suitors. They want you. They exaggerate their height and salary. Each has a distinct personality and a carefully curated profile. Nothing determines the atmosphere and experience of an Internet dating service more than the people who use it, but sometimes the sites reflect the personalities or predilections of their founders. If the dating sites had a mixer, you might find OK Cupid by the bar, muttering factoids and jokes, and Match.com in the middle of the room, conspicuously dropping everyone’s first names into his sentences. The clean-shaven gentleman on the couch, with the excellent posture would be eHarmony.
Match.com went live in 1995. It is now the biggest dating site in the world. eHarmony is the one most overtly geared toward finding you a spouse. It was launched, in 2000, by Neil Clark Warren, a clinical psychologist who had spent three decades treating and studying married couples and working out theories about what made their marriages succeed or fail. By reputation, OKCupid is where you go if you want to hook up. OK Cupid was also perhaps the most desirable eligible bachelor out there, until February, when it was bought for $50M by Match.
by Nick Paumgarten
See full article at The New Yorker
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