REUTERS — Mar 21 — Josie Brown never had a chance against her 6-foot-6-inch killer. John Gaumer, confessed and led Baltimore County police to Brown's body on February 7, listed his height and other attributes in his quest for dates on MySpace.com. "There are millions of people we're dealing with here and somehow people think they are all preachers," said Paul Falzone, CEO of Together Dating, a brick-and-mortar company that performs background checks on all members. Falzone says background checks result in 10% of applicants being rejected. For most of the 40 million people using Internet sites for dating and socializing each month, a disastrous 15 minutes over coffee at Starbucks is the worst they will suffer. Only a small percentage of "intimate partner violence" — nearly 700,000 such incidents were reported to the U.S. Dept of Justice in 2001 — originate from Internet dating, according to Mark Brooks, editor of Online Personals Watch, which monitors the dating industry. "To think a felon could find a victim, especially for a heinous crime, gives me the heebie-jeebies. I do all I can do to prevent that," said Herb Vest, TRUE.com CEO. So far, California, Florida, Texas and Michigan have considered (background checks) legislation. Yahoo! and Match.com, the industry leaders with 6 million and 15 million monthly visitors respectively, continually stress dating safety. "The Internet has its dark side and they are not doing everything they can to keep sexual predators and gold diggers off these sites. If you don't police yourselves, the government will come in and police you," said Michigan state Sen. Alan Cropsey. "There are other ways to get to who that person is, rather than have the government ram a business model down your throat," said Abe Smilowitz, CEO of Webdate. Webdate uses real-time video as a safety measure, allowing prospective dates to chat and get a look at each other via Webcams. Companies like Safedate and Honestyonline are springing up to run background checks for individuals. According to Dr. John Gray, education is the solution. "The warning signs often come out right away. Beware of someone who can solve all your problems or who comes on really strong," said Gray.
Category: Outlets – Reuters
Brazil Tries to Seize Data on Users of Google’s Orkut
The full article was originally published at Yahoo, but is no longer available.
Sexy Hoax Turns Into Dating Fad
REUTERS — Mar 11 — A British internet journalist set up a website two years ago filled with fictional accounts from friends who claimed to have used Bluetooth technology to make contact for a chat, romance or even sex — a practice the site dubbed "toothing." News organizations across the world, including Reuters, The Guardian, the BBC and Wired News, fell for the story and reported that "toothing" had taken off among commuters. A year later the journalist behind the site published an online confession claiming it was an elaborate hoax to prove he could create a new sexual buzzword. "I tried some tests on the underground and pubs and found lots of cell phones were turned on and used for 'toothing,' which was strange because I thought it was a joke too," said a Milan DJ. To play, you need you need to activate the Bluetooth facility available on your mobile phone, which will then show a list of people within a few yards who are also active. Then write a message and press send. Young men in Dubai have been using the technology to contact women in public places, according to the BBC's website.
The full article was originally published at Wired News, but is no longer available.
Online Daters Sue Match.com, Yahoo
REUTERS — Nov 18 — Match.com is accused in a federal lawsuit of goading members into renewing their subscriptions through bogus romantic e-mails sent out by company employees. In some instances, the suit contends, people on the Match payroll even went on sham dates with subscribers as a marketing ploy. Match spokeswoman Kristin Kelly said the company "absolutely does not" employ people to go on dates with subscribers or to send members misleading e-mails professing romantic interest. In a separate suit, Yahoo's personals service is accused of posting profiles of fictitious potential dating partners on its website to make it look as though many more singles subscribe to the service than actually do. The Match lawsuit was filed earlier this month in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles by plaintiff Matthew Evans, who contends he went out with a woman he met through the site who turned out to be nothing more than "date bait" working for the company. The Yahoo suit was filed last month by Robert Anthony, of Broward County, Florida. The suit, brought in U.S. District Court in San Jose, California, accuses the company of breach of contract, fraud and unfair trade practices. The lawsuit also claims the company violated the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act, a law best known for being used in prosecuting organized crime. FULL ARTICLE @ USA TODAY
Mark Brooks: Small players, one man bands and new sites that are scrambling to get to critical mass may well send bogus emails. Larger, established top ten players don't. Date bait emails are very bad practice. As an industry we should work to stamp it out. These services don't 'send' their employees on dates. However, I've not heard of many dating services banning their employees from using the services they work on.
Online Daters Sue Match.com, Yahoo
REUTERS — Nov 18 — Match.com is accused in a federal lawsuit of goading members into renewing their subscriptions through bogus romantic e-mails sent out by company employees. In some instances, the suit contends, people on the Match payroll even went on sham dates with subscribers as a marketing ploy. Match spokeswoman Kristin Kelly said the company "absolutely does not" employ people to go on dates with subscribers or to send members misleading e-mails professing romantic interest. In a separate suit, Yahoo's personals service is accused of posting profiles of fictitious potential dating partners on its website to make it look as though many more singles subscribe to the service than actually do. The Match lawsuit was filed earlier this month in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles by plaintiff Matthew Evans, who contends he went out with a woman he met through the site who turned out to be nothing more than "date bait" working for the company. The Yahoo suit was filed last month by Robert Anthony, of Broward County, Florida. The suit, brought in U.S. District Court in San Jose, California, accuses the company of breach of contract, fraud and unfair trade practices. The lawsuit also claims the company violated the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act, a law best known for being used in prosecuting organized crime. FULL ARTICLE @ USA TODAY
Mark Brooks: Small players, one man bands and new sites that are scrambling to get to critical mass may well send bogus emails. Larger, established top ten players don't. Date bait emails are very bad practice. As an industry we should work to stamp it out. These services don't 'send' their employees on dates. However, I've not heard of many dating services banning their employees from using the services they work on.
Meetic Plans 342 Million Euro Paris float
REUTERS — Oct 4 — Meetic is preparing a Paris flotation that could value it at up to 341.7 million euros ($411.5 million). (estimated price range of 19.20 euros to 22.30 euros a share). Meetic is valued at seven times 2005 annual sales and 35 times 2005 earnings (EBTIDA). Launched four years ago, Meetic operates in 13 countries and nine languages. Meetic made a net profit of 2.7 million euros on sales of 21.3 million euros in 2004.
Mark Brooks: I’m in Prague right now. Noone uses internet dating here! Europe is still prime territory.
Demi Moore, Ashton Kutcher Wed
Mark Brooks: Has anyone done a study of this trend on an online personals site yet?
News Corp. in Talks to Buy Blinkx
REUTERS — Aug 15 — News Corp. is considering buying closely held Web search provider Blinkx. Murdoch last week confirmed during an earnings conference call with analysts that the company was in advanced talks to buy a controlling interest in a Web search engine, which he would not identify, and that it had budgeted up to $2 billion for investments and strategic acquisitions.
The full article was originally published at Biz Rate, but is no longer available.
Mark Brooks: News Corp. just bought Intermix which owns Myspace.
News Corp. Banking on Continued Growth for MySpace
REUTERS — July 23 — MySpace is gunning to become the Internet's next major consumer brand. Jupiter Media analyst David Card says that while there is evidence that MySpace has figured out the formula for success in social networking, it is still not clear that its popularity is sustainable. MySpace 15 million uniques and 7.5 billion page views in May, making it the fifth-largest domain in the United States, according to ComScore Media Metrix. MySpace claims more than 22 million users worldwide. "We have plans to build MySpace into a next-generation portal," said CEO Chris DeWolfe. In the works are plans for MySpace to create products and services for mobile devices and push into Europe and Asia.
The full article was originally published at Yahoo, but is no longer available.
Mark Brooks: A key difference between Friendster and MySpace is in the integrity of the connections. I believe Friendster users tend to be more oriented towards 'real world connections' whereas first level connections made on MySpace are more likely to have been initiated online. Friendster has battled 'fakesters' in the past to maintain this connection integrity.
Diller Ends Vivendi Feud With $3.4 bln Deal
REUTERS — June 8 — IAC/Interactive Corp (owns Match.com) has agreed to sell its 5.4% stake in Vivendi Universal Entertainment to NBC Universal for $3.4 billion. They have been haggling in courtrooms and boardrooms for five years. IAC said it would result in an after-tax gain of $330 million.
Mark Brooks: Where will the peripatetic Diller turn his attention now he is freed of this dispute. In their Q1 report…’personals revenue grew by 11% to $54.2 million, driven primarily by a 6% increase in paid subscribers and higher average revenue per subscriber.’ Things are looking up for the online personals industry. Spark just acquired Minglematch and announced similarly rosy Q1 numbers.